Two and a half years ago my marriage imploded. Little by little I move toward a new life, a life which once again fits me and incorporates my dreams.

Two and a half years ago, I had my dream life. I had found a partner who shared some of my most important dreams, and we were building a way to make them real. I had love, a beautiful home, and work that came naturally to me and allowed a lot of time to create the larger life we wanted.

Then one afternoon, after a few months of slowly and quietly escalating strife, my husband said he was not interested in discussing whatever was going on, whatever the uncomfortable undercurrent was. No interest. Period. Done.

I left our house at daylight the next day, and headed to a little seaside cabin—distraught, and sick with fear, heartbreak, and confusion. I hoped to do the romantic thing, stare into the ocean and find magical, healing, balm and solace. In the end, it wasn’t that easy.

The end of my marriage brought the end to so much in my life. I had no husband, no home, no income. I no longer had a vision of my future. I was L O S T, lost. I cried for hours at a time. I raged. I hated. I pounded my head on the pillow, the floor, the wall. I drew deep, hot baths, and sunk into the water until my entire body was below the surface—where the world is very quiet and calm.

And there still was no magic healing.

But there had to be some healing. Life had to get better, or I could not bear it. I soon knew that, in spite of the love and attention of friends and family, the only one who could make a real difference, was, of course, me. I realized that I had to take care of myself, first and foremost. I had to be selfish.

Here’s what I cobbled together on my way to finding a new life.

1. I stopped drinking.
My brother explained to me that to deal with my life now, I would need a very clear head; he strongly suggested that I quit drinking. I had brought a bottle of white wine and a bottle of something bubbly with me to the little cabin beside the sea. After he said this very sensible thing, I dumped out the remainder of the open bottle, and passed along the unopened bottle to some gals in a cabin on down the way. For two and a half years now I have been sober. I don’t regret the sobriety and the clarity.

2. I started attending Al-Anon meetings.
My (now ex) husband is an alcoholic. Now some people say I am not allowed to call him this, that I must say he is a “problem drinker”. But the truth is—so clear in hindsight—in spite of all my wishes otherwise, I married an alcoholic, and I was an enabler. So, to look for answers, I went and hung out with the pros—other men and women whose lives had been affected by alcoholics. I learned lessons I had learned years before, but hadn’t mastered. I learned (again) about the disease of alcohol, how it’s not anything *I* can control. I was repeatedly reminded that I could expedite my healing by keeping my focus upon me and my own issues. These meetings were life-savers (I still attend), and have helped me find an iota of forgiveness for my husband’s actions. More importantly, they keep me accountable for my own actions and choices, which are really the only thing I can directly affect.

3. I made a concerted effort to eat healthful foods.
Too worn and frail-feeling to bear a trek to the grocery store, I ordered tons of groceries online—healthful foods, easy-to-prepare foods, comfort foods. The main point was to keep the pantry and refrigerator stocked, keep eating, and eat reasonably well.

4. I enrolled in Pilates classes, and attended three times a week.
This was uncharacteristic of me, and a milestone. I abhor exercise—I’m an active person, but things such as working out at a gym, to me that just seems wasteful. And, Pilates is expensive! But this was a major step toward caring for myself, and undeniable evidence that I was doing so. I needed such evidence; it was like a marker of success, somehow.

5. I wrote.
I used blank-paged journals and watercolor crayons, and I wrote just about everything. I recorded the day’s weather and the day’s feelings. I made lists of dreams and wishes and fears. I imagined new lives. I sketched the things I saw around me. I kept notes and planned my day. Among other things, the writing served to purge destructive feelings, clear my head, and to give some hope to my heart and soul.

