Today is our wedding anniversary. See you in court.

So today, is our wedding anniversary. I’m not sure how to feel about this. This date has been looming on the calendar for a while and now that it’s here, it just feels weird. We’re in this crazy separated limbo because deep down, we’re both afraid to do what we have to do. Instead, I’m using this day to empower me and take the necessary legal action to put some closure on this whole mess.

I've immersed myself in emotion-provoking music with meaningful lyrics ever since I saw you last. It was the first time I had seen you in a couple months. And although we still share the same last name, we haven’t lived together in seven months. I was panic-stricken at the thought of seeing you. You definitely weren't expecting me. Since this day, your refusal to sign any papers has confused me and I have since discovered your sorry attempt to avoid me by obtaining a new phone inclusive with new number. How soon you underestimate my detective skills and intelligence.

I made a PROS and CONS list about you. The CONS far out-weigh the PROS. There are so many reasons we cannot work, but I can remember days where it seemed like there was no doubt that we could.

You were the first person I ever felt completely secure with. I knew you would never stray. I knew you loved me. I knew you desired me. Yet I continued to sabotage our life together. We had it all. The marriage, the house, friends, jobs, cars. I regret so many of my poor decisions and impulsivities. I resent your avoidance, ambivalence, and your endless supply of Budweiser.

We were a team. You were the brawn, I the brains. I know you remember all the talks we had. You always said that was one of the things we were good at. You showed me things I otherwise would have never seen. I like to think I did the same for you.

And now, we can't even be friends. The hatred your loved ones feel for me, coupled with the strong disdain mine feel for you, make it virtually impossible for us to coordinate any part of our lives together any longer. Let alone the intense resentment we feel towards one another. You resent me for loving another when it was already over between us. I resent you for not having the balls to officially end it and for choosing your addiction over me.

I know you still think about me. We've always "spoken" to one another through song. I know when certain songs surface on the radio, you can't escape the thought of me. I secretly like that you keep getting mail with my name on it because at that precise moment, you are forced to think of me.

Enough time has passed that I'm coming to terms with our separation. And while that last legal thread connecting us will eventually be severed, I fear how I will feel when that final thread is gone. Yet you've also made me believe that I am no longer a good person. You've manipulated your hypocritical wiles to effectively turn the table on everything that transacted between us, taking none of the blame for yourself. I've gone through my stages of grief: anger, guilt, sadness, denial. Have you?

Remember the last time we slow danced? I do. As usual, you were singing off key in my ear. I remember rolling my eyes. I took things like that for granted. Now I wish I could have that moment back. I don't even remember anymore what it feels like to have you touch me. Your constant physical touch provided a lot of affirmation for me. I'm not so sure anymore. You know I hate being unsure. You also know I hate change. You've had to press on and provide for yourself. You always had more drive than I did. I've had the luxury of taking a few steps back and time for myself with little to no responsibilities.


I looked up to you in so many ways. After a while, I became disappointed. Now thanks to you, I quickly skip over certain TV channels and NASCAR races. I don't listen to country music at all anymore because I know you still do. Certain grocery stores make me sick to walk into because of you. My heart falls into my stomach whenever I see an orange truck. I can't even tell you the last time I listened to "our song".

I long for us to be on the same wavelength we used to surf together on all the time. After I left you that day, I was traveling on snow-covered roads remembering how you used to call me at work to tell me to be careful on the way home. At that precise moment, my mind sent you the same message. Did you get it?

Alas, all of my wishes cannot come to fruition. I would at least be happy to know that from time to time, you think fondly of times we shared, and remember the good you loved about me. I think those things of you. Our inside jokes, our morse code by squeezing one another's hand, our nicknames, the good ole futon days and Hostess cupcakes. I know you well enough to know your bitter tone is just a front, especially after I found out you wanted to take your own life this past Christmas. You’re too damn stubborn for your own good. You’re too afraid to let your guard down.

