Tag Archives: divorce

Divorce and the Mental Fog

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A side-effect of long-term emotional turmoil.

I should start off by saying a few things.

Even though my husband cheated on me, lied to me, asked for a divorce on my birthday, locked me out of my home and hangar, and, with his mommy/girlfriend has subjected me to all kinds of harassment since I discovered his infidelity in August, I still love him.

How could I not still love him? We were together for 29 years. That’s more than half of our lives. You can’t suddenly stop loving someone you’ve invested your whole emotional being into.

At least I can’t.

He apparently can.

And that’s one of the things that I’m having so much trouble with. I can’t understand how a man who spent half of his life with me, a man who built four separate homes with me over the years, a man who cried in my arms when his father died, a man who traveled and laughed and learned and experienced so much with me — I can’t imagine how that man can simply flick a switch and begin hating me as he so obviously does. How else could a man subject his life partner to the things he’s put me through since May, when he first began looking for my replacement on an online dating site?

How?

The First Two Months

It’s been nearly eleven months since he asked for a divorce at the end of June, ruining my birthday forever with a phone call when I honestly half-expected a surprise visit. After all, he had been coming to see me at my summer job site on my birthday — even when it seriously inconvenienced me — almost every one of the previous four years. We’d been talking only a few weeks before about him coming to spend the summer with me. We’d been talking about which car he’d bring when he drove up with our dog. And where he’d work. I’d even begun making room in my closets and dresser for his things. And had bought new pillows to replace the wimpy ones I had.

At first, I didn’t believe he really wanted a divorce. I figured that something had happened, something had pushed him to say something to shock me — as I tried so many times to shock him out of the malaise that had overwhelmed him for nearly a year, turning him into a moody stranger. I knew even that day that the divorce wasn’t entirely his idea. I knew that he wasn’t willing to face life on his own, that he wouldn’t cut ties with me after a 29-year relationship unless there was a Plan B.

I asked him whether there was another woman and he said no. It was a lie, but I believed him. I’d never lie to him; I couldn’t imagine him lying to me.

I asked him to come see me, to talk to me in person. I offered to pay his airfare. He arranged a trip two weeks later. Obviously, there was no urgency on his part. That should have tipped me off, too.

When we met, he lied to me again. To my face. Multiple times. He watched me cry. He held me while I cried. He cried, too. Yet he seemed resolute. He wanted a divorce. Even when I showed him a wonderful piece of property where I thought we could make a summer home together, he didn’t seem interested in a future with me.

I asked to settle when I got home in September or October. I never told him not to file — as his lawyer suggested in court just a few weeks ago. I never dreamed he would go after the fruits of my labor — the things I had worked my entire life to accumulate and achieve: my investments, my business assets and savings, my personal assets. I thought he understood the meaning of the word “fair.” I thought he was ethical. I thought he had moral standards.

In other words, I thought he was the man I’d fallen in love with, a good man who knew the difference between right and wrong.

Understand that I still didn’t know he was lying to me. I didn’t know that the good man I’d fallen in love with was dead, shoved over a cliff by a desperate old woman who’d stolen his heart with promises and lies and old lingerie photos, eager to capture a new man so she wouldn’t have to grow old alone.

Throughout the first two months, I still had some measure of hope that our relationship could be mended. He didn’t want to be alone. We’d been though so much together. Surely this could be fixed up when I got home.

This idea was reinforced by a good friend of mine where I was living in Washington. He kept telling me that marriages are hard work, that I could make things work when I got home.

I didn’t know at the time that my husband had called him in July and had told him that he still loved me. My friend misunderstood the message and gave me all kinds of false hope.

The fact that my husband still hadn’t filed for divorce simply reinforced that hope. Not filing convinced me that he wasn’t serious — at least not yet. There was still hope that we’d resolve our problems.

At least that’s what I thought at the time.

