You're in Mississippi right now with your family. Your grandfather's wake is tomorrow and his funeral on Monday. You'll be back in touch, by phone I assume, on Tuesday. We've been emailing a little off and on today, but right now, right or wrong I'm taking a step back and just going to respond to what you send. I think this time 'apart' again may be a blessing in disguise. As much as I hate being away from you, I think I needed this to sort of think things over when the wounds of you being with your ex aren't so raw.
I've been considering everything this past 24 hours (and will continue to do so for a long time to come), and it seems to be I'm fighting way WAY more of an uphill battle than I had imagined recently. I saw some huge changes following our visit in Houston that left me feeling cautiously optimistic. Actually, if I'm being completely honest, it left me feeling damn near positive that in a very short period of time you'd be ending this charade and no longer splitting your love, and your body between me and another woman. I thought I saw the light at the end of the tunnel.
Boy was I sorely mistaken.
While I do believe there were changes, and I also believe you are equally torn between the two of us. I started thinking about your time home on r&r. You constantly want to remind me that you aren't out there just to visit your ex, and while that may be true, I also know that you've spent several days vacationing with her and your daughter (happy family scenario), and now you're off to another family function (yes I get it, but its just another brick in the wall so to speak) as a family unit. I can't compete with that. I'm the woman on the outside and always will be. No one who has been present throughout your relationship (friends, family, your daughter) will see this as 'dating' or 'feeling things out'. This is you and her marching the slow path to reuniting, and every day, every moment you spend together as a couple. As husband and wife. As father and mother. As son/daughter 'in-laws', you're making it infinitely more difficult to come back and say you love someone else and this just isn't going to work.
You make it virtually impossible for there to be any future with me.
I wanted SO much to believe what I saw in your eyes in Houston. To believe what I felt in my heart the days following as I read your emails filled with words of love (to be honest I've never felt so swept off my feet in all my life)...and for awhile I did. However, the more I take a step back and look at things, I realize I'm just an escape for you. You love me, you love imagining a future with me when we're 'together', be it virtually over the phone, over Skype...or in reality hidden away in some unfamiliar city somewhere. I understand the appeal. Its my most happiest place as well. The place where my dreams come true, and I live happily ever after safe in the arms of the man I love more than I could ever imagine loving anyone. Hearing about your vacation with your ex and Ashley...and now off to your grandfather's funeral as a family again...I realized that it is nothing more than a beautiful dream that will never be.
Surprisingly I haven't really even cried over it yet. I expect to at some point, but it hasn't happened yet. I suppose this is because I'm not out of your life, and so for the most part nothing has changed. Except that I won't be escaping to that happy place ever again. I can't just bury the dream to reanimate it later. I can't push it aside for a short while. I can't put it on a shelf. I have to let it die. I have to let it die. I believe once this happens then the tears will come. In staggering amounts I'm sure. That's when I'll begin to mourn. That's when the reality of the life I've chosen will once and for all set in. That leaden cloak will drape itself over my shoulders and I'll have to steel myself to bear the weight. That's when I'll turn and face my chosen life as a mistress, as a man's woman on the side, for the first time. I'm frightened. I know I can cope with it. I know I've got the courage for that. What I don't have the courage for is walling in my heart again and saying goodbye. That would take an infinitely stronger woman than I am. I just can't build those walls all over again....
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