The hardest is knowing the house we used to share is up for sale. It breaks my heart to know I abandoned not only the house, but also us. I sabotaged the good we had in exchange for what? Every single day, I wish things could just reverse themselves, to the good times at least. I know there isn’t anyone out there like you and when I reflect on your good qualities, it felt like you and I were supposed to be a forever thing. Yet I know better that this certainly wasn’t entirely my fault. I’ve let you make me believe it was for way too long. Now I know that my need to put my wants and needs on a pedestal are not unreasonable. It’s what I deserve.

You’ve gone out of your way to cut off all communicative ties with me. Yet my confusion lies in the fact that although you won’t talk to me or see me, in the eyes of the law, we’re still as one. This is the hardest for me to wrap my mind around and I sometimes feel as if I still hold some entitlement to you because of this. I wish we could just talk. I wish you had the balls to face me without running away or avoiding your problems. I wish you’d let down your walls and stop being so damn stubborn. I wish you’d admit that these past few years weren’t just a fluke. I need to hear you miss it too.

So as I sign this formal complaint for divorce to file at the courthouse, I bid you a happy anniversary and a fond “see you in court, m-effer!”

Keeping the letters to myself allows them to haunt me. (One month of letters)

I’ve had these writings for a while now. I have gone back to them from time to time. Keeping the letters to myself allows them to haunt me. It’s time to set them free so I can move on.

01-04-10

I miss you. I wanted to call you the minute I walked out of class today. I wanted to tell you that the minute I walked into the school it reminded me of you. I remember doing work there or attempting to do work and then calling you. It was around the first time we started talking on the phone. I could always just talk to you. I feel empty now.

01-05-10

When it was good I didn't even know how good it was at the time. I didn't allow myself to fully appreciate it because I was so wrapped up in being sad and mad and confused about her. Why don't I get it at the time it's good. Why do I wait? Why does it come to me when it's over? When it's too late? I miss you.

01.06.10

It's so hard for me to live in the moment. I'm constantly looking back in the past and letting feelings of regret control me and when I'm not doing that I'm looking to the future and letting feelings of fear control me. For some reason NOW is a scary place for me because it’s the most unfamiliar. Of course I know the past because I was there and I fear the future because of the past. And NOW is usually bad because I'm stuck in the past. If I could turn my brain off, like keep it from analyzing the past and assuming the future, then maybe I could actually focus on now? But obviously that can't happen I can't just turn my brain off. So somehow I have to train it like when it starts to go there I need to outsmart myself or trick myself. I'm not sure how to do this but I'm going to try.

If I think about NOW I know I'll never be with you. I'm not even sure we will ever be friends. I do know I’ll always wonder "what if"…what if I really gave you a chance? What if I really picked you? What if I didn't let her control me? What if… And it's those thoughts that make NOW hurt. But those thoughts are thoughts of the past and future. But…those thoughts define NOW. I'm still so confused. I miss you.

1-07-10

Today was tough. My roommate moved out which I thought would be a really good thing…well it is a really good thing it just makes me feel even more alone. I talked about you today to my therapist. I told her how much I respect you and how horrible I feel about what I did to you. She said it was bad timing. I agree. I just wonder if we will ever have the chance for good timing? I hope so.

01-10-10

I found the envelope you addressed to me, the one you sent the CD in. I ran my fingers over the writing and for a moment I felt close to you again. I keep thinking back to the day we were supposed to go snowboarding and how that was it. The day I lost you for good. But the confusing part is I was sure I had lost you before that day. I said it before but I'll say it again. I was heading back here just two days after we were supposed to hang out. And I got scared to death. This time not because she might find out but because I felt I didn't know you anymore and it would be a day of sarcasm and mean comments and there was no way I could handle that then leave and be back down here remembering you like that.

Why do I get so scared? Why does it seem I'm always making the wrong decision and then regretting it so much? I feel I have more regret than I do accomplishments. That's why I'm staying here and finishing what I came down here to do. I really considered running back home. I can't even go to the park without thinking of you. Thinking of how I'd call you and give you a play by play of what my dog was doing and you could really care less because you don't really even like dogs but you listened and you enjoyed it and that meant the world to me.

