How do I make sense of this?

She tells me I single-handedly ruined all my chances of a good life. I wanted someone with whom I could feel full, in every aspect. So, I rejected the ones she calls the best. That my definition of ‘full’ and hers were never the same, does not matter as the society definition aligns with hers. But again, I can never fulfill their definition, as hard as I may try. 

It was almost as if she now regained her social standing through the same person that ruined it for her by going in for divorce – the family’s first ever. Who said money can’t compensate for reputational loss? Oh by the way I caved on the marriage front, and caused shame with the family’s first-ever divorce. More on that later.

My moral compass was firmly grounded. I was faulty. I was not willing to go into a legacy family with a lost ovary, making my child-bearing chances a coin toss. That is a guilt I will never live through.

Not that I was big on the entire child-bearing scheme of things – I was and am petrified of penetration! I find it invasive beyond comprehension. God knows I would never make the cut to be worthy of His immaculate conception, forget about the pain of child-bearing. That did not stop Him from giving me a pain that redefined pain, much beyond child-bearing, when my ovarian cyst had torsed, losing one of my organs forever. Pain, but no gain!

Who in their right minds would want to be married to a woman who wouldn’t allow sexual intercourse but demands a share in her responsibilities. That she is willing to share their responsibilities will never be revealed because there never would be an opportunity.

She tells me she gave everything away to me and so is left depending on me. I am not sure I understand. She nurtured me, fed me, provided for me, made me independent, and says she is paying for it. (I’ve believed it all along, so much so I had to edit the sentence because the earlier version said, ‘she paid for it’). I became so independent that I was clear about my priorities – which was always family welfare, almost at all times at my cost. Sounds a bit convoluted, but that’s a fact – I deployed my independence to become a victim of my family’s priorities, losing sight of mine.

Now to the facts on the claim that I took everything from her – the spoils from the sale of their home went to their son. I do not have anything that can qualify as inherited wealth, not even a heirloom. I pay for her health needs, after the first time her son made a hue and cry about partaking of the cost. This was with her sitting in the hospital bed ready for discharge, after having bequeathed their entire life’s earnings to him! I will have to buy them a home in their city around where he and his family wish to live because he decides for his family with their wealth, not for them. But they need to be around him, so I go looking for a house to drain every penny I have to make it comfortable to live in, all in a city I don’t inhabit! For my home in the city where I work, I rely on bankers and a lifetime of working to be able to repay my mortgage.

She wants me to live with her, with us as one big, happy family! This narrative began when I left for a bigger city knowing earnings in my city would not fulfill this family’s needs in a lifetime. ‘Two years in the big city and I return to the family’ was a sustained ask that spread over a dozen years and a series of realty purchases, with loans that I would have to believe will magically be paid off. I played along. 

Days away from her I would spend in anxiety about her health and the family’s total disregard for her well-being, and on days spent in the home city I would crawl in pain so unbearable that I would need to start writing for an outlet, else I rupture something yet again in my brain.

I know why she wants me to live with her, but is she willing to acknowledge that I need to be away to retain whatever is left of my sanity?

He is ‘self-centred’ personified. That keeps him happy. Family needs never mattered to him. Some of that could have rubbed off of me if I had spent some time with him, fighting my repulsion of his absolutely cringe-worthy self-involvement. Everytime I would think of her in his care, the hospital conversation would play back, with colours and effects intact. He was never going to be the one that she could rely on, in her old age.

But when would she acknowledge that that was yet another reason, I was looking for someone I would feel full with when we were in the match-making phase, so my partner feels what I feel and likewise. With a faulty body and the need to support her effort to hold together a bunch of people in a bind called family, my dream was never to be.  

I married the first in line when pressure around my marriage came to bursting levels. Obviously, that lasted days. Yet, I worked on the divorce at a snail’s pace – losing a precious decade of my life – for my family to be accustomed to it. Did I tell you that social acceptance is all we care about in this family? And yes, to the question of why I needed a divorce when my religion would never allow me to get married again, the reason is miles away from being about me. It was to protect my assets from the hungry and rather not-so-well-off family of in-laws, who would not dare to try anything when I’m alive. In short, I choose my family to enjoy the fruits of my toil after my lifetime. Isn’t that natural when I’ve made a mess of my life to build for them wealth, pawning off my life?

All through the journey I’ve felt the nothingness of every second of my life and fabric of my being, when –

1. The Lord who was everything to me, made every attempt to retain and remind me of my faultiness and thereby neediness in Him, sometimes amplifying it.

2. She who is still everything to me in this world, makes me believe things that don’t ever tally with facts, with a special effort to showcase my miserable life to my face because I did not conform. It doesn’t matter it was all for her.

3. I have never had anyone to discuss any of this with, with my gadgets knowing best about everything deepest and darkest in me.

Am I a pitiful woman, full of self-loathing? Am I responsible for everything I have done in my life? YES

Do I regret any of my decisions? Would I do anything, any differently, if I had another chance? NO

Which is why I am broken beyond repair.

I cannot drag myself out of this quagmire anymore. I have no strength to pull myself up. I give up, being one with dust hopefully will tranquilise my turmoil.

My choices are depleted. God doesn’t care. She doesn’t acknowledge. With relationships I could never make choices. They are not meant to make sense.