One Mother Rambling Through Life

I alway knew that I was not his first love but I never felt like a second place finisher until a few weeks into our relationship. I should have never pushed those feelings away then. Now 17 years later as I talk with our teenage son about his father’s recent nuptials I know that I should have trusted my instinct in a new soul crushing way. I was the rebound and consolation prize. I was the distraction from the feelings he was having about the loss of his first love. 

We met two months out from her decision to call it quits and his rock bottom. I was a young, driven, and happy college student. I knew what I wanted and what I didn’t. It was probably the time that I was the most headstrong. It was a little out of character for me. I was still searching and finding who I was. After a daily innocent existence I was dipping my toes into the water of life. 

I had dated a little but mainly I was just looking at what there was. I met him and I was hooked. And I mean that in a quasi literal sense as we played the fishing game and just laughed and had fun. I looked in his eyes and saw something that I saw as a future. I had no idea that in his mind's eye his future could only be satisfying and fulfilling with her. 

Early on when we were dating, in the time where you sell your best characteristics, he would reminisce about the romantic things he would do for his ex. Drive hours to leave notes and flowers and make sure that her life when they were together was the thing of songs and movies. It was wonderful. What young girl doesn’t want to think that their potential love will take care of their needs.

He was after sex. He used the line that “Anal” is not sex not to fulfil or connect with me but to fulfill his own lusting. As an innocent I needed more lead in and less lusting. I had no idea what I should do. I was not an oversexualized teen. I think he was confused about what he really wanted. You cannot have the virginal partner with the sex drive of a maniac without first building trust. Within months of having sex for the first time he was already looking at pornography secretly. Something that he openly called evil and wrong when we had first gotten together. Once again it should have been an omen of things to come. 

Of course there were signs. Ignores signs, but signs none the less. On the first Valentines together I paid for lunch. I got him a gift. What did I get? A gift? A card? A handwritten poem? A flower left on my car? Nope. Nothing. I got an excuse that he did not believe in the day. After his building up about how he made his former love feel like a princess I got nothing. But thankfully for him I was naive and accepted that it was just a shifting and was not personal. We just needed to build that relationship. Give it a few years.

A few years go by. We are married. We are parents. I have married him and given him a son. A person to carry his family name into the future. I ask him what the plan is for Valentines day and he has no plan. I cry on the phone. He feels pressured to get me jewelry which is something I don’t really wear but he is trying to fall in line so I am pleased. I am happy. I am forgiving. 

When we were dating he knew I was not big into house cleaning. He knew I struggled because it is a never ending task. That was something I never hid. Trust me. But as our relationship continued it became more and more evident that he was expecting some chore loving person. I tried. I really did but the never ending nature of the chores would just take over. 

I am a curvy girl. When we met I had been very involved in a sport. I was walking to and from classes. I was active.  But as I got older of course I got less active. I had three children. My thyroid hates me. I gained weight. Weight that only clinged to me and only starvation and daily long workouts alleviated. So if I wanted to have a life outside of work I was not able to lose weight. But I did it. But as I was reaching my lowest adult weight he had two physical affairs that I know of and countless or unknown emotional affairs. His excuse was that I was not available. He was working at a bar and I was busting ass losing weight. I got down to 142. I worked very hard. But it was not enough. I was not the ex who was built slim, tall, gorgeous, and with no kids. I was the college educated girl with flab, pregnancy stretch marks, and exhaustion from working and raising children. 

We moved for a fresh start. I messed up when I found that other men could appreciate me. Nothing was ever serious. I was an idiot. I grew up and rededicated to him. I changed careers and found something that I love. I worked hard over the summer to finish all professional courses so that I could move forward. Its not enough.

He had another affair after we moved. Maybe its the only one I caught him in. He was still in love and searching for her. He was still writing romantic loving poetry about how much he loves her and wishes he had her and would give anything to have her again. I can’t ever be her. I know that.

  I’m short, fat, and not fun. I get caught up on work things and lost in my work. I shut the work out when I am overwhelmed and focus on games, shows, kids, and not the things he thinks I should. 

So when he came to me and told me that he and his ex had been talking I was not as shocked as I think he expected. I saw it coming. When he said they were rekindling. I knew it was coming. When the divorce went through and we mediated custody I was prepared. When he married the love of his life, his first love, the one he was a poet, a romantic, a hero, and a dedicated man to I was not surprised.

Even so I was devastated. I am a person who had always been good at a strong face through adversity. I can stand strong in the sun and break at night. If I can spare others the breaking I try always. The tears and rivers came when I was alone and unseen. For him the love of his life and his purpose was her, she was his first, his always. But to me he was my purpose, me true first, and me always. While he entertained to himself that I could go on easily without him I knew I would never trust and never be able to really move on. 

It is always hard to be the consolation and second place. I have always known second and always been pushed aside when the true love returned. I know I am not destined to be that. 

He asked what he had to do to make me see that I was not second? Not search for her? Let her go? If you write poetry, delete it. Delete the thought and feeling with it. Keeping it only shows its importance. 

I sit listening to my heartbreak mix in me small lonely swelling. I’m sleeping on the couch so the girls can have their own room and the boy can have his own room as well. It’s not like I need privacy. I am only here so that they can have me. At least to them I am not the consolation yet. Maybe later. The Ex or well I guess that’s me now. The wife is more fun so I should only give it time.