I want to contact you so bad. But I respect you. I hope you're doing well. I mean I really have no way of knowing but I hope you are happy and laughing. I love the way your face lights up when you laugh.

01-11-10

The days are getting easier which is something I never thought I'd be able to say. I know it's the increase of depression medicine and addition of anxiety meds. I'm not proud that it's the pills that's keeping me sane but at this point in my life I can use all the help I can get.

It does frighten me though, the fact that I'm completely unstable, anxious, depressed and scared without medicine. It's like I'm broken and the pills are there to fix me. I'm determined to learn the skills I need to in order to fix myself. But today I need them and today I'm doing good. And today is all that matters.

01.17.2010

I decided to stop writing you. But began to feel lonely and lost without putting my thoughts down because they just stayed in my head. I didn't have anyone to share them with. Even though you're not here and you want nothing to do with me, I like to at least pretend I'm talking to you because talking to you was one of my most favorite things.

01.17.2010

And when I think I couldn't miss you more...YOU sign on. I know that sounds so corny but it's true. You signed on once more that I noticed, put your status to "away" right away with the message of "snowmobiling".

Your button changed from green to red right away again just now but I still feel close to you when it's red. It's when you're not on that I hurt.

This is my attempt to let go, to forgive me.

This always starts out as a letter to you and ends up a letter to myself as well. Truth is I don’t have many broken connections in my lifetime. But of the few, you are one…and one that bothers me greatly. My subconscious beats me up with you at least once a month – more frequently, once a week.

I don’t know why I have allowed myself to fixate on making this connection. On healing something you don’t even know exists for me. Or maybe you do know because I’ve reached out to tell you on occasion. I can only assume you’ve rejected the attempts because I am a nothing to you.

My waking mind understands. My sleeping mind does not.

All I can figure in regards to my need for a peaceful connection here is this:

I interacted with you at a time in my life where I was so absent from my truths – I didn’t know myself. I wish around you I had been different. I wish that some of my reasons for acting had been clearer to me at the time. I wish we had been friends. I wish that I had been friends with myself and made friendships based on the real me and not the front that I put on.

You happen to be one of the people I know I purposely acted out against in my struggle to find myself. And I hate that. And I think somewhere in me I believe we would have been friends.

It doesn’t matter to you, no. But it does to me.

So, this is my apology either not received or unaccepted. Yet, as I start to write it I realize that it is as much to me as it is to you.

I am sorry that I acted the way that I did to you simply because I didn’t know me. I’m sorry I fought for something that I didn’t even care to have – when really a friendship with you would have been more satisfying. I’m sorry that this is pathetic and prolonged – existing 15 years after we even saw each other last.

I’m sorry that my mind does this to me and I can’t move on from it. That it carries so much meaning. That a portion of my worth is defined by it - that it consumes me and doesn’t really matter much at all.

I don’t even like looking back on these words because they don’t make much sense in the context of who I am, but they are true.

This is my attempt to let go of something that doesn’t really exist in the first place. This is my attempt to forgive me in my youth, and quite possibly even now.

Keep watching over me, and I will always do my best to make you proud.

It’s been fifteen years.

Since that day you were supposed to pick me up. But you never showed which was typical.

I remember standing by the window watching the snow hit the ground. I was so excited to go Christmas shopping with you. I went to bed that night understanding that you were a busy person, and that there would be other days we could go.
But there wouldn’t be another day. Waking up to my mother crying, explaining that I was never going to see you again was something I didn’t expect, or understand. I didn’t get why God took you from me and why there were so many people crying. Four year olds don’t really understand the concept of death, and it took me years to truly understand it.

The wake was hard. I remember sitting on sissy’s lap and being told to remain quiet. I wanted to run around and play, but was told to sit there. Tears were running down everyone’s faces like a waterfall. Everyone was hugging me and telling me how sorry they were. Sorry for what? They aren’t the one’s that took you from me.
They told me that your heart had stopped. Mommy said it’s because you smoked too much. That doesn’t stop me from smoking a pack a day now though. Like father like daughter right?

