I came back to my apartment and I realized that it has been 9 months since the start of my separation. Almost a year. I am in a very different spot now in my recovery. I’m starting to make friends, my apartment is actually clean, I’m fairly steady with work, and my relationship with my son has never been better.

I think how well I’m doing actually allowed a lot of grief to come back in today. Throughout this separation, my ex has treated me horribly and made my life a living hell. I recently started establishing boundaries with her around communication about our son and this has been such a healthy move for me.

She has still never held herself accountable for anything that happened in our relationship, blamed me for everything, and moved away from our relationship without a backward glance. She has been dismissive and has pretended as if she is the “victim” of our relationship. She cheated on me so many times during our relationship. She filed false allegations of DV against me. Classic narcissist tendencies. I think today I had the realization that I didn’t deserve how she treated me and that I actually deserved to be treated with compassion. I broke down crying for almost an hour with these realizations. I managed to hold myself through my grief.

I am grieving that broken wreck of a man that I was at the start of all of this. I am grieving that this person may never have enough self-reflection to recognize the pain she put me through. I am just grieving. Thank you all for listening.