Our Life Isn’t What It Used To Be

8 years ago we were just kids. We were getting ready to run off to the courthouse with our closest friends and family. We were so eager to combine our bank accounts and change my last name to match yours. We were so incredibly in love with each other. And now 8 years later, I’m sitting here wondering how the hell we got here. 

Today we should be celebrating us and how far we’ve made it. We should be exchanging gifts and I love you’s. We should be thankful for a decision we made that would forever change our lives for the better, but instead it turned out to be a decision that gave us so many life lessons. Instead of celebrating 8 years of marriage we’re announcing our separation and eventual divorce. 

After my hospital stay and all of the challenges that come with having a preemie, I really thought we would come out on top. I thought it was a situation that we would grow through and that would bring us closer, but I was so wrong. It only helped you come to the conclusion of what I didn’t even realize was coming. I was prepared to continue choosing you and work on things while you were preparing to let me go. 

I had pictured what our anniversary would look like this year so many times and I never pictured it like this. I pictured us going out to dinner like we always did and being proud of the beautiful life we had with two kids. Our first wedding anniversary with two kids. But now we’re discussing coparenting and I’m wondering what I’m going to do to keep myself busy today, so I don’t have to think about how this all went downhill. 

This wasn’t supposed to be us.

Your pictures are off the walls and our wedding rings are in a drawer, but everything in this house still reminds me of the life we made together. We went through so many things that typically tear couples apart that I never expected anything to break us. Maybe that was me being naive or maybe I just truly believed in us that much, but either way it kills me that I was wrong. 

I never would have thought that on this day I would ever be mourning the loss of our marriage rather than celebrating it. I can still hear so many people saying, “Don’t get married yet, you’re too young. It’ll never work out.” And I hate it SO much that they were right. It is the worst possible “I told you so” I could ever hear. Today will always be so much different than I would’ve ever pictured it and that absolutely breaks my heart. 

I know the day will come when we’ve moved on and our lives are completely different, but today it still stings so much. I just hope that 8 years from now this is a decision we are grateful for and that it was for the better.