You were only 42. You had so much more life to live. A life with me, and the rest of your family. It fell apart; the whole family stopped talking when you died. I saw you sister the other day; she didn’t even know it was me.

So my question is why, why did you leave? You left me with her, who reminds me every day that I was a mistake. And that she wishes you were here and she was gone. Well, I wish you were here too.

No one ever told me I wasn’t allowed to date, no one gave me my first boyfriend that “shotgun” lecture. You weren’t here to see me graduate or help me pick out my first car. A psychiatrist once told me that I felt uncomfortable around men because you weren’t in my life. I was never athletic; mom told me playing inside was more fun than going to parks. I thought that as years pass mourning is supposed to go away, but why is it that I mourn more now than I ever have? I miss you every day.

I go to your gravesite a lot. I play songs that mom told me were your favorite. I don’t have much of yours, a few pictures and a raggedy flannel. Sometimes I forget what you looked like, how you smelled, what you personality was like. People say I look like you, I wish we could compare face to face.

Who will walk me down the aisle when that time comes? Who will give my husband-to-be that “if you hurt her I know where to bury you” look?

I wish I could have a conversation with you, one last time. I’m older now, and I think we would get along great. I miss going to work with you, and spending the night at your house. I remember you used to make me giggle a lot, and that I was always happy when you were around. I remember the birthday where you smashed the cake in my face, and mom got mad because it ruined my dress.
I miss you more than words can explain.

Keep watching over me, and I will always do my best to make you proud.

To the one that I still love:

To the one that I still love:

I am writing to tell you how I feel even though you may never read this. I just need to put it all down on paper as sort of a closure thing for myself.

You were the first guy I said “I love you” to and actually meant it. I felt love within myself that I wanted to share with you so much and I know you had it within you too. You expressed your love in so many ways and always made me feel more beautiful than any guy ever had. Things were great for the first few months and I thought our relationship would never end. After the first few months everything went downhill, and it has taken me a long time to realize why. We were fighting every day. We would call each other up and within the first five minutes we would argue about the pettiest and most childish things. I know realize that we never talked about anything that bothered us until we started fighting. It was like a war, everything we really thought would come up in harsh ways when we were fighting, and this was the wrong way to “talk” about these things. I truly loved you even if it didn’t seem like it when I said the harsh things I did. I was wrong. I will admit and I am truly sorry for all the things I said to you to make you feel so down. I know you are sorry for the things you said too as you have expressed that many times, an I have grown to forgive you. When we were together I felt so secure and happy and even when we fought so much I didn’t want to end things and let you go because I was already attached. When I finally let you go, it was the hardest thing I ever had to do, but I knew it was the right thing to do because you weren’t getting any better at telling the truth. For so long I hated you for lying and I blamed you completely for our relationship falling apart, and now I know I had a big part in it too. I never should have let you go because you only got worse. I blame myself today because I feel that if I had not let you go then you wouldn’t have spiraled downward so far. It took me so long to get over our relationship and be happy again with someone else. I have not yet had another relationship as long as ours and I will tell you I miss it a lot. I still miss you tons and wish everything was back to the way it was in the first month we were together, but sadly the past is the past and there is no way to change it. I always thought we would never speak to each other again after our relationship ended so dramatically. I thought I would never be able to forgive you or be friends with you because of how devastated I was over what happened. It took almost a year for us to both be able to be friends after all that had happened, but I’m glad we got past everything. We finally became cool again at the end of last school year. I was having a really good day at school and I was waling in the hallway and I saw you I knew that I had finally forgiven you and moved on completely, I couldn’t help but smile at you. Surely enough at the end of the day you sent me a text and it was nice to see a friendly compliment, instead of the harsh insults we used to send back and forth. From that day we were sort of friends, but summer came around and we hung out and had tons of fun just like we used to.All the memories of when we were together came back to me and I wanted to kiss you and hold you like before because for the first time it felt like we were still together in the relationship that was so amazing. I had to restrain myself and make myself snap back into reality but it became easier the more we hung out. The start of this year had come around after all the summer memories and I had never saw you in school or heard about you, I truly began to get worried. I finally found out you are at a school where you are happier and are doing well. It took a lot of asking around but I am glad I finally got an answer.

