False Hope

During his first presidential campaign, Barack Obama said, "There is nothing false about hope."  I loved that quote.  Just the very idea that hope itself is a reason.  But, that was eight years ago.  When he said that, we thought the progressive political agenda was on the rise.  When he said that, I thought my marriage would last until my death.  

One night, my husband came home and said to me, "I'm not happy."  My insides turned to water, then to acid.  I put shields up just in time to keep my face from burning away.  Over the next few weeks, as he edged further from me in the bed, as his wedding ring mysteriously disappeared, as I lost the ability to make eye contact with him, hope shriveled.  It didn't die, but my little thing with feathers molted and went into hiding for a long time.  

The Ex did nothing to help it.  It hurt at the time, but now I see it for what it was -- a kindness.  He made his exit plan and followed his timeline.  Out of the condo in one month, out of the marriage in six.   I only had to nurse hope back into being one time, and when I finally did, I could focus on things that were real and possible.  Things that were not him. 

I am reminded of this painful kindness as one of my friends finds herself involved with a man who is separated from his wife.  They are not yet divorced.  The explanation is that they have to wait 2 years in Illinois to get the no-fault divorce.  And the man feels sorry for his wife who moved here with him and doesn't really have any other friends.  He still talks to her daily and hangs out with her.  He invites her to  his celebrations, all while he is plowing through his post-relationship crazy phase.  He is filming himself in bed with women, and using that footage to flirt with even more women.  

My friend is uncomfortable with the situation.  She is right to be so.  Maybe this man thinks he is doing his wife a kindness by staying around to be her friend, but what he is doing is false hope in action. I am sorry, President Obama, but everything about this hope is false.  This woman's hope is dying the death of a thousand tiny cuts.  Once this is done, there will be no pieces big enough to put it back together again. Much kinder to just leave her.  Leave her entirely alone for a while.  Maybe it will hurt more at first, but wouldn't you rather recover from one deep, clean wound than from a thousand smal slices that leave your tissues tattered and unrecognizable? 

Even in my year of heartbreak, I saw little things to be grateful for.  This is another one -- that the wound was clean, quick, surgical.  That the skin around it was intact enough to join together again.  That hope was damaged and displaced, but never false.