Emotional Turmoil

Still, my mind was in turmoil. I was trapped in Washington for my summer work, unable to do anything about fixing the problem at home. I missed a deadline on the book I was working on because I was so caught up in my marital problems. And although I’d asked my husband not to contact me about the divorce or settlement for a while, he emailed, asking if I’d given it any thought. I replied that I thought we were going to wait.

That made the situation worse. I couldn’t understand what his hurry was. He’d told me there wasn’t anyone else. Why was he so eager to settle?

It didn’t make sense. He hadn’t filed for divorce yet. How could he possible expect me to settle? What the hell was going on?

The mental turmoil got even worse when he stopped returning my email messages and phone calls and texts. He was actively ignoring me.

It was in mid-August that I discovered that he’d hired a lawyer. I called him to ask him about it. I had to ring the phone at least five times before he picked up. He was rude and angry. He denied hiring a lawyer.

And that’s when I started crying. That’s when I realized that he was lying to me and had been lying all along. If he’d lied about that, what else was he lying about?

A little more fishing later that evening and I found out about the woman he’d been seeing since at least June — before he asked for a divorce.

Yes, he was too cowardly to leave me without having a Plan B. A 64-year-old desperate and vindictive bitch he met online was his Plan B. He was throwing away a 29-year relationship and financial security for a woman 8 years older than him who had some sort of decorating business advertised on the Web and was deeply underwater in a home that had two mortgages on it. A woman who was likely attracted to him because he owned three homes, a plane, and a Mercedes — and his wife owned a helicopter.

My mental turmoil went into full-swing when I made these discoveries — although I didn’t know her age and realize that their relationship was a baby/mommy thing until much later. It suddenly became clear that he hadn’t filed for divorce because he knew I made 90% of my income over the summer and was depositing money in my business bank accounts quite steadily. The more I deposited, the more they’d be able to get their hands on. Every time he forwarded me a check, his mommy/girlfriend probably thought cha-ching! I went into a panic. I was 1,200 miles away and I needed to file for divorce before I put any more of my hard-earned money at risk.

I clearly remember sitting at an outdoor cafe in Wenatchee early on a Monday morning, making phone calls to lawyers in Phoenix. My hands were shaking as I dialed one number after another. I finally got someone interested in talking to me. I hired him and got the wheels turning.

Four days later, at 7:30 AM, the process server turned up at my husband’s mommy/girlfriend’s house to serve him with papers. She slammed the door in his face, claiming my husband didn’t live there.

But he was there. I know he was. Yet another lie.

The emotional roller coaster I was on was still climbing the first really big hill.

A Different Person

It was around this time that my friends began noticing a very dramatic change in me. During the first two months — before I knew about the lies and the girlfriend, back when I thought there was still hope — I was sad but mellow about my divorce. I didn’t talk much about it because there really wasn’t much to talk about. I didn’t get very emotional. I just went on with my life, struggling in private to stay focused on the book I needed to finish, but otherwise keeping my marital woes to myself. I stayed on my diet, hoping the new, slim me would help energize the physical part of our relationship, the part that had grown cold in our final months together.

But when I discovered his lies and infidelity and their obvious plans to take as much from me as they could, I became unbearably weepy. I couldn’t understand how he could do this to us. (And I still can’t.) I needed to talk things out and there were very few people who would listen. I became a different person — not the strong, upbeat person they knew but a weak, tearful basket case who cried randomly throughout the day. I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t go a few hours without breaking down into tears. Many of my local friends simply couldn’t deal with it. This made matters worse for me because I needed a shoulder to cry on and the shoulders I thought were available didn’t want to get wet with my tears.

It was the utter betrayal that was killing me inside. Knowing that the man I loved could lie to me, steal from me, and be so completely heartless after 29 years of life together.

It was around then that I started blogging vaguely about my situation. I’m glad I did. I managed to record most of my thoughts and feelings about what I was going through as I was going through it. The sadness, the anger, the confusion. Without those blog posts, I wouldn’t have a clear memory of how I felt.

Although I didn’t realize it, I had entered a mental fog.

