The Beginning of the End

When Bruce was getting ready to leave for Texas last February of 2004 (for his job with Westinghouse)...
he didn't want to be with me.
Yes, I mean intimately.
I tried not to let it bother me,
but it did.
He had never been like that before.
Especially when it was a fact that he would be gone for over six weeks.
He did call from Texas,
but not as much as he usually did.
And when we talked,
there was a strain,
and I didn't know why.
I even joked with my mom that I hoped we wouldn't be getting a divorce.
I guess that somehow I just knew.
In April, when he walked through the door of our house,
I was shocked.
He had lost about 50 pounds while he was gone.
His clothes were hanging on him.
He gave me a bouquet of flowers with a balloon...
and it said...
thank you.
I asked him for what...
and he said for taking care of my kids.
That really threw me.
I mean...I just didn't understand it.
And I cried...and cried...and cried.
I knew it was going to be bad.
He never wanted to be with me again.
Physically or emotionally.
Oh we tried...I guess.
But it was definitely a half-hearted attempt,
on his part.
He got to the point where if I hugged him,
he wouldn't hug back.
Or...
if I got to close to him,
he would actually turn his body sideways...
so that I wouldn't touch him.
ouch.
Talk about pain.
I didn't know what was going on...
I didn't understand any of it...
and I was trying to desperately to hold onto my marriage.
My life.
Talk about mental cruelty.
He is a master of it now.
These are things that I won't soon forget.
And now everybody will know just a little more...
about me...
and why this has hurt me so.
Hurt my kids.
He made me feel like less of a woman...
less of a human being.
I didn't matter anymore.
And I wasn't even given the common courtesy of knowing why.