Embarrassment and Shame

By Authorsbelle @AuthorSBelle
If you are going through a divorce, at some point you will get to a point where all you can feel is embarrassment and shame.  For me, it is the first thing I felt, and I am still feeling it to this day.  I am embarrassed that I could marry someone that would throw me to the side so easily.  He went from telling me he loved me constantly to packing my things and proclaiming he wanted to be single.  This is a man I had been with for over ten years.  I thought I knew everything about him, but he told me that he had never really loved me.  He knew I'd always be loyal and put our family first, but I wasn't the one.  Even as my BS alarm started to blare, my face turned red with embarrassment. 
Then came the shame.  I'm ashamed that I took his name.  When a woman takes a man's name it is a gift.  The man should feel honored that she is willing to brave a new identity in order to become a family.  Until the paperwork is final I have to walk around with his name on every part of my life.  I feel branded.  Everywhere I go, I expect people to call me a fraud.  I introduce myself using my maiden name, but my license exposes me at every turn.
I'm ashamed that I could have been so naive.  How did I not see that his declarations of love were all lies?  Was he ever honorable, or is that something he lied about as well?  I always knew he lived for his brothers in arms, but why didn't he live for me too?  Is he simply a walking job, unable to hold a personal relationship, or does he secretly long to be a playboy?
I doubt the shame will ever go away, and I'll certainly never get my answers.  In an effort to bury the shame, I remind myself that not everyone I meet or see knows that I am going through a divorce.  Naturally, the hundreds of ladies I teach aerobics have asked their questions, but random pedestrians have no idea what I am going through.  I shouldn't feel the need to hide from them, or shy away from friendly conversation.  This is the time to make new friends and try new things.
My life is no longer planned out.  I am a blank slate.  It's time to stop focusing on the shame and overwhelming embarrassment, and start focusing on my new reality.   I can be anything, move anywhere, follow any path.  Now is the time to act.  Before, I may have turned something down if it kept me away too long, or wasn't right for the family.  He was pushing for children, good thing I held off on that, so that was always a major consideration in decision making.  Now, I can look at each offer with unattached, rootless eyes.  It's time to get out of my own way.  It's time to live.