When my marriage ended, I had an unrealistic idea of “how long” it would take to get through the pain.
I was a few months away from hitting the one-year mark when my counsellor asked me, “what exactly do you think will happen on Day 366?”
I wanted a magical moment where all of the hurt was suddenly gone. Where anger didn’t boil inside. Where sadness didn’t control.
I wanted a miracle.
I thought that getting through the “firsts” would somehow feel better and widen the narrow path so I could begin skipping my way through the seconds.
Day 366 was just a little bit better than day 365. Day 365 was just a little bit better than day 364. Day 364 was just a little bit better than Day 363.
Some days there were bumps and setbacks that had me catching up to where I’d been…but every day further away from Day 1 gave distance and time and space…and room to breathe.
There was no miracle on the day after the one year mark.
Yesterday was 5 years.
The cold…the chill in the air…January always brings an overwhelming sense of bitterness. Where, for me, the ice outside matches the ice inside.
Yesterday was 5 x 365 + 1 “leap day” since my marriage ended and I felt myself slipping backwards. Much as I didn’t want to recognize this one day, I couldn’t help but face the fact that somehow…it had meaning.
It took 1,826 days of one day at a time to get me from there to here with absolutely no miracles in between. No magical moments that suddenly erased it all.
Day 1,826 is 5 times better than Day 365 but still…Day 1,826 felt a little bit worse than the day before because, every now and then, there’s a day that, for whatever reason, reminds us of everything all over again.
When the cold, bitter chill wraps its way around your heart…so you can appreciate the thaw…when it gets here.
When the hurt is just a little bit more than the day before.
And a little bit less the day after.
Hmmmmm. So clear and true