Month: February 2017

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 4 Comments
I tell you that I’m leavin’,
You can’t believe it’s true!
You say….
Girl, there’s just no livin’ without you.
Don’t take your love away from me.
Don’t you leave my heart in misery.
‘Cause if you go, then I’ll be blue,
Breakin’ up is hard to do.
Remember when you held me tight,
And you kissed me all through the night.
Think of all that we been through,
And breakin’ up is hard to do.
They say that breakin’ up is hard to do,
Now I know, I know that it’s true.
Don’t say that this is the end.
Instead of breakin’ up I wish that
We were makin’ up again.
I beg of you don’t say goodbye,
Can’t we give our love just one more try?
Come on baby, let’s start anew,
Breakin’ up is hard to do.
Written by Howard Greenfield, Neil Sedaka • Copyright © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner/Chappell Music, Inc, Universal Music Publishing Group

 

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I arrived home Friday to a man who was so sweet I wondered where he had been for the past year-and-one-half. Since I had told him that I want him to leave, of course, there has been a change….there always is for this type of thing. I guess it is to be expected. Shaking things up puts the boulders on top until time slowly sinks them back to the bottom. Some things never change.

He missed me while I was on the coast. He believes you don’t let go of something we have had this long. Or so he says. Now when the fear of losing me is closer than he had  ever dreamt. Filling the pill boxes, carpooling, doctor appointments. Is it me he wants or my numerous occupations…nurse, taxi driver, cook, house cleaner, bill payer, laundry folder…the list is almost endless and so is my need to know.

We talk. I am insistent. He is adamant we need to keep trying and he is staying. I suggest that he take my letter to his therapist to see what she says. I tell him I bet that she will say that he should take this time for himself. I also tell him that I want him to give his therapist permission to talk to mine to see if there is any middle ground there. He agrees. We talk late into the night without hurting each other. What do you know!

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The next day we go to lunch and start talking about separation. It is not a pleasant conversation with plenty of “My lawyer said this” and “My lawyer said that.” That little exchange gave us a preview of what was to come and neither of us liked it. Yet, one thing has changed. Paul is noticing that we are apart more than together and he is upset. Asking why one of us is gone so often. He wonders why we have to leave? “Can’t we just be a family again?” he asks. A small earthquake is rocking his world and he feels it shaking the earth under his feet.

Later, we decided to look at our calendars to see what kind of leaving can be done during the month of March.

Shit! I totally forgot that I leave with Gracie on Wednesday on a cross-country trip for a diving meet. Gone until the 7th.

B leaves the 10th for a business trip to Canada and Pennsylvania. He comes back the 17th.

The following week is the Highland Games that we have both committed to.

The next week is our anniversary with a trip to the East Coast to see our son. Neither of us wants to give that up. It should be interesting. Hopefully, we can communicate like the middle-age adults we are suppose to be rather then using our usual two-year-old communcation methods…me,me,me…you,you,you. Never just us.

Now we are into April.  Two more diving meets within the first two weeks and a business trip to Colorado. In between all of this, I am trying to become a volunteer for hospice which will require training.

All of this to say…who has time to break up? Doesn’t mean we won’t. Just means that there is a lot of booked time away from each other this coming month. Yet, Paul is noticing and he is upset. Asking why one of us is gone so often. A small earthquake is rocking his world and he feels it. Deeply.

I think it is just what we need. It may not be my original plan but it’s good enough for now and sometimes that is all you can ask for.

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Queen of Hearts

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 3 Comments

10 Minute Poem Challenge

 

QUEEN OF HEARTS

You tell me you want to keep our love alive

I tell you I want to be free

You want me to hold your hand

Until you’ve decided to be rid of me

You think that you have the advantage here

Your game so neatly played

You have counted on that fistful of hearts

Resting so neatly in your hand

To win this lovers game

You’ve used your charms quite nicely

Much like a card-counting pro

You think you hold all the cards

But I am now a worthy foe

The surety of my love for you

You mistakenly believe

Binds me to you forever

And to the rules of this game

But now I hold something more important

Than your Queen of Hearts

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Confident she’ll win the game

