Friends

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.4 Friends

I don't have many friends, but I am rich in those I do have.  Those supported me in ways that still amaze and humble me.  All I had to do was call them.  They listened to my tail of woe, supplied a place for me to stay, helped me pack up my belongings.  They were there.  One lived on the opposite coast and would listen to me till our cell phone batteries ran out.  Another, who taught me the pleasure of cycling, let me take over his bedroom for a couple of months, as I started to enter into the deepest part of my depression.  He even put up with my children living there a few days a week.  A third, whom I worked with, watched me lose weight with increasing rapidity, as I lived on peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, carrots, and granola bars.  Another, who was going through the same thing, helped me find a Divorce Recovery group instrumental in the beginning of my healing process.  They say you don't know your true friends till you're in crisis.  I found this to be true.

The Decision

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.3 The Decision

The week had been ... awful.  Monday was her fortieth birthday, and the night of our worst argument.  The details, which are forever imprinted in my brain, are unimportant except the fact our eldest, who was seven, was in the room.  I exploded, as I had finally come to the end of my rope.  This scared my wife, and, once I came to my senses, me too.  We had come to an important crossroads, which could lead us either to heal our marriage or divorce.  The Multiple Sclerosis could no longer be a consideration, or even financial repercussions.  What was our relationship doing to our children?  to me?  By the end of the week, my anxiety attacks, depression, irrational anger had to be addressed.  I had to leave.  Friday, on my way home, I arranged to stay at a friend's house.   When she asked me when I was coming back, I answered, "I'm not."

The Past is Always Present

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

1.2 The Past is Always Present

A short time after she asked me for a divorce, my wife was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.  This took us both by surprise.  Even after having children this was a lesson neither of us had learned.  Unknown to me, but not her friends, she had been having increasing mobility issues for a few weeks.  So, when her primary care physician scheduled her for an MRI, I did not take it as seriously as I probably should have.  In the wake of having been asked for a divorce, I really wasn't caring much about what she had to say, anyway.  The diagnosis changed that.  I insisted on going with her to the Neuroligist visits, which she eventually started to hide from me.  In the beginning it was a rallying call giving the illusion that we could mend fences and find what we had meant to each other.  I think, though, both of us knew the diagnosis couldn't hide the deeper damage.  The change on the horizon was getting closer and more inevitable.

Prologue

Everything Changes

by

Matthew T. Lipson

PROLOGUE

 Walking out the door in order to go to work, I didn't know the changes awaiting me at the end of the day.  All of us like to talk about how we know the fluidity of life, but until we are faced with change in times of crisis all this is just words.  We set up expectations for ourselves based on what we perceive as life's predictability.  Change is something we control in our private lives.  Or, so we all think.  I thought I knew about change.  After all I am a father of two girls, at the time very young girls.  I was married.  I had travelled and gone away to college.  I had faced change, right?  No.  The change facing me at the end of this day was more than I had faced in the past and almost more than I was prepared to face.