The Mental Fog

Last month I was chatting with a friend about how I was feeling. After months of shocking developments and harassment that had trapped me on an emotional roller coaster, I had become somewhat dulled to the situation I was in. Yes, I was still in pain and I still cried a lot more often than what I think is healthy. But I had become able to talk about specific things that had happened without getting all worked up.

For example, yes, I’d found the locks in my Wickenburg house changed when I got home in September. Even though he was living with his mommy/girlfriend in Scottsdale and had a condo in Phoenix, he had tried to lock me out of my only home. It took me many, many months to even think about the cruelty of that one deed without crying. But now I could think and even tell people about it without shedding a tear. It was as if my mind had build a mental scab around that particular wound.

My friend told me that when she got divorced years ago, she’d entered a “mental fog.” Although she couldn’t really describe it, I immediately knew what she meant. And I knew that in certain times of my life — times when I wasn’t focused on something important to me like flying or driving or writing or having a good conversation with a friend — I was in a mental fog.

I thought about it one day and jotted down the symptoms I’ve experienced:

  • Feeling numb after months of riding an emotional roller coaster. There have been many ups and downs over the past eleven months. They’ve filled me with devastating sadness or euphoric joy — and all kinds of emotions in between. After a while, however, a sort of numbness sets in. Sometimes I’m not even sure what I’m feeling.
  • Acting on autopilot. In other words, I was doing things without thinking about them. Things like preparing meals, cleaning the house, and traveling to visit friends and family members.
  • Not fully aware of my surroundings. I don’t go here very often, but when I’m in a serious emotional state of mind — especially when I haven’t slept much — the fog completely surrounds me and I tune out the details of where I am. This often happens when I’m working with my lawyer and I get a flash from the past that reminds me of how good things used to be. It certainly happened in court on May 7 when I broke down in tears from the pain of seeing him sitting on the other side of the court, my enemy after 29 years of a loving relationship.

The mental fog is what makes it difficult to remember so many of the things I did or thought during this difficult time. I think it’s a defense mechanism that the mind automatically puts in place to defend itself. I think of it as surrounding myself in a cocoon of soft pillows before being bounced off of hard walls. The mental fog deadens the pain.

No Flying in the Fog

I should mention here that there is no mental fog at all when I can focus on something that has nothing to do with my situation. I’m talking about reading and writing, having conversations with friends, performing difficult tasks that require my concentration.

Wahweap Hoodoos
Flying over the Wahweap Hoodoos on a solo cross-country flight from Seattle, WA to Page, AZ in September 2010.

Of all the things I do to keep my mind off my divorce woes, flying is the best. When I fly, I focus on every detail of the flight, using my senses to accumulate information about the situation and using my mind to evaluate input and make decisions.

Looking at the aircraft during preflight, monitoring the instruments, seeing where I’m flying.

Listening to the sound of the engine on startup and warmup and in flight, hearing the odd sound of a strong wind in the mast and cowling while idling on the ground, hearing the blades slap at 80 knots.

Smelling engine exhaust when warming up on the ramp with the door open and a slight tailwind, smelling the heat on the rare instances when I use it.

Touching various components I can’t see on preflight, feeling for unseen leaks, feeling the controls in my hand and the way the helicopter responds to my inputs, feeling the force of the wind when picking up into a hover, feeling the shudder of the aircraft when going through a wind shear, feeling the motion of the aircraft when riding turbulence.

If there was something to taste, I’d taste it, too.

The experience of being at the controls of my helicopter is a joyful release from whatever else is going on. When I’m flying, there is no betrayal by a man I love, no ruined relationship, no desperate old woman sleeping beside my husband while itching to get into the home I made with the man I love. There’s only the amazing machine and sky around me, the ever-changing terrain below, and a feeling a freedom that can’t be beat.

I wish I could fly more often.

Other Emotions

Beyond the mental fog, I am feeling emotions I can clearly identify.

