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    • Jan 1, 2018

A Wealth of Isolation


Wine glasses, 50,fabulous & finally free

I vividly remember the first new year I spent without my closest friends. Through a series of disconnected events, my husband had managed to manipulate me into believing I was better off without them. These were friends who had known me as a skinny, incredibly introverted teen and been a vital part of my teen and young adult years. The kind of friends you talked to on a daily or weekly basis, but were always sharing your life with. Because of the controlling nature of my husband, they were seen as a threat. I was easier to control and manipulate without their love and support. I can see this now, 20 years tends to give you that kind of clarity, but at the time I was hurt and confused and trying to carry on. I would still wake from nightmares of the last conversation I had with my closest girlfriend. The things she had said about my husband, as she refused to act as godmother to my child – they lingered in my mind and cast a veil over my happiness for months. I had emerged from the fight wounded and alone but had built myself back up with a thick shell of scars around my emotions and feelings. Never again would I allow another person to have the power to hurt me so. As I toasted the New Year with my husband, I embarked on my plan to surround myself with acquaintances but to eschew close friends.

It was a beautiful evening, spent at the home of a neighbor who was kind and seemed to want to become friends. I remember being cordial with her and then realizing I was on a new path now. I returned her overtures with polite deferrals and used my “work” as the barrier to future invitations. I wound up joining a book club started by this same neighbor, because my husband felt it was important for our social standing that I be included in such things. For 9 years that group was a sisterhood of women from all different walks of life, united simply by geography and a love of reading. I used to look at the closeness shared by these women with envy. I was always a part of the group, the lively one with plenty of jokes – but I was always alone. Making a connection and or having a close friendship terrified me as much as the idea of leaving my manipulative and controlling husband. He had done his work well, I had no close friends and no one to turn to when his rage came out and rained down on me. I blamed myself for everything, and that was just the way he wanted it.

Please share your story with us at mystory@50fabulousandfinallyfree.com

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