Why does the past hurt?    I found some old videotape - played it.  It was from 1999.  I was married.  I  had a family.  We were happy.  Honeythis and honeythat.  Smile for me.  You look so handsome.  You look so  beautiful.

 The kids were great.  They were sweet.   They loved me. 

 That all changed in 2002.  I got fat.  He checked out.  Became selfish is what my therapist explained to me.  The kids started to not love me.  They were 14 and 15 and had raging hormones.  I was working too much and going to school too much.   He quit his job because the network marketers told him that he was spending too much time working for the man and if he spent that much time working for himself, he could be a millionaire.  I was told I needed to sacrifice.  Like I hadn’t given enough in life and life hadn’t taken more than its fair share.   I was encouraged to quit college and support my man like I was living in a damn Tammy Wynette song.  That may have all worked out fine and well for Hillary Clinton but it didn’t bode well for me.  I grew unhappy.  He grew disconnected.  My bucket was empty and had a huge hole in the bottom.  I tried to tell him.  He didn’t listen.  I wanted to seperate - I had hopes he would come to his senses because he loved me so much - he had a girlfriend instead that I found out about.  I filed for divorce - he didn’t want to.  If we could work things out he would break up with his girlfriend.  By this time she had been in my house, my bed, and met his family.  I threw him and his kids out of my house and moved back in.  I was the bitch and they have all hated me ever since. 

It was worse then them dying.   I lost so many people in the divorce and then I raise the question -

Did they ever love me?  Or was I just convenient at the time?  Once I became inconvenient, did I lose my worth? 

He is remarried.  Number 3.  He is not a millionaire.  The son almost died of a drug overdose. Father sent him to live in Florida with mom.  The same mom we took him away from.  She is a drug addict.  It killed me to learn of this.   The daughter is estranged from her father and lives with friends and has dabbled with drugs and drinks way too much.  She is strong and smart and will overcome and be successful.  Son may not.  He was like a balloon - if he started to stray, you had to pull him back in.  He was easy to pull in.  He just liked to test you to see how far you would let him go; if you would let him go.   Who pulls him in now?   I have kept a distant eye over the kids.  My heart misses them.  Still.  I reached out to them - nothing. 

A lifetime ago.  In 1999, I weighed 145 pounds.  I will be at that weight or lower again.  But the family, I will never  have that again.   Maybe someday they will understand and I won’t have to be the bad person.  Maybe someday I won’t care. 

Maybe…. 

 Damn videotape.