The anniversary of my divorce

I got married on February 29, 1996 to a man that knew, from the time we started dating in 1991, that I would be his wife. (Sounds like a recipe for "Happily Ever After" doesn't it?) Why did we choose that date? Because we could!

Before we began to plan the wedding I was in the process of applying to various post-graduate programmes and took pains to point out that if I was accepted, I would go study. Ironically, I heard nothing from any of the schools I had applied to until I returned from our honeymoon. It never occurred to me (I blame it on impetuous youth) not to go.

Those early days were filled with entertaining friends and as the last couple in his circle of friends to get married we would get more teasing than normal. I remember at one such get together someone asking, "What finally made you go ahead?" And with my usual bluntness, me responding with, "He wore me down!" He was quite proud of that, saying that if he had not been persistent when I wanted out, we would not have made it to where we were. Even then I knew there was something missing but could not put my finger on it.

While studying, during one of those all-night conversations that can range from the hilariously funny to the extra deep that students seem to love, one of my flatmates asked if my initial attraction to my husband was physical rather than to his personality. It was then that it hit me like a tonne of bricks that I got married to keep a friendship alive that should have remained platonic.

Once that light bulb went off in my head, there was no "unknowing" the truth, so I returned home at the end of a year that was one of the best in my life and went through the motions which was not fair to either of us. July 1999 was when I finally had the courage to say the words, "I can't do this anymore." I had never been so scared but as they came out of my mouth I felt a freedom that I don't even know how to describe.

My court date was January 2000 and when I woke up on the morning of February 26 of that same year I was a free woman.

All of this to say that every February is bittersweet for me ... I used to sink into a black hole because of the fact that it is the anniversary of a failed marriage. It also marks years of learning from my mistakes, appreciating who I am, what is important to me and most importantly trusting that voice inside that sounds the quiet alarm when all is not well.

I am no longer overly introspective.  February is now what it is, just another month on the calendar.

Oh, and for all of you who did the maths, yes, I never did make it to my first anniversary ...