About me.

I’m a mom, a grandmother and a retired high school teacher. I am also divorced after 30 years of marriage to the man I considered the love of my life. My name is Pat. I decided to write about my divorce for several reasons. My altruistic reason is that I would like for others who have been dumped by their spouses to know that they are not alone, that they are entitled to every imaginable emotion and that they’re all normal under the circumstances. My selfish reasons are: I have kept journals throughout this journey and have discovered that I like to write. And I find it cathartic to write about my experiences.

My hope is that I will be able to help someone along the way. If so, it will be worth the writing.

15 June 2018 — It’s been almost eight years since I wrote the above description. All of it was, and still is, true. But I’m so much more than that. The pain I felt then was palpable and I was having a difficult time knowing who and what I was. I’m happy to say that I’ve worked through the pain and the anger. Some days I still feel a little sad about the abrupt dissolution of my marriage but I no longer want to do bodily harm to my ex-husband and his now wife. If anything, I feel a bit sorry for them. Life has not been particularly kind to them these last years. I hope the last two sentences will be the last time I feel compelled to talk about them.

So…who am I? I’m a feminist. A liberal Democrat. An activist. I’m an outspoken supporter of Human Rights and Equal Rights. A card-carrying member of the ACLU. A conservationist – I support Sierra Club and The Nature Conservancy. (Global warming and one-use plastics keep me awake at night.) I don’t have a lot of money but most of my donated dollars go to Habitat for Humanity. (In my opinion, Jimmy Carter does it right.)

I’m tough and soft. I’m opinionated. Sometimes I get so excited about a conversation that I interrupt. I drive my daughters nuts. I love whole-heartedly and unconditionally. I try not to hate. I keep remembering my mom telling us not to be hateful. I have to admit, though, that not hating President #45 while he does so many hateful things to our country, our world, nature, etc., takes a lot of energy. Yet I try.

So here I am now. I was all this eight years ago, too, but I couldn’t say it then because I was so bruised and beaten and scared that I didn’t know who I was.

Oh, one more thing – I now have two great grandsons. Add great grandma (GG) to my list. They make me so happy.

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