6. I read.
I needed advice, perspective, support, and hope; Writers who addressed abrupt change, alcoholism, and betrayal hit the spot. I don’t recall exactly how I came upon the books I ravished, but there was some very good karma helping me find these titles (you can find the complete list on my “shop” page). I highly recommend the following; they were each keenly appropriate and easy to read, even in my addled, sorry state.
When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times by Pema Chödrön
Perfection: A Memoir of Betrayal and Renewal, by Julie Metz
Drinking: A Love Story, by Caroline Knapp, and
The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, by don Miguel Ruiz

7. I asked for and accepted help.
I leaned on my friends and family. I did this in ways that fit for me and the time and place I was in. For example, when I moved into my new apartment I knew I wanted an influx of the love from my friends, but I did not feel up to inviting anyone over just yet. So, I invented the Mailbox Housewarming Party, and invited everyone to send me something “warm” in the mail. It was humbling to ask, and felt a little silly and pretentious, but for the next many weeks my mailbox was a very warm and friendly place, with postcards and packages—an array of well-wishes that still, to this day, warm my heart.

8. I sought challenging acts, at which my success was not guaranteed, but was likely.
I knew I had to boost and re-build my confidence and self-esteem, and I knew that I could use both “baby” and “giant” steps to do this. We each have our own struggles and fears, and our success-building challenges will differ. One of mine was just taking care of myself; the Pilates and well-stocked pantry were little successes in that realm.
On a larger scale, I plunged into NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month. My goal was to write 50,000 words in thirty days, which works out to be about 1,666 words a day. The daily goals made this foray seem attainable, and, gave me small successes as I kept my word-count steadily growing. The final “win” of 50,000+ words—before the final deadline, mind you—was a ginormous boost to my confidence, and something which I can always look to for hope and faith in myself.

I call the photo above, Reach for the Sky. The tendrils of clouds seem to be reaching, grasping, aiming for something more, something beyond. I like to think that I am reaching for the sky—now from a position of some clarity and strength. I’m not strong every day; hell, I’m weak more often than strong. And I mostly run around still very confused about what I want from life. But.

But I have come nearly 180° from my chaos of two and a half years ago. In incremental bits and pieces, I have been healing from the worst personal devastation I’ve known. Bit by bit, I again want to reach for the sky.

Last Friday night I ran my first 5K.

There is so much wrapped up in that short statement, the gist of which is: I did the impossible!

im•pos•si•ble |im′päsəbəl|
adjective
not able to occur, exist, or be done

When I registered for this run on October 27, 2011, there was NO WAY I could run five kilometers. NO WAY. While I had been a long-distance runner in high school and while I always loved running, it had been decades since I had run—I mean, anything running more than a little burst to catch the WALK light at a crosswalk.

Left to my own devices I would have never, ever embarked on a 5K. But in an unusual course of events my nineteen-year-old niece, Olivia, became my catalyst and coach, and I set off to do the impossible.

Under Olivia’s wings, I latched onto a podcast training program, one of the “Couch to 5K” plans. My first “workouts” consisted of intervals of running and walking—60 seconds of running, 90 seconds of walking, repeated for 15 minutes.

You got that part? Only SIXTY SECONDS of running—and “running” being a gait slightly faster than a walk, a slow jog really. And these first runs completely taxed my abilities. Huff. Puff. Ow.

But my Couch-to-5K plan assured me, Download these audio podcasts, follow the plan and you’ll be running 5km in just nine weeks, and Olivia said, You can do it, and, godammit, in high school I did do it (albeit 38 years ago!),

and so, I believed.

After all, the run would be part of the Disney Tinkerbell weekend, so some belief in the impossible actually seemed appropriate, if not requisite.

I do not remember the last time I consciously embarked on the impossible.

This quest became part of nurturing a new me. Each time I completed a podcast workout, I WON; I had done something that the week or the day before had been impossible. Certainly the possibility was within, but until I grabbed it, it remained impossible—and each effort took some of the impossible out of my next foray.

Sure, this is old news. I mean, we read these stories all the time, right. But for the first time in a long time—and coming at a time when I really needed such a boost—I was succeeding in tangible, measurable ways.

And this success fortified my soul, my heart, and this fortification is what I have needed so that I can heal and move on with my life.

Since my divorce two years ago my spirit hasn’t been good. I have struggled to believe in myself, I have struggled fruitlessly to envision a new future for myself. The process of training for the 5K—with its dozens of victories and the real strength that I gained—has been restorative, in completely unexpected ways and realms.