One of them is a weariness that periodically drags me down. Specifically:

  • I’m tired of having to explain myself to people who should understand. This is mostly the “get over it” crowd who have been through a similar situation and have worked through their own emotions, yet don’t have the patience to watch me work through mine. I’m also tired of having to explain why I’m fighting in court — that the simple fact is if I gave him what he’s been demanding since September, I would be financially ruined and unable to face myself in the mirror. Yes, I know the only ones who win are the lawyers. I thought my husband knew that, too. But apparently his mommy/girlfriend, who has been controlling his side of the divorce since November, doesn’t understand this. I sometimes wonder if it’s his money or hers that she’s pissing away on legal fees.
  • I’m tired of dealing with lies and misrepresentations. This is coming from their side of the divorce. After eleven months, they’re still lying and misrepresenting the events of the case. This came to a head recently with what I call “The Garage Fiasco,” where they lied and attempted to bully their way into the garage of our home to get their hands on some papers. (Blog post to come.) When will the lies end? How has dishonesty become a way of life for this man? Is that what she taught him?

But there are also positive emotions, most of which I’ve been experiencing recently:

  • Relief that the end is in sight. They managed to delay the court date until April by claiming that they needed more information to evaluate my business but then they failed to do any sort of information-gathering. This proves to me that it was all a ploy to delay things. I think he believed he could wear me down and I’d give in. (I’m not sure where he got that idea; he should know me better. Perhaps his mommy/girlfriend convinced him that I’d give up and go away. What the hell does she know about me?) But with half the trial done and the last court date less than 2 weeks away, I can clearly see an end to this ordeal. And that makes me feel good.
  • Hope that the justice system can be fair. I can’t say much more about this — at least not now. But case law gives me hope that the judge can do what’s right and fair for this situation.

  • My New View
    Having a view like this out the window of my home is something I can really look forward to.

    Positive feelings about my future. Remember that piece of land I mentioned earlier in this blog post? Well, it’s still there and it’s still waiting for me. It’s a 10-acre parcel high on a hillside, overlooking the Columbia River and Wenatchee Valley. It’s private and quiet but only a 15-minute drive into a great little city with everything a person could want or need. Seattle is 30 minutes away by airline or 2-1/2 hours by car. I’ve already drawn up plans for a hangar home that will house my helicopter, RV, and vehicles — for the first time since 1997, every one of my possessions will be under one roof. I’m looking forward to being able to fly from my home, have a garden, and keep bees for honey and wax. Maybe even have chickens and horses again. Best of all: I don’t have to deal with sour looks when I do something my “life partner” doesn’t like but lacks the communication skills to verbally object to. In other words: life without someone holding me back because he’s too fearful to move forward or really enjoy life.

  • Hope that what comes around, goes around. Yes, I’m talking about karma. I don’t believe in karma, but everyone tells me that it exists and is real. They all assure me that the lying, cheating bastard the man I love became will get his in the end. Frankly, I’m hoping that it comes in the form of his mommy/girlfriend having a stroke and him having to change her diapers every day. That’ll serve him right. I can say with certainly that just living with an evil, vindictive woman who lies and does cruel things to others to get what she wants should be enough punishment for any man. (It’s still so difficult to believe he’d wind up with someone like that, but beggars can’t be choosers, I guess. Their mutual desperation is likely what brought them together.)

The mental fog is lifting and what I see ahead of me is so much better than what I left behind.

On Dreams and Omelets

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An unsettling dream stirs up old feelings.

I dreamed about my husband again last night.

It was the first dream about him in a while. In this dream, he’d managed to get permission to come to the house. I wanted to demand that he leave his girlfriend/mommy behind, but got my request in too late. He pulled up the driveway in his Mercedes with her in the front seat and some guy I didn’t know in the back. When I told him that I would not let him in with her on the property, she tried to argue it but, in the end, drove away with the other man.

In the dream, my husband had his camera with him and immediately began taking photos around the outside of the house. When I reminded him that he was wasting his time and that the pictures could not be used as evidence in court later in the week, he started to talk to me. You know — communicate. The thing we hadn’t been able to do for years. I have no idea what he was saying, but I remember feeling so sad that he was finally talking to me. When it was too late to fix anything. And I felt sorry for him. Again.

