Journey

This evening, I photographed all four kids eating ice cream on the front steps.

Leo was quite pleased to have been entrusted with his very own (tiny) ice cream cone, and calmly sat beside his brothers, obviously feeling so big.

Leo, 12 years months old

It was just about 12 months ago when I wrote about eating ice cream for dinner. At the time, Leo was just a wee newborn; it was one of our first outings as a family of six. We had no concept of where this first year with our lion baby would take us, of the fact that we would be moving again so soon, saying goodbye to the goats, buying and painting a house, adding and subtracting a puppy, and settling into such a very different life from the one we had been living before our fourth baby was born. One might expect that Lena and I would have known to anticipate how quickly Leo would change and grow, but he seemed to shed his infancy even faster than his brothers before him, so eager to join their pack.

And somehow, amidst all of the excitement and chaos and joy, Lena and I lost sight of each other. We took our love for granted, and forgot to nurture it. We failed to prioritize our relationship. We neglected to even keep it on the list of "things to think about." And suddenly, something that we never imagined could ever be on the line--our marriage--was in question. We began seeing a couples' counselor in March, and at first we seemed to be making progress towards finding each other again. But then I got overwhelmed by the ocean of distance between us, and doubted that Lena and I could ever reclaim what we had once shared. I let myself slip further and further away, until I hardly recognized my wife--or my life--at all anymore.

Everything exploded a few weeks ago, when it became clear that the state of our marriage was such that we could no longer continue living as we were. Lena and Leo went to stay with her extended family for a week, while she and I both faced the full extent of the damage and let our hearts break. We realized that choosing to reconcile would mean choosing to start over anew, that our previous relationship was over, and that it would have to become something completely changed were we to remain married. And ultimately, we concluded that we will move forward together, that we will commit ourselves to the hard work of rebuilding a foundation of trust, and making our marriage stronger, better and more true than it's ever been. While it feels so good to be sharing my days with Lena again, to be seeing her and connecting with her for the first time in months, she and I are both wary of how easy it would be to let ourselves slip back into our old life without really addressing the issues that nearly cost us our marriage and intact family. We want to do this work, and we want to do it well: to be thorough and fully attentive. I hope that people will be respectful of Lena's and my privacy and not ask for details about all that went down between us this spring, but I am planning to write here about our new journey: the quest to really find ourselves and each other again.

"You know this means I'm ALWAYS

going to require my very own cone, right?"

Unabashedly optimistic as I am, I can't help but recognize the blessings that we've been gifted alongside so much pain, loss and devastation. Remembering my love for Lena, truly remembering her most amazing self, and choosing--once again--to commit myself fully to a shared life with her, to our vision of what we want our family to be, feels so inspiring and beautiful. I love Lena so much, and letting myself feel the full weight of that love--that completely crushed me when I thought it had been lost forever--takes my breath away. I am overwhelmed with gratitude to have been given this opportunity to make myself a better, more honest, person and partner. Lena and I get to be falling in love for a third time, now with new-and-improved self-awareness and conviction about what we will demand of each other and our relationship. The knowledge I have learned--and continue to learn--as I have awakened to my own desires and needs, and accepted my faults and failures, is not anything that I will be willing to give up, and is information that will help us to ensure that we don't repeat our past mistakes.

photo by Jaz

Thank you, readers, friends and family members: for continuing to check in here despite my blogging negligence, and for supporting my family and me through this stormy time. It was difficult for me to write--in this place of joy and love--while everything in our home felt so fraught and uncertain. But now I find myself wanting to write more than ever, to hopefully help other families to avoid the path our marriage suddenly took, and to inspire people to hold onto what they believe in--even when it seems that all hope has been lost.