My cousin has been married for 13 years now. I know that her getting into married life did not begin in a very wonderful romance. It was at first marriage for convenience. I know even from the start because she told me how things happened and why things have to happen.
Her single life back then was like a princess born with a silver spoon. Those times when all that she needed were actually provided by my aunt,her mom. She has a half-brother(a half-american) but her mom got separated to both to her biological dad and her half-brother's american dad. And so my aunt had to pull the load alone being a single mom to her two children. Before she finished college, her mom was diagnosed with a cervical cancer, suffered with the sickness for a year or two but did not survive. My aunt passed away and my cousin was left with nothing since her half-brother already got married during that time, living in a different city so far away from her.
It was as if she was living in a paralytic world when her mom died. She wasn't used to doing things by herself esp. about earning a living. She didn't even know anything about household chores at all. She admitted to herself so bitterly that it was embarrasing to have realized that her growing up pampered with everything by her mom really did not prepare her for a life that will help her grow a mature individual in the future. And she had regrets.
All she had in mind when she got married was that this man will save her from living in an empty solitude of having not knowing where her life might lead her without her real family by her side at all. She simply felt alone and unloved and so when her boyfriend proposed, she simply accepted it hoping that her life will have more of a grand meaning. Later on she admitted that she has already learned to love her husband...providing them with the things she and their children needed.
But then as years went by,she sadly realized that this is not the man that she wants to spend the rest of her life with. She was never free. She married a jealous and insecure man. And that by not allowing her to go out and socialize with her relatives and friends for sometimes made her feel like living in total seclusion. Plus the unreasonable jealousy of her husband telling her so stupidly that when he's not around she might have escaped and met with another man. Even accusing her that the baby she bore might not be his!Oh my!I wonder how did my cousin bear all her husband's stupidity.. forgetting her very own pride as a woman. They would fight almost everyday. Even when they already have 5 kids now..nothing changes. I told her that maybe you need to hear mass for sometimes with your husband so that God will bless this family that you two make. Well, what more could be more painful than realizing that later on she found out that it was her husband who actually cheated her. And that he once went out dating another woman. Her married life for her was like pure hell. But then her husband was wisely able to iron out the issue and so again all went back into normal but the jealousy remains. It hurts me so seeing her telling me while trying to control her tears that she tried to be a good wife and a mother,already wondering if her husband really loves her in the first place.
If only she could forget her responsiblity being a mother to her 5 kids, she might have probably been able now to enjoy her freedom. But a mother will always be a mother, ever willing to sacrifice her own happiness for the sake of her children. At times I get text mesages from her as if begging that I must pay her a visit for sometimes, she ,being hardly able to deal with the boredom by not having this freedom to go out for fear that her husband might just accuse her for something she could never do.
Now, she even blamed her past life being able to enjoy too much of her single life and now this is the prize that she gets. I told her to stop feeling so bitter about her life and regret things because in the first place God bless her with five children who are all lovable. I dont actually know how to comfort her..when just having me by her side listening to all her fears and woes doesn't seem enough. It seems to me that 11 or 12 years it must be of being an emotionally battered wife is just too much for her to bear.
One day, she texted me, telling me that she's going abroad the next day to work. I wonder where the kids are. Her eldest son is only a freshman in high school while her youngest is only two-year-old. And when I asked her how did her husband let her go...she simply replied saying.."He doesn't know..".
Is this a starfish? It's tinier...its feature is not as strong as the other starfish that I usually see. But as I see how different it is from the rest, I realize that this one has its own uniqueness...like everyone of us..no matter how small we think we are...God made things unique..you and me.
The sunset...a realization maybe that at the end of the day, things must calm down. We need to rest after a long busy hour of running after meeting deadlines to finish our work.Where there is no more rushing...
