In our last episode (OK, the last three), Kate was struggling with her spouse’s recent revelation that he established an account on Ashley Madison two years ago.

So, for any of you who haven’t bailed on this leaky tugboat…here’s an update.  Sorta.  It may just be more blommit.

I love that word.  Blommit.  Super-big puffy heart it so hard.  And I love you guys, too.  MWAH

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I am still largely numb.  There are occasional brief bouts of anger, and there’ve been a couple of tears…but apparently, I’m still in shock.  What he did is so incongruous with the behavior of the man I married – the man I THOUGHT I married – that I’m having trouble reconciling the two.

Sometimes, I even forget for a while that this is actually happening.

Emotionally, anyway.

Physically, it’s a different story.

I feel raw.  Hollow.  Like my soul has been in a horrible motorcycle accident;  I’m covered in road rash on the inside, the smashed fragments of my heart staining the pavement a bright red.  My mouth tastes of metal.  My stomach randomly churns and dips as if I’ve been blindfolded and thrown upside-down onto the Gatekeeper at Cedar Point.  I’m exhausted, yet wide awake.  I spend much of my day feeling like one does the day after a bad stomach flu.  Drained.  Empty.

Weak.

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Sometimes I am weak, sometimes I am strong.

I am strong because I am demanding the space and time that I need to think this through.  I am weak because sometimes I still want to hug him and hold his hand.

I am weak because I realize this sends mixed signals.  I am strong because I don’t care.  The final decision is up to me, when and if I make one, regardless of how he perceives I am feeling today.  Regardless of what HE wants.

I am strong because I’m getting myself tested, and requiring him to do the same.  I am weak because my gut tells me that this isn’t necessary, because he’s telling the truth.  That he never met any of these women.  That nothing physical ever happened.    I desperately want to believe this is true.  Every fiber of my being tells me he isn’t lying.  But that’s the same clearly faulty intuition that completely missed this was happening in the first place.  IT WENT ON FOR FIVE MONTHS AND I HAD NO IDEA.  (Sporadically, he says.  But the window was open, so SOME sulfur must have blown in.)

I am strong because no one at work has any inkling of the internal chaos I’m carrying.  (I even finished that blasted EEO-1 report – EARLY – go me!  Although of COURSE now that I’m DONE I see they extended the deadline A WHOLE MONTH.  I put in 3 hours on my day off and NO ONE THOUGHT TO TELL ME I HAD 31 EXTRA DAYS?!?  <stabs air wildly and sprouts hissing rattlesnakes from scalp>)

I am weak because I don’t trust any of my family or friends enough to share this burden.  And because saying it aloud will make it real, and I don’t know if my heart can sustain the blow.

I am strong because even though I had previously quit going to therapy, I made some new appointments today.  (And he’s going to pay for them.  OBVS.)

I am weak because I still love him.  And because part of me thinks we can fix this, and a bigger part of me still wants to.

Is there any chance at all that he’s telling the truth?  Is it possible he was just window-shopping, clicking on the pretty things he’d like to have and adding them to his cart, only to abandon them by closing the browser instead of clicking “Complete Order”?

Does it matter?

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I am strong because I’m keeping to my exercise routine.  I ran yesterday and today.  Although I am weak because I’m just not eating.  My body simply doesn’t want it.

My run times are suffering – badly.  I’d been doing a 9:20 mile, and this week it’s been 9:45-10.  Ouch.  (Side note:  The fact that I think a 10-minute mile is “bad” is freaking hilarious.  I spent most of my life being completely unathletic, and I am realizing as I’m typing this that I sound like an ex-smoker telling tobacco users that they smell bad.  I’ll slap myself FOR you, so you don’t feel you have to do it.)

<slap>

So, as I write this, it’s Tuesday, and that means…

…it’s time to face the scale.

I mentioned in my last post that I was pretty sure I’d lost some weight this week.  After all this, that’d be a definite plus, right?

I thought I was looking a bit thinner these days.  I mean, I believed I could actually see a difference.  And that NEVER HAPPENS.  This morning I went as far as to take some pictures, because it felt like a pretty dramatic loss, and I was thinking I would have a physique I could actually show off a bit. <strut strut>

But when I looked at the pictures, I saw this fold here and that bulge there, and promptly hit delete.  Must have been an optical illusion.  I should know better than to trust my vision at 6 AM, before I’ve had any coffee.  HELLO.

It was time to face the music.  Numbers don’t lie.  Let’s get today’s.

I went for my slog run.  I came home.  Peeled off the sweaty running togs.

I dust off the scale with the broom (because I have three cats, and hair weighs something.  So does dust.  Can’t be too careful when you’re letting an inanimate object set your mood for the week.)

(Quit looking at me like that.  I KNOW you have your scale rituals, too.  Shave first?  Pluck your eyebrows?  Visit the restroom for one last hurrah?  Yeah, I’m on to you. <points finger-scissors at eyes, then back at yours>)

I step on.

I look down.

HOLY FREAKING FAINTING GOATS BATMAN.

I LOST SIX EFFING POUNDS LAST WEEK.

ALL HAIL THE ASHLEY MADISON DIET!

Seriously, do they need a new spokesperson? I hear they’ve had some publicity issues.   And I have WAY more mass appeal than that Jared ex-Subway clown.  (Especially now.  Couldn’t set THAT bar much lower.)

All kidding aside – I know I need to eat.  After living on swallowed angst all weekend, I’ve been trying to force myself to eat one good meal a day.

But I’m struggling.

I don’t want to eat because I want to lose weight.  (That’s a given.)

I don’t want to eat because starving myself will hurt my spouse.  A sweet, slim revenge for what he did to our marriage, a full dish of piping-hot guilt stew to go with that regret roll he’s been noshing on.

I don’t want to eat, because I normally don’t want to WANT to eat, and eating when you don’t want to ACTUALLY eat seems like a waste of a perfectly good gift horse.

I don’t want to eat because my heart is screaming that it’s hurting.  It screams so loudly that no one can hear it.  Eventually, maybe they will see the screams.

I don’t want to eat because I want to disappear, fading gracefully into the ether, drifting off to a place of peace where no one hurts.

Is that weakness, or strength?

Does it matter?

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My spouse says he’ll do absolutely anything to keep us together.  He’s had a taste of what it might be like to lose me, and it’s wrecking him.  I can see he’s lost weight; I can see the anguish in his eyes and feel it vibrating from his very core.

He’s terrified.  Absolutely frightened.

(Good.)

I have agreed to try counseling with him.  I have also insisted (as I said above) that he get physically tested.  He didn’t even hesitate.  Didn’t protest “but nothing happened”- he understands why I might not can’t believe that right now.  He even offered to go to a Christian counselor (remember, he’s been a fairly hostile atheist, so him seeing a Christian counselor is kind of a big deal.)

What else should I ask for?  What would YOU ask for?  What would you need him to do?

Am I an idiot for giving this a chance?

I know that doesn’t matter.

As long as I’m at peace with whatever I decide.

Speaking of peace, here’s a giant chicken.  BECAUSE GIANT CHICKEN.

Bawk bawk, homies.  Thanks for hangin’.