Killing me slowly.........

The last couple of years of my marriage were most definitely killing me slowly.....my spirit.....my soul.......my health and my body.....all of it.....and I didn't know it till the weight of it left and the dust settled.....and as the dust settled around me a lightness took place inside of me......inside of my soul..........became really apparent......and in the space between a clarity has come to find me......and the sad part of all of it is that I know it was not his intention to do that to me........I know that....not a conscious one......yet he held some of the power of it and could have set me free in all of it as we journeyed..and it certainly wasn't my intention to stay in something that was destroying me a little bit each day.....yet I did....and we did........and for me I chose that path because I really thought it was for the greater good......I really believed there was a way beyond what had happened.....had seen other couples say that there was.....and believed that we too could find our way there, in the magic of the other side ........I thought love was going to prevail......and hope......and faith............however what neither of us realized was that our entire lives, and marriage had been consumed by his affair......like a fire that swept through every part of us.......and there was enough progress between us and in therapy for me to believe we may make it......that we could heal......and find our way back from the edge.......but my subconscious for a good bit was consumed by some strange and indirect competition with her.....trying to measure up at every turn........until I realized there was no competition......like truly none.........and I don't say that in arrogance, I say that in terms of the fact that I was HIS WIFE.......I should have had priority in his life at every turn.....every single moment, in every single thing he did and said to me........ and my feeling that I didn't, that that was not the reality I was living in any longer, should have been all I needed to walk away myself......I know that now........ however hindsight is such a gift right? The looking over my shoulder and feeling uneasy and insecure was probably the most damaging to me and my soul......it is no way to live.......However I also know it had to end the way it did.......me giving it my best shot......and learning to let go of him piece by piece, and him being the one to end it had to be too.......I could not have carried the weight of that all of my days.....my heart for my family and for him was too tender for such things.....so it had to play out like it did till the bitter end.......but on the other side I am clear on the fact that his leaving cut a huge cancer out of my life.......leaving me free to thrive......achieve the best shape of my life.....my best health of my life.......feel the strongest......most energetic....and youngest I have felt in years........and I am grateful to God that he felt that my freedom and life was worthy of releasing such a burden......in a way that could help me find peace and fulfillment on the other side of the pain.......A part of me will mourn the loss of my marriage and my sweet little family perhaps all of my life.......but a bigger part will recognize and be grateful for the gift it turned out to be.........