I listen to them play, screams of “Dad!” and laughs ringing through the house. Hearing him teach her that sometimes it’s okay to laugh when someone falls and comfort her when she’s bumped her knee.
There’s no negative air between us, no more walking on eggshells, we just appreciate what both of us are doing for our child. She is the soul focus in our life.
6 years ago today I moved back to my parents home. It was never my family home as I’d never lived here. With both of my parents choosing careers that fortunately provided living accommodations, there had never really been a “family home” as such. Yet there I was, in a position I had never dreamed of being in, as I had no where else to turn. I had lost the home I believed I was building. I had lost my best friend, my partner. I was forced to return to a country I had believed I wanted to leave, had accepted I may never live in again, because I was so certain this was the first move to the rest of our lives.
I didn’t want to come back on my Dad’s birthday, I was worried I would taint the day. If you had told me in that moment that 6 years later we’d all be sitting around a table eating pizza together with our daughter I would have laughed in your face. I was broken coming home, my heart had never felt heavier, I’d spent the entire plane journey from Australia, all 1235 minutes of it crying to myself. Why had I not advocated for myself sooner? How dare I let anyone treat me the way they both had? Why wasn’t I good enough? What did she have that I didn’t? Why did’t he value me enough after 4 years to even try avoid hurting my feelings? Nothing had ever hurt me as much as that.
Now I sit and listen to them laugh. There are moments where I think what if things had been different and she’d been able to experience his love every day of her life, that’s what I mourn now. Not our relationship and what that would have meant, but what it could have been for her.
Insights of A. Rose 