faith – By Autumn Rain

It’s hard to imagine what sort of future I want, especially because the premises of my circumstances keep changing and throwing me for a loop. There are other factors as well, like what I think is realistic, what I can handle, and what I think I deserve.

I don’t think that I have a good grasp of reality. Maybe I am that talented, driven, and lucky. Maybe I’m more like everyone else. I don’t know.

Is there something that I’m meant to be doing?

The weird thing is, I stayed strong in my faith until I had a miracle happen. The sort of, “Whoa, I did not see this coming, and this really helps everything,” sort of miracle. Instead of feeling bolstered, it was like the rug had been pulled out from underneath me. I guess it’s one thing to have faith in complete darkness, but when I started moving towards light with no idea where it was coming from … that’s when it got scary. False hope? A brighter future? I have no idea.

Why would that sort of miracle happen to me anyway?

My body couldn’t take the stress though. I couldn’t sleep or eat, and I lost nearly 20lbs in two months. It left me feeling forced into the next step I took.

Not that I know what I should and shouldn’t share about what’s going on.

As it stands right now in my tiny corner of the world, I need a future. I need to figure out what future I’m aiming for. I need to stop feeling like a 17-year-old staring at high school graduation without the foggiest clue of what’s supposed to come next, especially considering that I’m 20 years past that.

I want to be a writer, but between betrayal trauma and living expenses, I’m just not sure anymore … it seems so unrealistic now.

After all, how many miracles can I expect to get me through?

I have lots of moments throughout the day when I’m overcome with the surreal thought of, “How is this my life?”

I’m not sure how much I should publicly share. Parts of it make me think of the line, “Lawyers clean up all details / since daddy had to lie” from the song End of Innocence by Don Henley, and the title itself feels apt enough.

There are days when it’s easier to lose myself in a list of things that have to be done, and not think about the big picture of what I’m doing. My heart stops every time the doorbell rings, and I wish that this wasn’t my reality.

Events are traveling through the neighborhood grapevine faster than I would have ever expected, but by now I have surrendered my pride and laid everything bare. People are more supportive than I anticipated, and I like how they periodically check in with me. I don’t really care if it’s morbid curiosity or genuine concern, as long as I have people surrounding me through all this.

I still feel hopelessly lost. I keep wondering when that feeling will fade, when something will come together and start to feel solid, but instead everything under my feet keeps crumbling.

And I don’t even know how much I should share, because it’s moved into the legal sphere now.

For all my life, I heard divorce talked about like it was an ending. In reality, it’s a beginning. Sometimes people take it as permission to punish you, to erase you, to make your life as miserable as they can. After all, why should they care? They’ve already moved on to their new partner, and you’re just a loose end and a failure. An object that no longer serves a purpose.

But I’m not.

I will not be erased. I will not surrender my life just because someone thinks that my existence is inconvenient now.

And the legal sphere is where I still have rights and a voice — where my story still matters.

So as much as I wish it had never been pushed this far, as unreal as it feels to be going through these events, I will not surrender. Not with everything that’s at stake.