Thinking you have me beat

But I hold onto my dignity tightly

And play this hand so sweet

In the guise of the lowly 2’s

I use them 2 walk away

2 reject the “love” you feel for me

2 let peace fill my heart

2 feel my emotions again

2 laugh in the face of disappointment

2 love deeply even if it is not you

And instead of loving the game

That we are used to playing

I find a new understanding

That I hold the cards this time

And the heart no longer rules

But bends to the lowly 2

So I lay down my hand

And  quickly walk away

No longer do I turn and look back

I keep my eyes straight ahead

For I have finally won this hand

The game is surely dead

There are no winners here

No winner take all

But finally I have found myself

And once again stand tall

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Please Leave

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 5 Comments

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This week while I  spent a week away at the ocean I wrote a “Dear John” letter to my husband. It was five typed pages, single typed. That’s what you should expect when you marry a writer I suppose.

This was not a letter I wanted to write. Six kids, several grandkids, 30+ years, lots of great times and discovery as we traveled the world together. Until recently, my heart still skipped a beat when I saw him. He is still sexy and the most handsome man in the world to me.  Other women think so too. So this is scary. It is sad. It is heart wrenching. No, this is something I never in a million years envisioned. I mean we got married in an old castle so our love would be timeless like the stones that held those old walls together. The castle remains standing while our relationship crumbles, the dust rising up thickly through the rubble threatening to choke us both.

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In the letter I told B that I would like him to move out preliminarily for a month so we didn’t have to say anything to the kids and disrupt their lives until we were positive of the direction that our relationship was going to take.. We could tell the kids that he is in China. I asked that he try to figure out who he is and what he wants the rest of his life to look like. I asked him to increase his sessions with his therapist. I told him to date, get laid or something. It’s time to move on for both of us. If you don’t know by now if you want to be with me then they way we are living is not giving you the clarity that you need. We need to shake things up a bit. But also just because you might decide you want back into my life there is a very good chance I will not be there and that that door will be closed and locked to you forever. For I am tired of you holding the master key to all the rooms in my soul

I was waiting until I got home to give the letter to him when we had time to spend together. However, on Wednesday night he told me his therapist suggested that we go back into marriage therapy. That triggered me and I told him I was no longer interested in attending therapy with him. I told him I wasn’t sure I wanted to be with him anymore, my love for him was quickly diminishing and that it was time we separate. He was shocked. He told me he loved me. I rolled my eyes over the telephone. I began to cry. He wants to keep trying. I don’t want to continue to suffer. Eighteen months is a long time to keep someone on a string. Eighteen months of wondering if today was going to be the day B walked in the door and said he was done was, in my opinion, 17 months too long.

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“It is awfully hard to admit that our relationship has expired but we both have felt it draining us and I see that we are getting resentful, frustrated and are losing hope if we have not lost it already. Sometime it feels like I’m “the other woman” waiting for her lover to choose between her and his wife. Loving him fully but he cannot commit to her fully because he wants both worlds. You want the world of having me for the business side of things (taking care of the kids, house, doing the things that make your life easier) but you don’t want to give your heart to me. You want to keep me on a string until you decide what you want and whether or not you judge me capable of giving it to you. Frankly, I am tired of that game, having to prove myself over and over again to some weird sets of arbitrary conditions that you change at your whim. It is time for me to get off this merry-go-round.”

I still love the man but just because you love someone doesn’t mean you should be together. Most woman would love to be with the man I was with for the first 25 years of this 30+ year relationship. It is hard. This is not what I expected as a come close to turning the corner on 60. I want happiness for him. I seek peace for myself…happiness will come later and that is okay with me.

“I know that putting myself through the discomfort of losing you and the changes that go along with it will not be easy. Separating will be hard and there will be times when we both will feel insecure, needy and totally off balance. I am sure the first time I see you with a new love my heart will shatter in a million little pieces. But I am also trying to remember that change is empowering because it will allow new things to enter our hearts and our minds. Things that we are obviously lacking as a couple may become available as we become single or enter into new relationships. Endings just set the stage for something new and allows exactly what we are needing or seeking to make its entrance into our lives.”

