When the timeline shatters

It was our bed. Now it's my bed. It was our flat. Now it's my flat. It was our life. Now it's my life. And I'm okay.

I've been trying to write this post for months, and I think I'm finally in a position to do so. The short version of the past six months is that my fiance left me, I was sad for a while, and now I'm not sad any more.

When it happened, it completely blindsided me, and sent me spinning off into confusion. I had no idea it was coming, at all. Looking back, that was particular idiocy on my part, because it had obviously been coming for months, even before we got engaged. We were keeping up the act, but the relationship was dying. I would never have been the one to pull the plug, because I was so totally oblivious. I don't envy him what he had to do. I know it hurt him almost as much as it hurt me. But at least he had the advantage of knowing it was coming - I didn't, and it sent me into shock.

When something like that happens, something that shakes you down to your bones, you have to re-evaluate such a lot. I had a timeline in my head. It was a timeline I'd had to adjust over the years due to my various failures and disappointments, but I thought I'd finally got it right. Kris and I would get married in 2013, 2014 at the latest, so that I'd make it down the aisle by thirty. Around my thirtieth birthday, I would finally get my damn degree, and embark on my teaching career as a happily married woman. We'd get a nice little house, a couple of cats (and a dog, if he insisted), and be happy. But then, with one blow, all of that was shattered. Not just my relationship with K, but the whole future I'd built up in my head. It isn't easy to pick up the pieces of your future, because it hasn't even happened yet. Still, I tried. I told myself, "if I meet someone wonderful next year, I can still be married by thirty-two"; "I don't need a partner to have a house and cats, I can probably manage that by thirty-five, if I get a really good teaching job". And so on. I thought those things every day for months, worrying about who I was, and who I was going to become. It was exhausting.

But you know what? I'm over it. Maybe I won't get married by thirty, or thirty-five, or forty. Maybe I won't get married at all. Maybe it doesn't matter. Being married won't make me a better person, happier or more confident or more successful. I can do all of that by myself, thank you very much. All I have to worry about is other people judging me for being a 'spinster' in my thirties, but I have two words for those people, and one of them is 'off'. And does it matter if I never buy a house? I'm getting on fine in rented accommodation. It would be nice to have my own place, but I don't need to build my life around it, and I don't need to judge myself either way.

I'm starting to accept that the timeline never really existed. It was just something I invented to comfort myself. Now that it's gone, my future is uncertain, but then it was never certain to begin with. If the last six months have taught me anything, it's that life can change in unexpected ways. You have to be ready. But whatever happens, I'm starting to accept that I'm not a bad person - in fact, I'm pretty great. My confidence has been building so much recently, and it's all thanks to the people who have helped me get through this difficult time in my life. My counsellor, my family, and my friends. You know who you are, and I love you more than I can say.

I've changed, and I think it's for the better. Six months ago, I would never have travelled to another continent by myself. But guess who's going to New York at the end of the month?

I'm okay. It feels so good to finally say that and mean it.