Choices..

i made my choice, i'm staying to honor the vow. i'm staying, because i said i would. i'm staying, because its the right thing to do. i vowed, health and sickness, good and bad, till death. So i stay.. so why does that feel like it was the wrong decision??

i talked it over with O. He understands, he even supports it, when he sees things are good, but when they're not - when he sees that i'm struggling,  he asks me "why?" And the only answer i have is because i promised.

I can't look at a different decision and feel good about myself. i can't look at breaking the vow and feel worthy of new vows anywhere in the future - because i won't see my word as true. i can't break faith with one, and see anyone else expecting me to keep to the next vow, if there is one.

So i stay, i bleed a little from the soul each day. i struggle to smile, i struggle to be 'her' for him each day. i break a little each day when im not where i want to be, who i want to be. But i hold to my vow, because not doing so isnt really an option for me.

i touch base with the who, and where i want to be, just to keep a portion of me alive, to stem a little of the bleeding, in hopes that by the time the vow is ended, there will be something left of me.

O doesn't think i understand his need to rest, how weary and thin he feels, keeping going each day. And maybe i don't, because i'm not him. But i understand how much i need rest, how weary and thin i've felt; how very much I just want to lie down and never have to get up again.

Kathy tells me she's never seen me so dark, but i've always been here, i just hide it well. Jason could tell volumes of how dark i've been for how long, he's been around a turn or two, he's seen it. He watched in the early years when the darkness first descended; he watched me battle through it, putting lights above me to hide it. Over the years i got better at cloaking the shadows, even convinced people they didn't exist.

But a few years back, i found i didn't have to hide them, i could embrace them - and should so that maybe i could finally eliminate them.

So i stay here, and i fight my shadows. All i really want to do is lie here and let them consume me. But i was taught to keep to my duties, no matter what. So despite how much i'm soaking my pillow right now writing all this out, i'll get up. Get dressed, go about my morning routine, go out later and get the mail, a package for my sworn husband, and drop stuff off that needs to be handled, come back here, and continue to pretend. i'm just the wounded housewife, he's not the virtual widower.

i want to not make this choice, i want to be there for O.

i stay, because i chose to honor the vow, i chose to keep my word...