The Other Shoe

or as I've always called it 'too damn good syndrome'.  You know, that feeling that everything in your life is going so well, that any moment now it's bound to crash down around you?  Sometimes -- okay always -- it's some irrational fear that something awful has happened any time someone you love is late getting home, or just an overall panic that somewhere, something is going wrong in a way that will cascade into your life? 

Other times, it's that completely irrational fear that all the people who've told you they love you, who think they love you, don't really know you, because you've kept the darkest, ugliest parts of who you are some kind of deep, dark secret.  Well, you think you have anyway; usually the people who love us, already know those things about us. We only think we've kept the secret because they love us enough not to talk about our touchy spots.

I've had those irrational fears my entire life.  That kind of indefinable fear that when things are good, it's just the set up for a really good crash, as if the whole universe were plotting against me.  In the book, The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce, the author talks about this mindset, and says it's very common in children of divorce. I'd always thought it was some kind of worth issue I grappled with, an accumulation of all my fears that I'm not really someone people could love, not if they knew who I really am, how I really feel. 

I don't really know that it's fallout from my parents' divorce -- given how late in my childhood that came. More likely, it's fallout from their awful marriage.  Whatever the reason, I've come to see it's something we can absolutely hand down to our own kids.  If our attitude is one of pervasive distrust and fear of rejection, our kids pick up on that.  

I do know it's not a mindset Gary shares. He does expect things to work out most of the time.  He views my fears as superstition at times, I know.  And maybe they are.  I seem to have this contradictory idea that if I do everything right, touch all the stones, that's my only hope of a good outcome, of safety.  And yet, when everything is going right, I'm sometimes terrified that nothing I do will be enough, that it will all crash down in some confirmation that I was never really meant to be happy, that everything I touch is somehow tainted. 

I spent years, decades really, thinking I was unique in feeling like a fraud, in pretending things were fine and that disaster wasn't lurking around every corner.  Maybe I'm not. Maybe there are other people who feel those same fears, or people who used to feel that way and overcame it. 

I've been working diligently the past few years to free myself of this feeling.  One of the first things I learned is that I had made a career of hiding big parts of who I am. In a childhood where I was frequently told I was too sensitive, too soft, that life's "not like you think it is" I'd learned to survive by not sharing the things that made me weird or different. I did my best to escape notice, to laugh off the mistakes that I made without letting on that really I believed I needed to be perfect to be good enough.

I'm not convinced all this is the result of my parents' divorce, or even of their bad marriage.  I think it's more a sign of our culture's insanity around individuality, some kind of collective fear of being rejected, of not being good enough.  And I think it starts very early in life, when we begin to think we can "mold" our children to become what we want them to be, or to fit into the small bit of space we have available for them; when we want them to fill our need to feel loved, or to impress others.  

I'm beginning to move past that, to finally trust that I don't need to be perfect to have a right to relax into who I am.  It's taken me most of 50 years, tho, and it seems there must be an easier path to it.

looking for a partner

In Unexpected Legacy of Divorce, the author writes "I was surprised to discover that they [children of divorce] often go in search of partners raised in stable, intact families." She also writes about how many children of divorce come up with a shopping list of sorts for a partner.  

In reading this, I see I did exactly that, though not the first time.  When I married the first time, I had only one item on my list. It wasn't even a good item, like honest, or hard-working.  I figured all I wanted was someone who wasn't smart enough, cunning enough, for head games. I'd had enough head games to last me several lifetimes.  Sure, I knew people were supposed to want to marry someone who was honest, loving, kind, trustworthy, hard-working, patient; but I never expected someone like that really existed, that men like that could be found anywhere.  Besides, if such a man existed he wouldn't want me, and he'd be much too boring.  

After my divorce, I made a list of qualities I wanted in a partner -- at least 4 yrs older than I was, never married, no kids, a nice extended family.  I didn't really consider whether or not my intended's parents should still be married, but as it happens that's been a real blessing to me.  


When Gary and I began dating, I quickly realized that I needed very much to become more the kind of person I wanted to be with; to be more trusting, more honest, to learn those skills I'd never learned growing up. It wasn't fair for me to ask someone to be all those things, unless I was really able to be honest, sane and patient.  While I've grown a lot, in some regards I'm still a work in progress.

I also found that being in a relationship and being happy required more awareness, more honesty with myself, more introspection than I'd expected.  I was constantly called to review my own part in a disagreement, to ask myself what I really wanted. Did I want to be right, or did I want to see a new side of things, to revisit my own expectations and maybe even change them? 


I wonder if having a list of qualifications for a partner, an actual checklist, is something other people do.  Or is the process better integrated for people who grew up in a happy marriage? Do those fortunate people just intuitively know when it's right?  Clearly, Gary didn't have such a rigid list or I'd never have made the cut, not in 1986 anyway. 


Is that awareness of who we need to be, not just who we want to be with, something our kids will just pick up by our example, or do we need to talk about it with them?  Maybe it depends on the kid. 

Does having happily married parents help?

In an early chapter of the book I referenced in my earlier post , the author writes that kids who grew up in happy, intact marriages "brought a confidence that they had seen it work, that they had some very clear ideas about how to do it" (it being marriage).

