Something to feel happy about

I won't lie. The last 12 months or more have been pure hell. When I think about what has happened, what I have been through and what I have lost, I feel physically sick, and extremely sad. Whats more, when I think about why I lost what I did, I feel even worse. I feel foolish, stupid and embarrassed when I think about the fact that I gave up my life as I knew it, sold my home and thought I was going to live happily ever after with the "love of my life" - even more so because everyone told me I was making a mistake, and whilst I have made excuses for him, and tried to see thing differently, the truth is that I gave up everything I had worked all my life for to be with someone I loved dearly, who in actual fact never loved me in return. This is why I feel like a fool. So much so that I have often found it hard to face my friends and family because of the shame and stupidity that I have felt.

But this installment is not about the bad stuff, its about focusing on the good things that have happened as a result of this complete and utter disaster. For so long it seemed that I felt nothing but bad about the situation, and about my life and where it has ended up as a result of "falling in love" with the wrong person, and I am not sure when, but it just happened one day that I woke up, and instead of feeling sad that the ex was not there, and remembering all the pain associated with this, I suddenly felt energised and really, genuinely happy to be alive , to be living the life I am living (with all its flaws) and to have the opportunities that this horrible situation has provided to me.

Don't for a second think that this is going to be one of those "I love the world" or "positive thinking brings positive results" kind of things, because that is simply not my game. But for such a long time I have felt like I had this huge opportunity to have a great life with someone I loved and worshiped and gave my all to, and have felt like basically a piece of shit for not being able to let that become a reality. I blamed myself, I was too dumb, too fat, too this or too that. Whatever, I have actually realised that I gave it my best shot, I did everything I could for the bloke and he didn't want me, not because of me but because of him.

I started to look at my life and how its changed and try to see those changes for the better. For one, I am not in a relationship where I am not loved and cherished for the person I am. I might be on my own but that is a much better place to be than with someone who doesn't really want to be there. I was spared the indignity of having children within this relationship - whilst I had thought this was something that would have been a wonderful experience, and having children with him was really something that I wanted, I am glad not to be, and know that I now won't be in a situation where I am raising children on my own, because I now realise that he would never have stayed.

I think that when I realised that I really don't want to be with someone who ends what I considered a serious relationship via email, and gained the self worth to feel that I truly deserved better, that my perspective started to shift, it wasn't about me, it was about him not being able to or better yet, wanting to conduct more meaningful and adult communication, I realised that I was indeed better off without him.

As a result I felt like the sun was suddenly shining on me, and all I can see now is what is good and positive, and the things I am grateful for.

I am thankful for my freedom, because even though waking up alone and not next to him is often sad, I am grateful to live in a world where the people I do see and interact with actually think I am worthwhile and they appreciate what I do and how much I care for them. I am grateful for my father and my sister who, despite driving me completely mental, love me and I love them, and even if our relationships are far from ideal, they are a bond I will never share with anyone else and most people will probably never experience.

I am grateful for the opportunity to be involved in a small business which is growing so fast that it is hard to keep up. We are going from strength to strength and even though we do our best to plan and to anticipate where the next growth will take place, the universe keeps us on our toes and makes it hard to see quite what will happen next. I am not anticipating that this involvement will make me a millionaire, but it is exciting, fun, stressful and I enjoy getting up every day and doing my best to make it a success - this in itself is reward enough for now, but who knows where we will end up, and had I not been forced to be homeless for almost 12 months I would never have had this opportunity, and to feel once again passionate and excited about my work, my contribution and my future.

I am so thankful that I decided to find a housemate, and was blessed with one that is such a complete joy to live with. It is not easy at 33 years old after living on your own for the majority or your life (other than living with various partners) to think about living with a complete stranger simply to pay the bills, and quite frankly, given I had my own home and was completely fine before this all happened, its a bit of a sobering experience to have to rent a place for the first time in your life and then find someone you don't know to move in - but I am glad every single day that I did. It is fantastic to live with someone who is completely faultless and who does nothing but bring a breath of fresh air into your life - this I have never known, even living with various partners!

So with all this thanking the universe and being pleased to be where I am and doing what I am doing, there is as one would expect, a slight twinge of sadness. I guess this is mainly from finding out that the ex has someone else in his life. That they are now enjoying happy times together in the house that I chose after many months of searching for the "right home" and that I thought that this was going to be the place where we would be together, and have a family and that I would make my home. Having someone else there is painful, I won't lie to you about that. Its especially painful when I am alone, I go to bed alone and I wake up alone and although I am not looking and don't expect to find someone to change that situation, I guess I was always hoping that one day I would. That one day I would find someone.

But I am grateful for the confidence I have in myself that I can be and am happy being on my own. It would be so much easier to feel good about myself by finding someone else to be with, but I don't want to do that, and certainly not for the wrong reasons.

Right now I don't expect to find anyone in a romantic sense, I am actually really happy not to, it seems a much better way of ensuring that there is no more heartbreak! I miss very much waking up next to "him", I miss cooking dinner for him every night, I miss cuddling with him on the couch at the end of the day, I miss watching the Footy Show on a Thursday evening, and watching the footy together on the weekends. I miss Saturday mornings, making breakfast and reading the papers together - but I am enjoying doing these things on my own, even if it hurts to know he is doing these things with someone else.

I guess what brings me comfort in this situation is knowing that he has contacted me on drunken evenings looking for sex, the old drunken root - this situation itself doesn't bring me comfort, it has made me feel like a whore but it does confirm for me that this was not a loving relationship and that things have certainly worked out in my favour. I do also feel fortunate that I am not the current girlfriend, who would not yet realise that he is seeking sex outside of what she probably thinks is a committed relationship.

So when I start to feel sad about what I have lost, and I remember happy memories and I recall how I thought it was going to be, and feel sad that things have ended up so completely differently to what I had planned - I start to think about the happy memories I am creating now, the enjoyment I am getting from doing the things that, whilst I didn't plan or expect to be doing them, that I really love doing them and feel once again, for a whole set o different reasons, completely happy and enthusiastic about what I expect with be a great future.