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So there it is. New beginnings. Painful endings. But I am okay and I will be okay. I am strong. I am invincible.  I am ready to move on from what I have today. I am not sure what the future looks like and I am okay with that. I am just trying to wish the best for all me included. I do worry for my children. Kids with autism do not do well with change and he has been an awesome dad. But…what is…is. And so everyday I have started my day with a meditation to bless myself and everyone in my life. Even B.

“I wish you happiness and that you are free of pain and suffering.”

It makes it easier to face the day and it makes me feel better.

I think it is time for me to get that dignity & grace tattoo

Power

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 19 Comments

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I ask B to share with me the emotions he has  felt on this “maybe” divorce journey as part of the 365 Days Little Buddha Challenge. My intention is just to listen in hopes of greater understanding and clarity.

He says that he feels under appreciated, under valued, and like he has been in a rowboat rowing all by himself.

I ask what would it take to make feel him feel that he was valued and appreciated.

“For you to focus on the family instead of yourself. I work and have taken on a lot in the last 5 years.”

What would that look like I ask?

“I don’t know.” It always comes down to I don’t know. Or I want to have the last word in our relationship. My word is the final word. And I know that at 56 I do not want to become a caricature of who I want to be and who I am.

And as I ponder his answers I realize that everything he has said I feel the same way about. Exactly. Undervalued. Unappreciated. Unloved. And when you have two people who are intrenched in those kinds of feelings it seems like there is no chance of moving on.

I wonder how exactly he feels I focus on myself. My writing? My genealogy work? He has work, the gym where he works out with Gwinnifer, Rotary, Boys Scouts, his various  industry organizations and playing the bagpipes.  Yet, he does focus on the things he likes to do with our family. Boy Scouts. While I focused on getting the kids to their therapist once a week for years, hippo therapy, diving lessons and meets. I write and research…that is all I do for myself except clean house at least two hours everyday, make dinner, lunches, do laundry, grocery shop, taxi the kids around, work in the garden, paint all the rooms in our house, etc.

I think having two children with special needs has impacted our relationship in ways that most families never experience and it has increased the stress in our relationship. In addition, it has made it difficult to socialize with others who do not understand how we must live. So we have isolated ourselves as a couple and I have isolated myself as a person.

And as he says these things resentment screeching out of his words like nine-inch nails on a blackboard; I realize once again there is no way to get over this. Even if I bowed down and “obeyed” like he says he wants in a woman, it would never be enough because he will never see anything but what he wants to see/ how he wants to feel…resentment (which he denies), cheated, and all the un-everythings so that he can justify his feelings about wanting a new life, a new wife, and find a way to feel comfortable in his mid-life crisis which actually started 7 years ago when he bought a two-seater Mercedes convertible for a family of six.

And so I inch that much closer to the demise of a relationship in which one person never expressed his needs or told the truth and one who expressed all of it. Constantly. Who asked the deep questions that B couldn’t answer in an attempt to learn about his wants but never could because the information was top-secret and I never had that kind of clearance.

It is time to make the kinds of chances that break hearts. It is time to make the kinds of changes in which it feels that you have been eviscerated and your guts are hanging outside of your body for the world to see. It is time to let go and get on with life unhindered by 30-year-old anger and disappointment. For every time I talk with you I feel horrible about myself afterwards. I’m selfish. Not appreciative enough, skinny enough, loving enough, a good enough mother, a good enough wife, a good enough partner, a good enough person. Like I am nor will I ever be enough. For anybody and certainly for you.

“You took my power,” he says.

“If you really felt that to be true it was your responsibility to get it back, instead of blaming me for not having the guts to do what you should have done.”

So here it is. The power that you accuse me of stealing.The power that you’ve always had and were afraid to control.  It’s all yours and it always has been. Let’s see what you do with it.

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Too Much

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 2 Comments

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When you really think bout it, it is amazing how we put so much trust in our love when we married when really, we had no idea what we were getting into or how it would all work out. It seems strange that we cannot do that now. We have just as many unknowns waiting for us now as we did then and yet this time we doubt our choice to love and give as freely as we once did.

Do we know too much or do we know too little?