I have finally been able to freely let go of remnants and uncomfortable souvenirs of my past life. I have dropped the burdens of perceived failures. I have shaken off the haunting shadows of my marriage. I am (finally and with fortitude) moving on.

The NHS Couch-to-5K plan ramps up the workouts weekly, and by Week 6 I was running for 25 consecutive minutes. It wasn’t pretty, and it felt like hell. But it also felt like the most amazing thing I have ever accomplished.

About four weeks before the 5K I had a chance to run with Olivia and we used her fancy synchronized watch gadget to clock my speed for the first time since I began training. I was elated with the results—25 minutes at an 11-minute-mile pace. I now knew—through and through—that I could run the entire 5K.

I had done it. The inspirational mantra on the bracelet I had taken to wearing had come true. I had Re-defined My Impossible. What had begun as a bit of a folly was now very real.

The actual run was still weeks and weeks away. I aimed to continue training and to better my pace. I had been training in adverse conditions—snow and ice and temperatures as low as 8° F.  Now I was about to spend three weeks in the Caribbean, at the other end of the weather spectrum.

In my first workouts in the freezing air I had been physically and mentally challenged to push myself and complete each day’s goals. Only two days of training were postponed, days when I judged it best to preserve my resources and fight off a cold (or worse). But in the sun and humidity of the Caribbean I was repeatedly overwhelmed and taken ill; I was only once able to complete my slated workout.

I was concerned. But I defaulted to taking care of my body, and frequently let myself rest after only 17 minutes or so of running. (Admittedly, it was difficult to fret too much when I was running beside the beautiful and warm Caribbean sea.)

I held onto the knowledge that I had already demonstrated that I was able to run the 5K. But I fretted that I was letting myself down, that I was succumbing to my mind’s weaknesses. These doubts were very, very disconcerting.

I had embarked on this 5K in some secrecy. I was worried that I could not come close to making it. I was even more worried that my fibromyalgia would flair and knock me on my butt. I was afraid to challenge my body to the extent the 5K would demand—and afraid to discover that it would be the fibro that was the winner, and not I.

But I had prevailed, I was now at a point where I had “won” and I had more to win. This was an interesting juncture, and a point at which it would be relatively easy to quit. The workouts continued to make me ill, and I could not see a way around that. I was certain I was losing ground. And I had already demonstrated that I was able to do what I had set out to do, so why go further?

There was still the actual 5K to run. And there was still Olivia cheering me on and waiting to run it with me. It didn’t really matter now which was my motivation—doing this for her, or doing it for me.

Except for a few days during Christmas break, for all of my training period Olivia and I were geographically separated by thousands of miles. I had been sharing my progress via text messages and Internet posts, and she had been cheering me on with her replies. At the end of January I finally flew into Los Angeles and we prepped for the run, ultimately queuing up on Main Street, Disneyland, California about 10 pm, Friday, January 27th.

This was it, the time for a new full commitment. My workouts had been curtailed, and I didn’t know how much I had in me. But I set a goal pace of a 10 minute mile and I sought to hold that pace for the entire five kilometers (~3.1 miles).

This pace seemed “impossible” but I had the strength of knowing that I had already done the impossible, so what’s just a little more impossible??

This was certainly the most cool/awesome/rad/kick-a*s-feeling state-of-being that I had been in in ages.

Olivia and I were both overflowing with anticipation; life was marvelous and fun and literally lying before our feet. And once again the 5K itself didn’t matter—it was just the moment. The moment. Each nano moment, bursting with every effort which had brought us there. Each step, each mile, each plunge into the impossible.

So, there I was, deep in experiencing “the moment”. I had a 5K before me, I had the impossible behind me, and I had a bubble of success to carry me through.

A cannon-fired cloud of colorful confetti kicked-off our 5K.

I ran.

30 minutes and eighteen seconds later—surrounded by other ecstatic runners—I crossed the finish line! I won; I did the impossible! Again, and more.