I am separating from my partner of five years this weekend. Madeleine, my sister, is coming to help me move home to my family’s house which is one hour north of the house in Cape Elizabeth where I’ve spent the past three years living with Joe.
It’s hard to say why I’m ending it, other than to say, simply, there is someone else. And this someone else woke me up to a version of myself I simply had written off as nonexistent, unpractical, not important.
I will love Joe without end. I was prepared to spend my life with him and I can see clearly the transformation (for the better) which has happened in myself because of the partnership we worked so hard on for the past five years. I have so much humility, respect, sadness… Joe kept me safe. He’s cared for me and loved me unfailingly and he’s truly done the best he can to make me happy. And he has made me happy, but my capacity for joy in a partnership is greater than what he can provide.
I can’t speak for him, but I feel that I am not his best fit, just as I know he is not mine. Or it has nothing to do with fit… I have grown beyond the scope of the relationship and feel limited by our roles in it, and I have found someone else who has made me feel there are no limits in the world.
The gratitude I have for Joseph for our life together the past five years is overwhelming. He’s given me the opportunity to be a better partner to my someone else, he’s given me space to try on multiple versions of myself, he’s supported me through multiple crises, he’s been patient and kind, he’s funny, worldly, intensely smart, my family loves him, and he knows me better than anyone else.
I’m overwhelmed to the point of weak and trembly laugh/crying because I am so deepy saddened and humbled to end my relationship with this wonderful man and also because I am so incredibly, deliciously, expansively happy in the arms of my someone else. I’ve discovered something - uncovered something - started something; I’m embarking on something with someone, and I am deeply moved and I am deeply privileged to know these men, and to be known by them.
This will be uprooting and redefining, feelings to which I feel I’ve become accustomed, but the pain of breaking my heart from its union with Joe will be new and I’m already sickened by the hurt it will cause him.
But my someone is waiting for me, and the love I feel for him burns far brighter than this pain and sadness. Time heals. And I am so acutely aware of the HAPPINESS which awaits.