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Storms and Baggage

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / Leave a comment

I wait in the shallows

Like a fish hooked to a line

Splashing frantically

Mistaking love for oxygen

Your words driving me backwards

As you release the hook

That has pierced my lip

And held me still for so long

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Like a gale churning and throwing

Our life far, far away from

All we knew

I am here

You are there

Yet, your words

And sometimes the lack of them

Take me under

Scraping the sandy bottom

Of what our relationship used to be

I think I can no longer be with you

Because you do not know who you are

And in not knowing

You drag me down to skin and bones

Clinging to life, yet lifeless

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I am a soul who still wants to dance

Unafraid of your pronouncements

Of whether that movement

Is good or evil

I want to feel the wind for myself

Let life wash over me again

Unhampered by your sea walls

Meant to keep the shoreline in place

I have done the work

I was meant to do

Have you?

For now I wish

To let the unknown be born

Let the necessary changes occur

Which will free us both

As we are no longer one

We are now separated by a quay

Of hurts larger than the boulders

Which have created it

I want to find wisdom

In how I am living

In what I am feeling and doing

Touching and tasting

No longer content to munch on stale bread

I want the life force

Of action and touch

I want to look outwards

Not back towards your shadow

Which tries to hold on to mine

Refusing to free it

But now…finally

I’m throwing my baggage to the sea

So once again I can be me

Do not try to retrieve it

There is nothing new there for you

All it contains is what

You already rejected

Time and time again

No, let that baggage float out to sea

While I go pack again

With those things that are

Meaningful just to me

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Things

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 4 Comments

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Tomorrow I leave for my week away as a trial separation. It is a relief. I am tired of feeling like I am never doing enough, not being enough, not being who he wants me to be. Every night B comes home and it feels like there is more distance between us. The hurt and disappointment between us bigger than any wall Trump could envision and I don’t know how to get over that wall or if I would even want to anymore. Of course, this is how I feel now…in another hour…who knows?

Today I found out that while I am skydiving tomorrow he will be visiting his own lawyer. Somehow bringing his lawyer into the situation seems to create hurt and distrust for both of us if we had not. Or maybe it just makes it crushingly real and that the hurt you feel now could magnify 100 fold with lawyers involved. Or maybe its the anger that would sharpen its mighty claws. Either way none of it feels good.

About that skydiving trip tomorrow…I think it might be canceled due to the rain. Talk about being bummed. I have been looking forward to this kind of like going to the dentist and requesting no shots of novocaine before the drilling starts. Sometimes you just need a challenge that will show you what you are made of. Sometimes you just need to know you are made of steel instead of marshmallows and grit instead of rose petals.Sometimes you just need to reassure yourself that you are really alive despite the numbing pain you are feeling throughout much of the day.

By tomorrow night I will be sitting on the deck (probably in the rain) watching the waves. Maybe I will even be lucky enough to see some whales. And I will feel what being without YOU forever might feel like. I expect it might be akin to an addict who needs her fix to feel whole. But if I am where I think I am in this entire process I think this time will be mine…all mine…with no expectations and no feeling that I am disappointing YOU. And maybe I will even be thankful for all I have learned in these past 18 months which has made me stronger and more sure of what I do and don’t want in my life. I may be 56 but there is a lot more of life to look forward to. And I want to see where it takes me as I go slowly into my twilight years. Frankly, I think they will be a blast whether YOU are with me or not but I secretly hope that you will be holding my hand.

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The Attorney

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 8 Comments

The other day I went to interview an attorney. I was told by numerous people that she is the best of the best, that she is a ball-buster that protects her clients interests and that she gets things done. Yes, she was the one I would want to represent me in the event of a divorce.

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I arrived at her office 10 minutes early, grabbed the door handle, and pulled. Nothing happened.  The door stayed shut and locked. After banging on the door it was answered by the para-legal who apologized and explained that they now kept their door locked at all times due to angry “other-side” men who felt “raped” by my prospective attorney. “Okay,” I thought. “Sounds like she knows how to do her job and do it well.”

I decided right then and there that if we ever became friends I never want to sit next to her at lunch. Too many embittered crazy men out there in the world.