The main purpose I am writing this letter is because I have been thinking a lot about you lately and I know deep within my heart I truly still love you. I just couldn't help but reminisce about our past together. It's weird because even though I have moved on and can be happy with someone else, I can also still be happy with you and go back to old times. I am glad you are doing well and I know you are happy without me and have moved on, and knowing your happy makes me happy. Maybe one day there will be a chance we get back together, but that's up to fate to decide and whatever happens, it happens for a reason, and i am completely fine with that. Looking past all the negatives, I have come to realize that you really changed my life in so many ways and I can't thank you enough for that. I love you and I hope everything works out for you, because you deserve it.

It is difficult to forgive someone you’ve never met.

To Anonymous,

We have never met each other, but I suspect we know quite a bit about each other. Five years ago you met the love of my life and you pursued him. He holds a lot of the blame too for the betrayal and for the aftermath of pain that followed and still twinges in odd moments even to this day. He holds a lot of blame. But so do you, you who knew he was taken and selfishly decided to pursue him anyways. You who knew what pain you had caused and continued to try to take and take and take. I feel some pity for you now, knowing that you got nothing but loneliness and misery from it too. I know you suffered for t his. But what kind of woman are you, who would poach on another woman’s man? Where is your self-respect? Where is your honor?

Now, I look back on that time and I must give thanks as well. For if my (now) husband and I had not gone through such a difficult period, our separation would not have bore the fruits that it did. We would not have had to re-evaluate so much, we would not have learned so much, and we ultimately would not have become nearly so strong as we are now. Our relationship would have faltered, and even if it had lead to marriage it would have easily broken. But now I have faith. Now I have trust. Now I have a depth of love I never knew was possible. And so while that time was a time of pain, it was also the best thing we could have gone through and I do not regret it. It made us who we are today.

So in the end, all I really want to be able to do is forgive you. I have tried many times, but it is difficult to forgive someone you’ve never met. I wish I could meet you, to say these words to you, and then to forgive you and finally find release.

-Anonymous

Dad...Please don’t leave me.

Dear Dad,
As the prodigal child that could do no wrong in your eyes, you’ve always justified and made excuses for my actions and behaviors. So much so, that even I’m starting to believe my own lies.

You’re not the emotional type and don’t understand my emotional ways. In the past few years though, you’ve delicately tried to ease my depression and anxiety-ridden woes. You did it the only way you knew how … money.

My whole life you’ve bailed me out from every situation I’ve turned into an utter catastrophe. Or you’ve protected me from getting too deep into trouble. You’ve invested thousands of dollars into me. Unfortunately, I wasn’t brought up to be grateful and appreciative. Instead, I’ve come to selfishly expect those extensions of monetary donations and bailouts.

I’m so desperate to make you proud, yet am terrified you’ll see me for who I really am and reject me. My pathological lying is out of control just to keep up your impression of me as “the good daughter”.

I’ve become so dependent on you. We haven’t always gotten along; in fact we butt heads a lot when I was younger. You secretly wished I had been a boy and made me fulfill your dreams to make me the same star athlete you had once been. You were disappointed and uninterested when my love was music. But even when we were at our worst, I still fiercely craved your approval.

I’m petrified of you dying because only then will I finally know what it’s like to feel loss and suffer through something that you can’t help me out of.

Everyone else calls me out on my shenanigans. You make me feel like I haven’t done anything wrong and that it’s someone else’s fault. This theory hasn’t been healthy for my mental wellness, but at times has been the only false sense of confidence I’ve had.

You’ve never said “I love you” and I keep longing for the day that you do. I’ve learned to see through the things you DO say and translate those to how you feel about me.

Please don’t leave me. The day you leave this Earth, so will the smoke and mirrors surrounding me. I’m scared to death of how I will be revealed to the world when you are no longer here to protect me.

I’m sorry for all the lies. And I’m sorry for not telling you all of this sooner. But you’re the only stable male figure that’s ever been in my life and I love you.


Love, 
Your Daughter