Where to start? There are so many starts and stops when you leave a marriage of 38 years. Why did I stay so long if I was that unhappy? I continue trying to figure that out. When did I know it was hopeless? At various times. I cannot site one particular moment.

It’s excruciatingly painful to leave a marriage, particularly one of great length. Does that make it harder? I think so because with each passing year there are more things to consider, and more people will be hurt. This is a drastic, life-altering decision. The love might be long gone, but you know it’s still going to hurt, and it’s hard to deliberately hurt someone.

There were red flags before we were married, they were in plain view, at least for me. I haven’t forgotten them. Doesn’t that somehow speak to the importance of paying attention to those things?

I had a good job when we were dating and returned from grocery shopping one day with a pound of shrimp he thought was too expensive. I received a lecture in a surly tone advising me that as long as people like me continued to pay too much for a pound of shrimp they would remain overpriced. I was stunned but said nothing. Why couldn’t I have a pound of shrimp I could easily afford? And who were these other people like me? I knew exactly who they were, people like my parents, and their friends I had grown up around. But he hadn’t.