And then I woke up, feeling frustrated and sad.

A while later, I was in the kitchen making breakfast. An omelet with bacon and onions.

I remembered all the times either he or I would make omelets for breakfast. We each had our own method and pretty much stuck to them for the 29 years we were together. Both methods made good omelets.

Now I make a smaller omelet, an omelet for one. And oddly, I find myself using his method.

Over the 29 years of our relationship, we spent a lot of time apart. First, it was when I traveled extensively for business, sometimes being away for two or three weeks at a time. Then, it was after we moved to Arizona and he went back to New Jersey, to live in the apartment he kept there for a week at a time every single month. Then it was when I started doing summer work, first at the Grand Canyon and then in Washington State. And then it was when he began living in our Phoenix condo every weekday, week after week.

During all those times apart, there have been other breakfasts made and eaten alone. But for some reason, today’s breakfast was different. Today I really felt the absence of the man I love.

I imagined the conversation we’d be having. Talking about our plans for the day — or lack of plans. One of us making toast. Letting the dog out (or in). Him brewing his Earl Grey tea. Cutting the omelet in half and placing the halves on the two plates he’d warmed in the toaster oven. Using placemats so as not to damage the table with the hot plates. Or maybe, on a nice morning like this, bringing breakfast out to the table on the back patio to enjoy it while the desert comes to life around us.

As I sit here typing this, I wonder whether he’s awake yet. I wonder whether he’ll make an omelet with the woman he’s chosen to replace me. I wonder if she cooks for him or he cooks for her or they share the task, as we always did. I wonder whether they both make omelets the same way. Or maybe she’s some kind of health nut — God knows she left enough vitamins in my house — and only eats egg whites or won’t eat bacon. Maybe they don’t eat omelets together at all.

And I wonder whether he ever thinks of me and the omelets we made together during all those years.

My Planned Home

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What I’m planning. What do you think?

I moved this post here from my private blog on Wednesday, June 5, 2013. Read about the hilarity that ensued that day to understand why I went public with this post.

A few people have been asking me where I’m going to live when the divorce is over and I leave my Wickenburg home. The answer isn’t simple.

RV Living

At first, I’ll likely live in my RV in Washington State, as I have for the past five consecutive summers. I’ll live at the golf course where I’ve been parking in May and June and much of July since 2008. My helicopter will be parked at the ag strip across the street, where I can see it from my RV’s back window and get to it for work within minutes.

In mid July, I’ll likely move up to Wenatchee Heights, where I’ve been parking in late July and August since 2010, when I first got my big fifth wheel. The owner of the land there was kind enough to set up an RV parking spot for me with 30 amp power, water, and even a septic hookup. With my helicopter parked in his backyard and the orchard I’m responsible for drying right across the street, life is very good indeed — especially the fringe benefit of being able to pick fresh cherries and blueberries every afternoon for the entire length of my stay.

A Hangar Home with a View

My New View
Having a view like this out the window of my home is something I can really look forward to.

Of course, that’s just my temporary living plan. I’m in the process of buying a 10-acre parcel of land in Malaga, WA, just downriver from Wenatchee. It sits on a shelf high above the Columbia River and Wenatchee Valley, with views of rolling hills, orchards, snow-covered mountains, and, of course, the Columbia River. It’s amazingly quiet and private, yet just 15 minutes by car from a great little city (Wenatchee) with just about anything I could want or need. I hope to close on or before my birthday — making this a much happier birthday than last year’s or any other birthday within memory.

I’m already working with a builder to construct what’s called a “pole building.” It’s a type of construction that’s simple and very popular for “shops” or barns. Sitting on a 50 x 48 foot concrete pad with a 25 foot apron/helipad out front, the building’s main floor will have two sides: one for my helicopter and RV to be parked side by side, and one for a four-car garage.

Front Elevation
Front elevation.

Garage Elevation
Garage side elevation.

