Pound Pup Legacy

The Non-Divorce, or as I have re-claimed it:  The Asexual Arrangement that's Purgatory for Parents... this is the situation I find myself in, and it scares the life out of me.  The guilt and shame behind this little secret eats me alive, but as one who has always been owned, submission to misery is all I have ever really known.  How did it all get so bad when I tried so hard to make the "right" and "good" decisions?

Easily.  I failed to see how my decisions would affect my own ability to be happy.  I lost everything that had once been me... and I am left with a person I am only beginning to understand as my own true-self.

Oh, how I wish I had been allowed to follow my own dreams, and not be so afraid of the disapproval of those who never got to know Me, baby-girl 1968.

I married a man much older than myself.  I married to get out of a very dysfunctional house, and I thought my drive to create a "loving, safe home" was enough to make any (unreachable) goal, possible.  As a result, I allowed myself to lose my youth, my profession and sex-life  -- all because I was too afraid to say "no".

Yesterday I found an article, 8 Entirely New Ideas About Love, and it amazes me how wrong I was about "those who risk, win".  Deep within the article, a simple statement made me stop and re-think my whole life-story:  "A lot of people feel shame about having a need," he says. "Our culture tells us that to be needy is to be weak, but it's really a tremendous strength to know what you need and to be able to ask for it."

I never knew what fulfilling my own needs meant, because my own needs were always denied.  Lie after lie, I learned to ignore the stress that boiled inside, and pretend my life was just fine.  I used to think my ability to not feel stress was a strength, but I am learning what a huge weakness denial brings a person's heart and soul.

I worry about my children, and how they will deal with my weaning away from a toxic-relationship that sucks my will to survive, but for their sake, failure this time around cannot be an option.  I must be strong, and admit my own weaknesses, so I do not live like someone's slave and doormat.

The last thing in this world I want my children to think is marriage is emotional suicide.  The problem is, how do I do that, without me believing otherwise?