And I had to disagree with that, at least in our experience. Gary's parents are very happily married, for almost 59 yrs now, and they are very good at being married. At the same time, tho, Gary had decided by age 30 (when we met) that he'd likely never marry, and had no confidence that he'd know how to be happily married. I remember him saying "Think about it -- everyone gets married thinking it will last forever, and half of them are wrong. What makes me any smarter?" So, even tho he'd grown up in a very happy marriage (really, his folks are so very good at being married) he had no clue how to actually make a happy marriage, and no confidence he could actually do it himself.

I, on the other hand, grew up in the marriage from hell, which became an even uglier divorce just as I was leaving home (really, you'd not have thought it possible to make things worse than they were, but my parents found a way). I married young and divorced fourteen months later, after the abuse expanded from only me to our baby. Statistically, there was no reason for me to expect I'd be good at marriage someday, and yet I had the greatest confidence that we'd marry and it would last, because there was no way in this world I was going to divorce ever again. Not even an option. And because I was sure I wanted Gary to be here forever.

First, I pointed out to him that not everyone gets married expecting forever -- I well remember standing at the courthouse for my first wedding, thinking "Please, please, one of us has to have the good sense to say NO!" Then we both said "I do" in our turn, and my very next thought was "What the hell have I done?" Thinking I couldn't be the only person who had that experience (I later learned that I certainly wasn't alone in that very bad choice to say yes, when every right voice in my head was screaming NO) I figured somehow I'd still convince Gary to marry me (and I did, but not that day).

It's a question Gary and I revisit often -- how is it that he grew up with such happily married parents, and yet he didn't feel like he had any idea how to be well-married? I've known his Mom and Dad (they are now my Mom and Dad) for over 25 years now, and I can see how they do it, but that's likely because after my early divorce, I made a point of figuring out how I was going to do this right, and because I'm a people watcher. We ask ourselves this question because we want to be sure we are helping our boys to understand how to be happily partnered someday. This is especially important, given how many of their friends come from divorced homes, even in the unschooling community where we spend our time. It's very possible they'll choose a partner who comes from a divorced home, maybe even a home where their grandparents were also divorced, given the statistics that say children of divorce are more likely to divorce later.

What answers do we have to this question so far?

Well, in recent years we've seen several marriages end, and each time, we find ourselves reassuring the boys that our marriage is good, that we'd never consider divorce. We answer their questions honestly, and share stories and examples from earlier times, both in our marriage and during our 8 years dating. After all, we have 15 years of stories that pre-date the boys' presence or memories, stories they'll only know if we tell them.

We talk about commitment, promises, how much work it is to live with someone else, even when you are over-the-moon crazy about him or her. About those days when you feel tired or grumpy, or when every sound makes you tired; when the kids are sick or the bills pile, or you get news that the one who works is being laid off. We talk about how you each keep the other's secrets, that you've each agreed to be the other's fall guy, that we try always to keep in mind to treat your partner the way you'd like to be treated; that it helps to remember how kind he was to me when I was sick, or tired, or pregnant. We tell them the whole point of being married is that someone does have your back, so it's important to have theirs.

We also have something more to share with our boys -- my past object lessons. I share from my childhood, talking about the things I saw that didn't work. I share from my first marriage, honestly telling them it takes two people to make a marriage, and that when it doesn't work, it's never just one person's fault. Because I truly do believe that, I'm required to be honest about my part in why things didn't work, about why I chose to leave that marriage and get a divorce. I can't simply villainize my ex, and say it was all my fault.

So, for those of you who are happily married, with kids -- how do you impart to your kids what makes a good marriage?

For those of you blessed enough to grow up in a happy marriage -- did watching your parents together show you what makes a happy marriage? Were there things they said or did that helped you understand marriage?

For those of you who, like me, came either from unhappy marriages or divorce -- what did you take away from those years that gives you hope for your current marriage? Or maybe you had a first (or even current) not-so-happy marriage, and you learned lots there.

What would or do you tell your kids about what it takes to make marriage good? Or do you feel it needs to be said at all; is it maybe enough to just live it as an example?

Thoughts on marriage & divorce

I just started reading a book, recommended by a friend, titled The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce, by Judith S Wallerstien, Julia M. Lewis, and Sandra Blakeslee. It's the results of a 25 yr study of the lives of children whose parents divorced; there are two earlier books, compiled at other times during the study. I notice a book mentioned on the flyleaf, The Good Marriage, by Sandra Blakeslee. I'll check my library to see if I can borrow it, and if I get as much from it as I'm getting from it, maybe I'll do some follow up on good marriage, rather than questions drawn from a book on divorce

Interestingly, altho my parents didn't divorce until just as I was leaving home (I'm the oldest) and I'd always thought they waited much too long to divorce, I saw myself in the first few pages of the book. Makes me wonder if truly awful, miserable marriages are no better than divorce. If so, "just" staying together "for the kids" isn't enough -- you need to figure out how to be happy where you are, too. It's an interesting read so far.

I started making notes as I read, for a later conversation with the friend who'd recommended, and before I knew it, I was composing a facebook note in my head, which I quickly decided would make a better blog post. Today, I'm feeling ambitious enough to want to have this conversation as a series of blog posts on marriage, and divorce. Because it's so much more fun to converse with the voices that originate outside my head, I'm inviting people to comment on my posts, and I'll be sharing a link for each one on facebook.

Off to write that first post!