One of those garage bays will be enclosed with a flight of stairs going up to a loft with a vaulted ceiling. That loft will be completely enclosed and insulated, with plenty of big windows and a deck on two sides. The 1200 square feet will have just two rooms with a bathroom between them. Windows in the vaulted wall will let in lots of light; windows below them will look into the hangar.

Downstairs Floorplan
Downstairs Floorplan

Loft Floorplan
Loft level floor plan.

My original plan was to use this as temporary living space until I could afford to build a real house on the property. But the more I look at my savings and the more I think about my future earning potential, the more convinced I am that this will be my only home on this property. So I’ve decided to make it very comfortable, with a dream kitchen that’ll put my old one to shame and a bathroom with the deep soaking tub I’ve always wanted.

And there’s plenty of space on the property if I ever do have enough money to build a home. I can then rent out this deluxe apartment to someone else and have some rental income.

So that’s the plan.

When? Who Knows?

The only thing I know for sure is that I’ll close on the land by July 30. That’s a must if I want to get the excellent price the sellers and I have agreed on.

As far as the building is concerned, the builders are scheduling out into September now. I can’t get on the schedule until I buy the land and come up with a 20% deposit on the building. Once I do that, and deliver another 50% when the materials arrive, they can complete the building shell in 6 weeks. Then it’s up to me — and some helpers — to turn that loft into a home.

Do you know drywall? Electrical wiring? Plumbing? Kitchen installations? Want a working holiday in a beautiful place? Call me! I’ll get you on my schedule this fall.

The New Blog

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A fresh start on a new life.

I decided to start a brand new blog today — a place where I can document the new things in my life: my new home, activities, friends, and lovers.

I won’t be abandoning this blog — I’ll keep posting about the usual things. But I will use the new blog to post information about the new things I’m doing to move forward in my life as I finish up my divorce and leave behind the man I loved for 29+ years.

The new blog will remain pretty much private until the divorce is finalized. A few of my close friends will get the URL. If you want the URL, contact me.

I’m looking forward to working on this new project and documenting my new life. I hope you’ll join me there.

The Loneliest Days of My Life

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No, it’s not when you’re thinking.

I’m finally in the home stretch for my divorce proceedings. It’s been a long, hard road, made harder by my heartache and the constant state of disbelief that the man I loved and spent more than half my life with could do the spiteful and vindictive things he’s been doing to me since May.

The topic of loneliness came up in a Facebook discussion with some friends. I had commented about how I loved the spontaneity of my life, being able to turn a day trip into an overnight stay. I mentioned how nice it was to be able to say YES to an invitation without asking someone’s permission. One person commented:

Being single has a lot more perks then people think. Oh sure, it can be lonely, but if you got good friends, and an active life, the feeling of loneliness is rare.

I replied:

I seldom get lonely. I can stay pretty busy.

Another person said:

In my previous marriage, I felt lonelier during its disintegration than I ever felt afterwards, happily on my own.

And that got me thinking about when I did feel lonely. It wasn’t this week or last week or even last month. It wasn’t really during any time since I left him behind in Arizona on a late April day in 2012. In reality, it was before that — in the final months leading up to my seasonal departure to Washington. As I commented to my Facebook friends:

I never felt so lonely as those last few months before I went away for my summer job in 2012. I moved to Phoenix to be close to him and he was as distant as ever. I should blog about this — I think it’s the only time in my life that I’ve ever felt lonely for an extended period of time.

And that’s true — I’ve never felt as lonely as I did during that 7-month period, from the time I returned to Arizona from my summer job in early October 2011 until I departed for the 2012 season on the last day of April 2012.

Moving into the Condo

It was a weird scene when I got home — although I didn’t realize it right away. My husband had visited me in September for a nice week-long trip around the Olympic Peninsula in Washington. It was the first thing resembling a vacation that we’d had in more years than I can count. It was a nice trip — at least I enjoyed it. I thought he did, too.

