9 Signs

I found a list this morning... Nine signs that your marriage might be over.

You'd think that I would already KNOW it's over by now... that I wouldn't constantly seek confirmation of that fact. I don't act unless I have analyzed everything thoroughly. The fact that I have filed tells me that I previously worked through this issue. Yet I found myself browsing over to that list to double-check my reasoning.

It was a good list, really:

1. You’ve “uncoupled.” (My first therapist called this disengaging... same thing.)
2. One spouse refuses to try. (He'd say that I refused to try, because I did TELL him that I didn't want joint counseling, and that I didn't want him to fix it. But I say he refuses to try, because he refuses to actually see that any of the issues are his, and he continues to work to blame me in every regard. Stalemate on this one.)
3. There’s a lack of respect in the relationship. (Bingo!)
4. You’re no longer a team. (We haven't been a team in ages. We have a monarchy and serfs.)
5. An unfaithful spouse keeps an ex-lover as a friend. (Actually me ending that friendship was the beginning of me actually facing everything that was going on. He was my crutch.)
6. No compromising in terms of wants and needs. (The Almighty Supreme Dictator does not compromise. Duh.)
7. One spouse is a serial cheater. (Even if that were the case, would it even be possible to call it cheating when no one really cares what the other person does?)
8. You disagree about whether to have children or not. (We have them. Haven't found a way to send them back yet. Besides... they were my buffer for years against him. I need my fellow serfs.)
9. You no longer communicate with each other. (According to him, "It's called KA-MEW-NE-KAY-SHUN!" Note the very obnoxiously stressed pronunciation. Which translated means, he talks, I listen, I respond, and he tells me why I am wrong until I agree with him. No, we don't communicate.)

Not that I really needed the validation... I KNOW that the truth is the truth... but yet I still seem to question myself. I hope someday I can actually hold the confidence inside me that I work so hard to portray to others.