What Price Awareness? How Long Indebtedness?

In 2001 I came home from the hospital with a newborn and my tubes forever tied. I remember clearly laying my baby down for her first sleep. I walked into the bathroom and closed the door behind me, my first moment of solitude since going into labor a few days before. I stood in front of the mirror, contemplating the decision I had made to stop having children when a voice I did not recognize said,

"You no longer have any reason to have sex."

I panicked. I couldn't breathe. I fell into a confused depression which I am still fighting 7 years later.

I think I have mentioned here before that I grew up trying to make the smallest shadow possible. I tried to fly under people's radar. I tried to make the people around me happy. Happy people = good little girl. My future was always to grow up and get married and have kids. That's what people did. Heck, my mother didn't even give me a middle name because "once I married I would take on my maiden name as my middle name".

Once I married and began babies, I took on a bigger role as facilitator. I supported and encouraged my husband's career. I taught my children life lessons and found opportunities for them to grow. That was who I was. Baby maker, facilitator. Helping everyone else be the best they could be. Second marriage, same as the first.

The journey I have been on since that voice stated the obvious to me has been the most painful experience of my life. But I have never believed that I was the only one in pain, ever. I know everyone in my life has experienced their own little hell. Facilitated.by.me... ironic eh?

I believe that throughout the pages of CtF I have expressed my love and appreciation for my ex-husband. I know I have told him more than once. The divorce was equitable and friendly. We promised it would always be a collective effort to take care of the kids. He has always been kind and compassionate to me. So imagine my surprise and dispair when he made a move to take the girls away from me for my first Christmas Eve/morning in 2 years. He made the schedule back in October and I have been planning ever since. Then *poof* he decided it wasn't going to happen. I said no. What ensued was an onslaught of meaness that I never thought existed in him.

Apparently, I owe him. Apparently, he has surrounded himself with people who call him stupid for the kindness and compassion he has shown me. Apparently, because he realized I was a lesbian before I had the nerve to tell him I will be forever dishonest. Apparently, he bought me a house. Apparently, he bought me a car. Apparently, he is disgusted that I am living off the support he agreed to give me while I go to school and rebuild my life from the ground up. He finished by asking, "where would you be without me?".

It has been a long time but I vaguely remember owning my own home before selling it to marry him. I also remember having my own car when I got to Boise and getting rid of it so that we would have room for a third vehicle. Now that the dust has settled it looks like I have come full circle. I have exactly what I had before the marriage. Plus two little girls who are the light of both our lives.

I have been walking around in shock since this took place. He has gone a long way from September when, while at lunch, he told me he still loved me and considered me his best friend. I also recall, telling him tearfully how sorry I was (again) for all the upset I had created in his life. I have always tried to convey my appreciation for the choice he made to be kind and compassionate, to act with integrity and honor during and after the divorce. But how long do I owe him and exactly what do I owe him? When can I stop facilitating others? When do I belong to myself? When can I be me with out having to show the proper guilt and humility?

How long?