On that trip we talked about his roommate moving out of his Phoenix condo. My husband had had the condo for three or four years and his roommate had moved in right away. His roommate didn’t like me much and didn’t keep that a secret. When he wasn’t openly hostile, he was making cracks about the things I did or said, always trying to pick a fight with me. I’m not saying we were at war, but I certainly wasn’t very comfortable when he was around — which was every weekday evening and on some weekends. Watching TV became a community event. So did some meals — either that or smell the stench of whatever prepared food concoction he’d heated in the microwave. Not only that, but because I’m a early riser, I felt that I had to tip-toe around the place in the morning, keeping it dark so it wouldn’t wake my parrot. I can’t tell you how many mornings I sat in the corner of the red sofa reading a book on my iPad because I didn’t want to wake him.

We’d decided earlier in the summer that it would be better if his roommate were to move out. I’d move in with my office and spend each week with my husband — kind of like a normal couple might. (Imagine that!) So when I returned in October, the roommate was gone.

My husband and I filled the void left by his departure by buying new furniture for the condo. A new bedroom set with a king size bed like the one we had at home. We sold the old furniture — which had been a gift from my grandmother — to his roommate for his new apartment. We bought end tables and a coffee table. And a table for the big HD television he’d bought. And a bunch of dressers for the walk-in master bedroom closet, so we wouldn’t need dressers in the bedroom.

We brought my office furniture — or most of it — down from our Wickenburg house. I set up my office in the roommate’s old bedroom. We also swapped the queen sized bed we had at the condo for a full size bed we had at home. That went into my office as a guest bed — as if anyone wanted to visit us. We also bought new blinds for that room. It had two sliding glass doors and the old blinds were ugly and in poor condition. By the time we were finished, the place was looking like a home.

A second home.

Life at the Condo

Throughout the autumn, I lived there with my husband, our dog Charlie, and my parrot Alex.

In the morning, we’d have breakfast together like a real married couple and he’d go to work. I’d go into my office and do some work for a while. Just before lunchtime, I’d put Charlie on his leash and we’d walk to the stores where I’d buy food for the night’s dinner (if we were eating in) and maybe some lunch out. We never missed a Wednesday farmer’s market. In the afternoon, I’d take Charlie to one of the dog parks I’d found in the area — the one at Indian School park was closest — where I’d let him run with the other dogs or chase balls. On other days, I’d take him out to the tennis courts near the condo parking lot and throw balls with him until my husband got home. We’d have dinner together, either in or out, and sometimes would see a movie. Otherwise, he’d park himself in front of the television and I’d usually get comfortable somewhere with a book.

Sometimes I flew. The helicopter was based part-time at Deer Valley Airport, which was closer to the condo than our house. I’d get a call for a flight, book it, and head up to prep. Then I’d do the flight and, with luck, be back at the condo before he got home. Sometimes it went long, though. That’s the way my business is.

On most weekends, we’d go home to Wickenburg. It was a bit of a pain in the neck — having to pack our things and load up the truck, then make the long drive — about 70 miles that took nearly 90 minutes — and unpack once we arrived. Often, we took two cars — after all, he worked about 1/3 of the way home and it didn’t make much sense for him to drive that distance twice. We’d spend the weekend doing stuff around the house — including catching up on TV car shows he’d DVRed — and maybe getting out in the Jeep. We had a nice hike in the desert out behind the house once. Then, on Sunday (if we’d taken one car) or Monday (if we’d taken two cars), we’d pack back up and move back down to Phoenix.

I say “most weekends,” because it wasn’t every weekend that we went home together. Sometimes, I had to fly. It made no sense to go all the way back to Wickenburg and then drive all the way back to Deer Valley the next day. So I’d stay in the condo and either come home after the flight or just stay there. And, of course, since my office was in the condo, I had to be there to get any work done. I worked on a book that autumn and that kept me in the condo on a few weekends.

Understand that this was not the kind of life I liked. While I realize that I do spend every summer away from home, at least I’m sleeping in the same bed for weeks at a time. Bouncing back and forth between these two homes was bothersome, to say the least. It didn’t make things any better that the condo was dark and cavelike from about 11 AM on, there was no privacy with the blinds open, and noisy neighbors woke us up more than a few times. The only thing the condo had going for it was its proximity — walking distance — from so many shops and restaurants and the fact that it had pretty fast Internet.

