My Delicate and Precious Flower

We had a couple of difficult days. My resentment and anger and hurt came through. I turned our conversations into opportunities to remind my wife how much she has hurt me in her decision to move on.

After both days, my wife reached out to me, to tell me that she felt terrible about the fights. I was surprised. My wife has been a sheet of ice all this time. To me, this was tantamount to a woman who does not care one bit about how much I was hurt.

Today, she called me to say that she felt terrible. We talked and then she broke down. As always it tears my heart to see her this upset.

For the first time, she told me how she really felt. She opened up in a way that I haven’t seen in years. Many years.

She told me about how naive and innocent her love for me was. That she felt a desperate sense of longing for me, which I did not reciprocate.

She told me that, She felt so broken that I could not understand what she needed. She needed me to sweep her off her feet, and make her feel an passionate and unconditional love. The only love I ever offered her was pragmatic.

I thought back to that time. And what I remember was a man-boy, who was reeling from the magnitude of being a single income earner. Whose wife’s silly love was a hinderance to his ability to do more for the family.

She felt increasingly defensive. And the young woman, who was always shy of exposing her inner feelings, built (slowly )an ever-stronger wall around her heart. 

And the conversation about her innermost feelings died away. And it was all downhill. I took her reticence to believe that she was trying to make the compromises needed. For her, she was feeling beatdown and hopeless.

And by the time, I came around to loving my wife on her terms, She was too bitter. She was a fragile young woman, and I had treated her rough. I had exposed her to too much of life’s challenges, too quick.

I should have treated her like a delicate and precious flower. I know there was a time I felt she was just that to me. 

I feel so much regret. A desperate heart crushing regret that we could not overcome our differences.

What a tragic loss.  Two hopeless romantics fell in love, and then failed to convey their love to each other. And all that is left now, is a choice to be civil. I hope I am man enough now, to honor the death of my love.