Can I be completely and utterly honest with you guys, at least for the length of this post?

Yes? Okay, great, now we can get started.

This whole divorce* thing sometimes** makes me feel like I’ve failed. It doesn’t just make me feel like a slight failure, but the biggest failure in the world. It makes me feel like I have completely invalid reasons to be getting a divorce.

First, I’m going to stop you all from commenting saying you’re not a failure, you did the right thing, because you know what? I know that, in my head I know I did the right thing. It’s just this damn thing called my heart that won’t let it go.

You see, it’s not people that make me feel this way so much, but media. Damn you media ruining everything. Damn all of the movies, tv shows, music videos, songs, books and everything else that brag up the couple that made it through the hard times.

Damn all of you media to hell.

Those shows, songs and such make me want to punch things. I feel like this inferior human being because I called it quits on my marriage. I threw up my hands. I threw in the towel. However you word it I am the one who chose to end the marriage.

I know for a fact I COULD have stayed in my marriage forever. T and I could have bought a house together, raised some kids and grew old together. I could have looked the other way and ignored the gambling, the drinking, the drugs, the lying and the abuse. I could have raised children in an unsafe environment. I could have lived in hell every single day until I died.

But because I chose not to, I failed.

I chose to give him an ultimatum. He had to want to, and try to, better himself. He had to beat his addictive habits and lying tendencies. He finally realized what he was losing months and months after I laid down the law. He did it all too late, with too little ambition. So really, he failed too.

Maybe, in some parallel universe, things could have been different. He could have taken me kicking him out how he was supposed to, woke up and realized what he was losing, and tried hard to fix himself. We would have worked through the issues and been one of those couples that thought every song about overcoming shit in a relationship was about us. But that’s not what was in store for us.

I failed more than just my marriage. I failed my family. I let some other person come in and control me and hurt them. I let some other person use my own family. I let someone come in and ruin friendships I’d worked on my entire life. I failed a lot of people.

Failure. Divorce. Sometimes I think those words are interchangeable.

But, there’s an upside of this failure.

Let’s look at some statistics. This is where this post gets heavy.

• Between 2000 and 2009 there were 738 spousal homicides.
• Women are more likely to be killed than men by a spouse.
• Homicide rates peaked among 15 – 24 year olds
• 37% of spouses reported violence after a separation
• 87% of abused women have been pushed or grabbed
• 48% of abused women feared for their lives

And then some questions that are frequently asked to a possible spousal abuse victim:

During the past five years, has your partner:

1. Threatened you with his/her first or anything else that could have hurt you?
2. Thrown anything at you that could have hurt you?
3. Pushed, grabbed or shoved you in a way that could have hurt you?
4. Slapped you?
5. Kicked, bit or hit you with his/her first?
6. Hit you with something that could have hurt you?
7. Beaten you?
8. Choked you?
9. Used or threatened to use  a gun or knife on you?
10. Forced you into any unwanted sexual activity by threatening you, holding you down or hurting you in some way?

Tell if your partner can be described using the following:

1. He/she tries to limit contact with family or friends.
2. He/she puts you down or calls you names to make you feel bad.
3. He/she is jealous and doesn’t want you to talk to other women/men.
4. He/she harms, or threatens to harm, someone close to you.
5. He/she demands to know who you are with and where you are at all times.
6. He/she damages or destroys your possessions or property.
7. He/she prevents you from knowing about or having access to the family income, even if you ask.

I’m not getting into the nitty gritty details of my relationship, but there are more questions there that I would have to answer yes to than I care to admit.

I thank God every single day that I realized what I was living in and tried to fix it quickly. I know in my heart that T isn’t someone who would abuse anyone when he’s thinking straight, but I couldn’t live my life like that.

I recognized things, saw increasing severity and got scared. Maybe things wouldn’t have gotten worse, but I can’t know that for sure. All I can be thankful for is that fact that I got out and I will never end up in that situation again.

The thing is, the abusive side of the relationship made me feel like more of a failure. I let myself become a victim. I’ve always been a strong person, but I couldn’t get my own feet under myself to walk away. When I finally got the strength to leave the relationship, or at least put it on hold, I felt guilty. I felt guilty that I let him treat me that way for so long and all of a sudden expected him to change.

The mind is a screwed up place, I tell you.

So here’s the thing. Those songs, movies and all of that other media that makes me feel like shit when I hear about relationships overcoming hard times? They can honestly go to hell. I should NOT feel like a failure because I couldn’t make my marriage work. I failed in some ways but in more ways than that, I flourished.

But even though I failed my marriage, I didn’t fail myself.

And I think that’s all that counts.