As for Wickenburg — well, the house needed a lot of work. My old office was a disaster area, but I was never there long enough to put a dent into the big job of cleaning it up. (It took weeks this spring to finally get the job done.) The yard needed some work and we actually did do some of it in January and February. But, overall, I felt that we were neglecting the house and wasting too much time on those long weekly drives.

The Winter of his Discontent

Sometime in the autumn, I realized that my husband was unhappy. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I honestly believed it had to do with his job.

The way he complained about his job, I have to assume he hated it. What else could I think? He complained incessantly about his boss and I had to agree — the guy was being a dick. He complained about not being able to sell because his boss refused to give him the price cuts he needed to clinch the deals. He complained about his boss micromanaging. Even after we’d treated his boss and his wife to a helicopter dinner out — do you know what that cost me? — he continued to treat my husband shabbily, like a second-class citizen. And his work conditions? He was in a tiny cubicle crammed into a tiny office with another guy. This was not the kind of office you’d want to go to every day.

I also knew that he was unhappy with his financial situation. He wasn’t making as much money as he needed to cover the condo mortgage and its absurdly high monthly maintenance fees. I told him to sell. He refused, saying that it was under water. It was only under water about $20K, though. I told him to sell and take the loss on his income taxes. He refused. I told him to sell it to me for what he owed and that I’d sell it and take the loss. He didn’t want to do that either. He just wanted that albatross hanging around his neck.

To top things off was the way he responded to me when I told him I wanted to do something that he apparently didn’t approve of. Rather than speak up and tell me what the problem was, he’d fix me with a disapproving glare and say something like, “Whatever you want,” in a flat tone of voice. He never got enthusiastic about anything. He never seemed happy. Even on the few times we went to concerts and the like, he didn’t seem as if he was 100% there with me.

I thought it was his job. I thought he was at the end of his rope with the situation. I thought that he was jealous of me having so much free time to do what I wanted to do between books and flying jobs. I thought he’d begun to resent my freedom — freedom I’d offered him so many times and was waiting for him to grasp with me.

How could I think otherwise? He never told me what was wrong.

One day in the winter, he emailed a close friend of his back in New York, telling her, “Maria is driving me crazy.” But he never said a word to me. I still don’t know what I did to prompt that complaint to a woman I’d met only a handful of times, a woman he obviously felt better about confiding to than me, his wife.

Much later, in September 2012, after introducing my replacement to his friends at his mother’s birthday party, he told a mutual friend that he still loved me but that when he’d come to see me on my birthday in June 2011, I didn’t tell him that I loved him. He was carrying around crap like that for over a year. But he never told me how he felt. He never made me feel as if he cared about how I felt for him.

He just complained about me to his friends.

It should come as no surprise that they cheered him on when he decided to search for my replacement. Maybe they even suggested it. It seems like something his roommate might do.

The Loneliness

The loneliness came over those few months. Living with a man so distant, a man I couldn’t reach, a man who wouldn’t tell me what he was thinking or feeling. He wasn’t the man I loved. He was the empty shell of that man.

How many times did I go into the bedroom with a book, hoping he’d turn off that fucking television and join me?

How many times did I wish he’d speak up when he wasn’t happy about what I was doing or saying? How many times did I wish he’d put his foot down and take control of the situation and show me the man I fell in love with all those years ago?

How many times did I wish he’d just shed the possessions and debt that was making him a slave in a job he hated?

Too many times.

I retreated into myself and my work. I came out when he suggested a marriage counselor and I really thought we could make things work. But he still wouldn’t talk and I was still alone. And then it was time for me to go back to work.

By then, of course, he’d given up on me — although he didn’t tell me that, either. He waited until he’d found my replacement, then ruined my birthday by asking for a divorce. Was that revenge for me not telling him that I loved him the year before? Probably.

But at least the loneliness finally ended.