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Change happens anyway

simplified divorceMy marriage broke down beyond repair for all sorts of reasons that I suppose will become clear to
readers over time.

I really wanted to save that marriage. I don't think I have ever loved anyone the way I love/d her. And yet as time apart has progressed, I have realised the reality of how imperfect we are as humans. In April last year I travelled to South Africa as my mother was allegedly very seriously ill. (That's a story for another day)

My return to Cape Town was exceptionally difficult, again for a number of reasons, but the single greatest reason was because I had very deep down in my soul buried a hope that even after fourteen months apart I could salvage my marriage. How naive of me.

My estranged wife and I went out several times during my stay in Cape Town and in hindsight I now recognise a recurring theme in how we engaged with one another. She had started to smoke, something I absolutely detest. She also continuously told me that she wasn't going to change and didn't see the need to. But all along her prerequisites for us to save our marriage was that I needed to change.

Each time that we met, when I said something that made her uncomfortable, she would use it as evidence that I hadn't changed, in fact I realise now that she needed to construct some reasoning that I hadn't changed because she didn't want the marriage to survive. But I beat myself up about the fact that I wasn't "improving" or changing myself fast enough. And that - my dear friends is the stark naked obvious evidence of emotional abuse.

She had not really interacted with me meaningfully in over a year. How could she really have known, By then I was already not eating meat and consuming very little sugar.

Thing is I also couldn't really tell if she had changed in any way at all except of course for the smoking and the copious amounts of alcohol that she was consuming. It was clear to me that either she was just behaving in the selfish manner I had become accustomed to during our marriage and taking advantage of the huge income she was generating and not having to share to live in a manner she preferred or she was behaving like this to cover up her pain - possibly even from herself.

By this time I had already stopped eating meat. I still ate fish and drank some alcohol socially. But my respect for my body was real and despite the fact that she was spending a significant amount on a personal trainer, she was still abusing her body. I knew my inner change was happening and so was hers, we were simply moving in polar opposite directions and yet the pain of relationship breakdown was so intense that I continued to feel like a failure. During this time was my birthday. She didn't send a message, a card, a greeting, a text. Nothing. I still send her a message. even if its just my a messenger App. But I do it nevertheless. Its an act of respect to me and our relationship and to her too, that her existence matters to me, even now,

Its nine months later and I see things very differently. I have progressed to nearly vegan status. Its no big thing and few others know, after all its for me. It didn't happen overnight. I simply started eating less meat, and then even less and even less. The whammy to this is that I'm also gluten free. That was also a personal choice and an experiment and again it has been a gradual change. Both these things she will probably never know. She will never see the change it has made to my health (despite that being one of her prerequisites), the slow change to my weight and also the way I see myself.

On Tuesday I will have my hair cut. Short. For me. I have always kept my hair long to please others. My mother, my brothers, my husband and my wife, and then even my children. But I have always preferred short hair. So for me I am going to cut my hair short.

In the last two years, I have become a vegan, lost weight, started to love myself, as I love others, I have started to wear contact lenses, buy clothes I like, and now I am committing the final act of forging my independent identity - me, what I want, who I am by cutting my hair short. very, very short.

I have always felt the need to reinforce my femininity. As a child I was a tomboy. Even as a teenager I used to race BMX. I rode motorcycles. I preferred boots and jeans and secretly wore them when I could get away with it. Even when I finally came out as a lesbian, I retained the strong feminine identity. Why? because I felt that I needed to to be able to relate to my partner. What utter rubbish and again how naive.

I am now emerging as me, myself. I still struggle with aspects of myself and yet I have changed, because change happens anyway.

My ex will never know or see the changes, but others will meet someone that she never has. They say that every cell in your body replaces itself every seven years. withing five years now, she will never have toched my body at all - how enlightening.






Ruth Richards-Hill

Ruth Richards-Hill

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