Living Plan B

When I discovered that I was pregnant with Peter's child just months into dating, I didn't get the opportunity to give Plan B much thought. Plan A already felt like a massive upheaval so working out how to untangle our newly wound up lives together was an unthinkable task.

Pregnancy was a shock to the system, but realising that Peter would be in my life for the rest of my life was difficult to get my head around. I remember just telling myself over and over "this has to work." I had nothing else to fall back on: no supportive family circle; I didn't own my own house; my better friends were scattered about all over the country and although I had a stable career, my earnings were at the lower end of the threshold. I didn't even allow myself to consider alternative outcomes, because it felt that there was only one suitable option: to move in with and set up family life with Peter as he'd offered to me.

It was only when I began counselling after the birth of our first child that the alternatives were discussed. I remember feeling mortified at a mental health nurse for suggesting that Peter was not treating me well. I was livid. He had saved me, hadn't he? With his stable home, good salary, consistent career, his involved, caring family and his solid circle of unfriendly male friends who all seemed to like him. Peter had saved me from a lifetime of struggling to pay the rent alone, from single mother-hood, from my unreliable family and alcohol guzzling good time friends. 

I wasn't ready to face up to the truth back then, but as I saw other mental health professionals following my post-natal depression, it became all too clear to me that I'd moved from one group of toxic family members, to another. Years later, a counsellor spoke to me about creating a "fuck off fund." 

"All women need one" she explained. "So that they can get out should they need to, without worrying too much about money. You take money where you can. A bit of cashback at the supermarket, pocketing the change as much as possible." I hadn't ever considered a fuck off fund before and I had no savings either. I just thought that Peter would look after me forever. Did I need a plan B?

The fuck-off-fund never really materialised, but my anger around the true disappointments of living a life and raising a family with Peter arose more and more, until eventually, I furiously ended this farce of a relationship and told him to leave a year ago.  

Still, a large, naive piece of me hangs on to the hope that Peter will see the error of his ways, his parents' ways, his sister's ways, that he'll associate himself with less chauvinists and reappear as the man I'd envisioned him as when our pregnancy journey first began. I still can't quite let go of the notion of "this HAS to work." I guess it's part of the reason that we continue our family day trips and the reason I haven't pushed for the sale of the family home which will ultimately give me more freedom and autonomy from Peter. But, I also hold on to a family unit in a bid to protect the children from his emotional neglect, from his lack of danger awareness, from his family and because I want to keep my young children close. It's an unconventional set up that we have, but being away from my children 50% of the week was never in my plan and I never want it to be. 

I find myself asking, how bad does it need to get for me to finally call it a day once and for all? Is a perpetual joyless, spirit sucking low level misery not enough? Am I awaiting his infidelity? Worse? Even after endless years of therapy, it seems I still battle low self esteem. I worry how hard I'd push for family life to continue, despite him recklessly ripping it apart. I often think to myself that if things with Peter were really bad, like if he was physically abusive, then the red flags would force this separation permanently. The problem is that his red flags are only ever at half mast at most. That shouldn't really be a problem though, should it?

If he died, I'd have no choice but to live out Plan B more consistently and with more certainty, so why am I still holding on to Plan A? Part of me still feels a little traumatised that Plan A has needed to come to an end at all, after all those years of telling myself that it HAD to work out. Would I eventually opt for a permanent Plan B if he beat me senseless or cheated? Or would I still be holding on to this illusion of a family life? It worries me sometimes what I might put up with to protect my children from a more fixed separation of two homes and two lives. How bad would it need to get for me to cut my losses indefinitely? 

Either way, this life is not the Plan A that we initally created together. I spend my evenings alone whilst the children are sleeping, worrying about intruders and fires and whether or not I'd wake up in time. This isn't the Peter who promised me forever, or promised forever to my dying grandfather on his death bed either. The words and actions rarely seem to align. I am living Plan B whether I like it or not. My bed is empty, he is absent from our children when they wake most mornings, i wouldn't have imagined he'd ever have been comfortable with that. I always have to cook AND wash up, it's me who orders AND puts the groceries away. I put the bins out, I pick up the dog poo, I check that all the doors and windows are locked. He's gone. 

Plan B means that he's not as reliable as I thought he was and that me and the children were not his priority afterall. It means paying for domestic help, like cleaners, gardeners and dog sitters; it means that all responsibility has been dumped on my shoulders in return for a burden-free life, supported outwardly by his parents. 

Even a year on, I haven't quite got my head around this. The outcome which I told myself that I must avoid at all costs is upon me. I guess they call it shock or maybe even PTSD. Whether I chose this plan or not, I'm doing it, living it and each day I come to terms with this life more and more. 

"Expect nothing so you won't be disappointed" my grandfather used to say to me and I'm learning to apply this to my new way of life. On the other hand, I'm also learning that some expectations are actually basic, fundamental needs, like love, respect and loyalty and these are expectations that no Plan A should ever have to compromise on.