After 10 minutes of waiting in an hip/elegant outer office, a stunning 50ish woman strode in. She was so poised and confident I almost knelt at her feet. It was her, the larger than life CCH and I was immediately impressed. She was imposing and stylish. She was everything I once envisioned I would be at this age. What the hell happened to me? I wondered. I was once on her path. At what point did I veer down another? Suddenly, I felt like Cinderella, still down on her knees scrubbing the floor.

She invited me into her office which was the perfect combination of functional modern.I asked the questions I needed answered and she showed me exactly what I was entitled to. I was impressed by her knowledge, her philosophy regarding divorce and her integrity.  She was everything I wanted in a lawyer. Hell, she was everything I was looking for in a friend too. I had a girl-crush going on.

After everything was laid out on the table I knew that I would be financially okay should we divorce. We laughed and chatted a bit more when suddenly CCH leaned over her desk, looked me in the eye and said:

“I am very intuitive so when people come to see me I know exactly where they are at in this whole process. They are ready for a divorce. So I have got to ask you, why are you sitting in front of me contemplating  a divorce? From everything you have told me about your husband and from what I have seen of you neither of you are acting like people who are ready to divorce. Neither of you have someone waiting in the wings and he doesn’t even have a lawyer. You didn’t come in here wanting me to cut off his balls and stuff them down his throat. I can tell you still like him and don’t want to hurt him. And frankly, you’ve got special needs children who still need you. Make no mistake about it, I would love to represent you but I just don’t see it. I don’t think either one of you are ready to take this step and I would urge you to wait. I would give yourselves time to make sure that this is what you really want to do because I’m not buying it.I just don’t think now is the time but if the time comes I will represent you.”

 

Needless to say I almost fell over. A divorce lawyer trying to talk me out of getting a divorce? It just didn’t make sense…or did it?

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Frankly, I am not sure where this divorce thing is going right now but I have decided to take my lawyer’s advice, my therapist’s advice and the song that my heart is singing and slow things down a bit. I will not act on impulse nor will I act on emotion because that will only muddy up the waters. Instead, I am sitting quietly… observing…living with uncomfortable thoughts and feelings as I wait for my soul to lead me down the path that I am suppose to travel. Somedays it feels like I am ready to take flight. Other days it feels like I need to sit for a while longer. The one thing I do know is that when that time comes that a decision needs to be made; I will recognize that the truth has finally sought me out and that I will act with complete faith that the decision I am making is the correct one so that regrets will not color the rest of my life. For I am taking the time and doing the work I need to do I so I can make a decision that makes sense now and in the future.

Amen-“so be it”  May I sit with dignity & grace holding my hand.

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Right Speech, Better Communication

/ Gardy Loo Pismire / 3 Comments

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Throughout my life I have been a person who is expressive. A person who uses lots of words and used them well. Too well it seems. I used words to let everyone know exactly what was on my mind at all times. I let words leave my mouth like flying monkeys swooping up people without thinking about the true meaning of my words. I didn’t care how I said IT just as long as IT was said.

Recently, it has occurred to me that my words were hurting others and as a result they were hurting me too. I realized that I was not connecting my heart to my tongue and had no idea how to do so. Even though I knew I wanted to change how I communicated I had idea of how to go about it. But then I chanced upon the Daily OM and the course How to Communicate Like a Buddhist : Lesson 1: The Elements of Right Speech by Cynthia Kane.

Kane’s way of approaching communication is different from anything I had ever seen. She states that the real purpose of communication is to help ourselves and others suffer less. And when communication is looked at through this lens it tosses convention aside and it makes it crystal clear that if we wish to change our relationships then the words we use, the intention behind them, and the way that we speak through them must be radically changed into talk that is kinder, more honest and most importantly… helpful… to those receiving our words.

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The thing I love about this course is that you pay for it based on what you think it is worth to you. Kane’s talks are detailed, thoughtful and in short…amazing. In addition, there is nightly homework to help firm up the ideas you are learning and put them into practice.

So here’s to better communication everyone! May your words be true, kind and helpful and may your well-chosen words spur you on to better and more rewarding relationships!

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