On my own, pretending....

I was thinking about the song "on my own," and why I was so fixated on using it for a dance showcase. It's about a young woman who is in love with a man who sees her only as a friend and is in love with someone else. She is talking about how she walks alone all night, pretending he is with her, and she is happy. But when the sun comes up, she has to face the real world again he fantasy bubble shatters. I was thinking how much that song reminds me of my marriage, that for some reason I can't seem to let go. It occurs to me that I was living a fantasy all those years, I was in love with an emotionally unavailable man, who only loved me in my fantasies. I have been pretending to myself that he was completely at fault for the loss of those 20 years I spent with him, I pretend that he was a deceitful, manipulative mastermind and I was just an innocent victim. And yeah, he was deceitful and manipulative, but on some level I always knew that, but I wouldn't really think about it. I loved him so much, I convinced myself that he was a much better person than he was, that deep down he really loved me but didn't know how to show it. My fantasy life was what kept that marriage going all that time. You know how I realized that? I was thinking about when we bought my ring. I worked for that ring for months before it finally came to pass. Remember I told you he just randomly said "You really deserve a diamond." and I ran with that until I got my diamond. But then I told everyone he bought it for me, like I hadn't had to lean on him for months. In my mind, he made this grand romantic gesture, EVEN THOUGH I KNEW THE TRUTH. Looking back, I did that a lot. I had a vision of a lovely romantic story for us, and I was determined to make that story come true, reality be damned. Like if I kissed this particular frog enough times, eventually he would become my prince.