Day 15 – Monday 23rd April 2007

I returned to work on the Monday as agreed. I needed to try and get some sort of semblance of normality back into my life; I was sick of feeling as if I was in a parallel universe that I would soon wake up from; and I knew that teturning to work would help me come to terms with the fact that this shit was reality and it wasn’t going to change. I really was on my own.

By now Danny had contacted Della and arranged for his stuff to be collected from her house; it appeared someone from his family was going to collect it on the Monday as I returned to work, a part of me was glad that I was not going to be there. I always believed that Danny would not collect his stuff; that all the time it was there across the road there was hope; and now that hope was gone.

When I got to work everyone rallied round me and was so kind; with my two closest colleagues and friends, Sherrie,  and Hannah, acting as my bouncers; they wouldn’t let anyone near me and one look from them told  people there would be trouble if they made me cry.

But nobody intentionally wanted to make me cry; my eyes were  doing that all by themselves.

So many people came to see me, to hug me, some to tell me that it had happened to them, and that I can get through it; I cannot begin to describe the kindness that I felt from those people; and I used their kindness and compassion to give me strength to get through the day.

I needed to work, I needed money and my contract of twenty hours a week was not going to enable Ethan and I to survive, let alone pay the huge mortgage I would have to take on. Even on my first day all of my colleagues rally round and are immediately there offering me an increase in hours on a flexible basis, so that if I cannot cope I can go home.

One of the people that I worked closely with came to see me and suggested I  make contact with Occupational Health for an urgent referral to a counselling service. She could see that I was just in a very bad place so she called them for me and said that they would be in touch within two days with an appointment. Looking back now I think that May pulled some rank and called them afterwards, because she was so worred about me and the fact that I was not eating, the weight was, quite literally falling off me;  by the time I got home I received a call asking me to go to see them the the following day after work.

So the day after my return when I leave work I went to see the Counsellor. I had the same dress on that I wore to the solicitor’s. This dress was starting to represent me, something that I had left behind, had let go, like I had left myself behind, and let myself go. Now it gives me comfort because every time I put it on I know I look better and better in it.  I cannot eat, the food is like cardboard in my mouth,  and I am also stepping liking a maniac because it helps me cope, and  is something that I have control over, as I have control  over nothing else.

When I get to the Counsellor’s house I just cry throughout the session. The counsellor explains to me that she thinks that Danny thought that I was too good for him and that “it is often the case in situations such as these that he has left you for someone who he will think he is superior to; someone who is perhaps not as pretty, nor as intelligent as you; a person that he has confidence he will keep. ”

She showed me with her hands, that I was ‘up here’ and Danny was ‘down here’, and that if he was with ‘Her’ the situation would be reversed. I think basically she was saying a lot of men go off with ugly women!

Well where ‘Her’ and I are concerned that makes sense! I get it now! Danny needs to feel top dog, and he was never going to be that with me! But he could be it with ‘Her’ ‘She’ never seemed to be the brightest fucking button in the box!  I smiled to myself when I remembered that one of her favourite sayings was ‘I don’t get it..’

When I get home I call my sister and tell her this revelation, and she tells me that she knew that all along!

I realise that what the Counsellor had said was probably on the ball. Danny had said how much he hated  it when I got an admiring glance; I thought back to that conversation before ‘The War’ broke out when Danny said that ever since we had been married he wondered if I would be there when he came home, because he always felt that I was too good for him; the Counsellor had got it spot on.

I remembered when Danny left he said as he was leaving that he was taking this option because he was terrified that I would do to him what he had done to me, and he just could not bear it. It was starting to make sense now, Danny had run away because he was afraid, so he thought that he would take the easy option. What a stupid fucking mistake to make!

I feel that I am getting stronger all the time and I wonder if wearing the dress that I wore to see the solicitor to my appointment with the Counsellor is an omen; and is the fact that it is loose on me now even more of an omen? I feel good in that dress, think of all the times that ‘She’ brought up how much weight ‘She’ had lost, constantly rubbing my face in it as I got fatter. Well here I am, thinner than her now, and I know that I look better than she ever will.

I will be stronger, I will get my career back, I will become my own person, and my God I will look good when I’m doing it. And Danny will realise exactly how much he has lost!!

So I get on the stepper and make sure that I work off over two hundred calories by stepping to the ‘Pussy Cat Doll’s’ “I don’t Need A Man.”

I don’t!

Rosie

Making This Better the book is now available including the journal entries for the first 5 years of our recovery & the whole 21 days of ‘The War’. Available internationally in paperback and ebook  at Amazon and Barnes & Noble also available at Xlibris and Apple Books for iPad and Waterstones Bookstores for click & collect