Valentine's Day 2023

Valentine's Day is a doozy to navigate when it comes two days after your husband admits to an affair. Honestly though, I had a good day. It was around 8pm that night that my heart started to break. I needed to talk to someone, anyone. I needed a hug. I felt a loneliness and despair I had never felt before. One of the hardest parts about this whole unravelling was how my parents were in Arizona. I've never asked Jon, but part of me wonders if he intentionally waited until my parents were gone to spill the beans because it was easier for him. It made things monumentally harder for me.

I was at a youth activity that night and as it drew closer to ending, I began to panic. I didn't want to go home to Jon. I didn't want to keep the Bishop away from his wife any longer than he had been. I tried to see if a friend at the church wasn't busy and could talk, but she was swamped with her own activity stuff. And so I got in my van and just drove. Drove with tears in my eyes wishing I had anyone who could help shore up all the hurt I felt inside.

My aimless driving took me to my Aunt and Uncle's house. They had been my second parents growing up, their home my second home. I broke down to my aunt and got a hug. And then I got advice. She spoke of reconciliation. Told me about another couple and how they had managed to keep their marriage intact through similar circumstances. Encouraged me to go to the temple and that Heavenly Father would tell me what to do - that Heavenly Father wants families to stay together. Truthfully, at this moment in time I was beginning to accept that divorce was my best option, it was clearly what Jon wanted and it's what I had told him would happen if this happened again. So hearing this advice was disorienting. 

Eventually I drove home. Jon greeted me with asking how my aunt and uncle were, since we had "Find My Friends" on our phones. What came next was wildly different from every other conversation Jon and I had up to this point. He did most of the talking. He told me how the things he used to look forward to with excitement in our marriage, things we'd do together, he now dreamed of with her - that a future with her excited him. He said how me taking care of everything was actually not good, I should have let him take care of things too because he's also an oldest child and likes to take care of people. And he brought up something the professor said in the psychology class we took together as newly weds. Remember how he said that an oldest marrying and oldest is the least compatible marriage? Yeah, I get that now. I sat there listening to him justify all the ways that our marriage couldn't work. When he finally ran out of reasons, the only thing I could think to say was, "Our marriage is dead." I then added, "You are the bad guy in this situation. No matter how this story gets told, you are the bad guy. When are kids are old enough, they will find out that you are the bad guy." And then I left the room.

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