It’s been a while since I decided to sit down and write something. Home has been blissfully quiet and calm. Calm. The operative word and the one that has kept me in something much better than the limbo we were in for several months. There is a lot more clarity now in our path – our goal seems to be set – stay together, raise a family, play each day by ear, but imagine a future where we are not apart. So abstract but actually so very tangible too.

Sometimes I slip into the bad old habit of comparing our relationship to others around us. I know that privately, everyone has their own set of struggles and ours just happens to be really heavy. It’s not impossible though – to stay together. I count how much time has passed since the disclosure and we are coming up on eight months. Even though I could look at it as eight months since we have been intimate, since he broke my heart, and since my reality crumbled – I am choosing to flip it all and say – look at how far we’ve come, despite all the possible odds being against us. We have made it back together. Maybe not as the traditional husband and wife, but certainly as more than just co-parents and more than just friends.

In a way, my marriage makes me question all those people who give up and call it quits. I love my husband unconditionally, and he loves me enough to stay – but that sparkle, the spark of ‘in-love’, it’s gone, and has been for a very long time. People divorce over less than that, pursuing the next best thing – constantly on a journey to find a newer, better, more interesting counterpart. Somehow, despite our incongruence, my husband and I still align on all the things that matter so much – our common family, financial, and future goals. To me, that seems more valuable than the spark and sparkle of shiny new love. There are days that I need to remind myself of this, but I imagine that even those in happy, heterosexual marriages do too.

We are all a little bit broken and even though the fissure in my relationship is one that will take a great deal of effort to repair, I am not interested in trading in my life for a new one. I titled this entry ‘New Beginning’ – I suppose it is appropriate with this New Year start.