In Conflict with Myself...

My mind is a whirlwind of thoughts. I have felt a sort of freedom for this past 2 weeks. T is away overseas. The not knowing still plagues me and while a feeling of freedom enveloped me since they left, they are due back this week and I find myself suddenly stressed and worried. T and his dad were planning to go for Umrah since all this crap started. Towards the end of January, the Uncle who is mediating through all this crap, MB, called and said that they want me to go with them. What a wonderful opportunity; to visit Allah's house, the most favoured place on the planet, to sort out our issues and hopefully pray and find spiritual healing and once again cement our union. I must admit, I was weary. Nothing was resolved here and we can go and make Umrah but what happens when we come back. At the time T and I were barely talking to each other. The trip was scheduled and we would be travelling with his mum and dad and some cousin. If they had decided to send us alone I would gladly have taken the opportunity in an attempt to fix the mess that we had created. I voiced my concerns to MB and he was very accomodating but still asked me to think about it. I did not refuse, I just questioned the facts.

Well that was the end of that. Nobody pursued the matter and although a meeting was held in early February (after much pushing from my family), which turned out to be an even bigger disaster than any of the previous mediation sessions, I decided not to go. A week or so later, I heard that the sister and her baby were also going with. My decision had been made and I was sticking to it.

I find myself battling emotions and a barrage of conflicting thoughts. I really want to make my marriage work. But how I keep questioning. T and I are the two that need to work things out, however to this day,the gripes that keep coming up are not about anything that I did to him. It's his mother's and sister's and father's gripes. They range from not eating the food the mum cooked, not wanting to interact with them, not offering to buy the baby clothes 4 months before the baby was even born, me having issues with their family who are dark, me having an issue with the maid bathing in my guest bathroom (and yes I do have an issue with that but that's another debate all on it's own), me leaving early in the morning to go and have breakfast at my mother's. It's all petty shit but it's their gripes against me. I am such a villain in their life. The gripes are nothing about T and I. It's only all their issues. So how do I make this marriage to work when I am this bad-assed daughter in law and T goes with whatever they feed him. That is why with all these gripes that they have against me, how was it going to be possible to go to a foreign country and pretend that all is hunky dory. They pretty great at shoving everything under the musallah* and pretend that life is just great.

I feel angry at T. I married him and he is the one who is supposed to care for me, protect me, look after me etc etc etc. Instead he goes with their gripes and fights with me. I am not asking for much just love, commitment and a partner to share my life with. I don't care about the gorgeous house or the fancy cars. Before T left we had a serious conversation (well it was serious on my side) and I asked him to really think about us and our marriage. I asked him to pray and decide what he really wants. I made it clear that if had changed his mind about being married to me than I would be fine with it but than he should stope blaming me, cos I didn't change the game - he did. I also told him to think about the plans that we made to share a life together and think really nicely about what he really wants. I too pray daily that he will decide and come back having made a firm decision and than to stick by it. I was honest in my feelings and made it pretty clear how I feel about him. I don't think pride is going to get any of us anywhere.

I haven't heard from him in this 2 weeks. Maybe it's a good thing, I don't know. Honestly speaking I feel very angry. Angry and hurt. T is my husband, we were supposed to make that trip together as husband and wife. I feel anger that while this spiritual retreat is important, the resolution of our marriage is just as important and they could have resolved things before they left and if things were resolved I could have went with. Instead they have marked it as an event, just like the baby's birth, and they claim that they will resolve things when they return. I for one am not holding my breathe. And so I have resigned my fate into the hands of the Almighty Allah. While I felt hurt that T had went on his own, I decided to leave him to do just that. Maybe in some way he will find the answers that will enable him to find his way.

And this is where the conflict starts. This month marks 7 months since all this started. 7 Months of consistent shit, pain and anguish. While I really want to make my marriage to work, I cannot do it alone and I need T to take on that responsibility. However I placed my faith and trust in him. He is my husband and his responsibility is to take care of me. Instead he shunned all responsibility and sided with his family and all their gripes. I don't begrudge him his family. In their own way they are good people, but their dependency on him and than the never-ending issues that they have with me led him to treat me like public enemy number . As I have said, I don't begrudge him his family, they are his parents and sister - but what about me. If they cannot accept that he is now a married man with responsibilities to his wife than they shouldn't have allowed him to get married in the first place. So while I am/was (i'm not sure where I stand anymore) willing to make this work, I feel terrified that who's to say that it won't happen again.

I feel scared that I placed my faith in T as my husband and he destroyed that faith. I know that in life there are no guarantees, I walked into my marriage with my eyes wide open. I knew T wasn't perfect. But he was my perfect. I was willing to take the risks because I felt that our bond was enough to withstand anything. How wrong was I?

So yes while I love T and probably always will, there is a part of me that also really hates him. While this part of me believes and has faith (even though day after day those hopes get dashed) that we will be able to work things out there is this part of me that feels angry at the pain he caused me. Instead of protecting me, he hurt me and I don't know if I can move past that.

*Musallah - prayer mat