He left last night, and I feel like I just want to lay down and die right now. But for the kids, because I'm all they have, and how can I abandon them too? I don't know how to do this though. I don't know what to do. I don't want to do anything at all. I am back in the grip of grief. I don't feel like I can take care of myself or anyone else. I want someone to take care of me. How am I going to do this?

3:51 p.m. - Surviving

I am barely hanging on. I hate to say that, to be that kind of mother, but that doesn't change it. I can't think. I'm not good. I'm so scared I'm going to lose the ability to function at all. The cracks in my spirit are deepending, widening, all originating at the gaping hole that was my hears and where it connected to John. He pulled away and took my heart with him, and I'm emotionally bleeding to death. I don't want to be here.

I've been doing laundry in between checking email. I debated whether to do his, but his mom said she would do it if he asked. That defeats the purpose of him being responsible for himself. He would probably resent me for it, so I've been doing it. As is well documented, I never liked laundry chores, but it's worse to see his things and know they are goig away, and I won't be washing them anymore. My underwear was tangled in his and I broke into tears as I pulled them apart to fold. I thought about keeping a shirt to smell him, but that may be a bad idea, like all my ideas seem to be.

I have been smelling his pillow. I cried and cried and feared I would wash his scent away. Maybe that's for the best, but right now I am trying to hold onto these remnants of him. It's my only way to have him at all--smelling his scent, touching his clothes--a shabby substitute for what was.

I can't even fathom life without him right now. I've tried to think of it, and the thought is overrun with hope that he will come back. The odds are against it; I know. But my desperations isn't letting me consider being without him, alone in this faraway place with two kids. I'm isolated and abandoned. My trust is shattered. My feelings of worth are so low. It's hard to imagine a life other than the one I dreamed.

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One Year Ago Today: