When I first started dating after 16 years of marriage, I thought I was having an out of body experience. It took me a while to see it as a luxury and a gift of the break. I had needed to do it and maybe surprisingly wanted to do it almost right away but I could not speak of it.
Although I am having a love affair with the truth, an antidote to having not enough of it in the latter stages of my marriage, I did not want to burden my children with fear. I felt they might think that the new family we had- the three of us- might somehow be disrupted by another man. I felt certain they would think that everything would change overnight after a cup of coffee with a boy.
I began telling them little fibs to spare them a truth that had little importance to them. Every date I had I pretended to be somewhere else- out at the movies with this friend, helping another friend’s mother move, a meeting, an errand, a glass of wine across the street.
Slowly I became accustomed to meeting new people and really enjoying the adventure of it. If it was a blind date- they would ask “how will I know you?” and I would tell them I would wear a long pink scarf. We have a basket full of disguises, dollar store tiaras and fake noses and glasses in our basement which I was oddly tempted to wear. If I knew them I would get them to pick me up down the street from my house.
I was leading a double life.
When you live with daughters and spend so much time together it is symbiotic- you understand each other without speaking, you read each others’ minds and crave similar things. Teenagers know more than you think they do and yet our children hold onto certain ideas that may conflict with what they in their hearts know.
I decided that I needed to tell them the truth. I told them that I was going on dates but that there was nothing serious to report and that I was their mom, that nothing would change that, and they were my number one priority. At the end of my 10 minute monologue they said “we know, mom”.
I got home that night from a date and there was a note across my pillow-
no sweat, after all.
what a good story Carrie- thank you for sharing it. So good that you have found joy.
I love this post!! While I know your girls are older than my two kids (7 and 5) I completely relate to everything that you wrote.
When I got divorced and decided to start dating for the first time in like, EVER, I never eve talked about anyone around the kids (even if i was talking to someone on the phone).
I wasn’t so much worried about them not wanting an addition to our family (because when step daddy did move in they were thrilled) but it had more to do with the fact that they had been through so much with the divorce and they were so young when i left their Dad I didn’t want to put them through meeting other men unless i was certain…or fairly close to certain.
When I got engaged to their now step-dad it was a seamless transition of joy and happiness.
Thanks for sharing! 🙂