187: How I Lost My Husband But Gained a Bigger Family

Andrea Askowitz  0:15  
I'm Andrea Askowitz

Allison Langer  0:17  
And I'm Alison Langer. And this is writing class radio. You'll hear true personal stories and learn how to write your own stories. Together, we produce this podcast which is equal parts heart and art. By heart, we mean the truth in a story. And by art, we mean the craft of writing, no matter what's going on in our lives. Writing class is where we tell the truth. It's where we work out our show. There's no place in the world like writing class, and we want to bring you in. Today

Andrea Askowitz  0:45  
on our show, we bring you a story by Serena name it. Serena is an Allison second draft writing class. And I just want to stop for a second to do a PSA about the classes that we offer. We have a first draft writing group Tuesdays and Mondays. And we have a second draft writing group, which is more of a harder core editing situation that Alison leads on Thursdays. And we have a final draft writing class that I lead on Saturdays, all of that information, is that right in class radio.com.

Allison Langer  1:19  
Under the classes tab,

Andrea Askowitz  1:20  
on to the classes tab. Serena story is funny and brimming with voice. What I want to focus on are what we're going to focus on in today's episode is how Serena hit the landings, landing after landing, and we're going to talk about that after you hear her story. Back with Serena story

Allison Langer  1:43  
after the break. We're back. I'm Alison Langer and you're listening to writing class radio. Here's Serena naman reading her story, the bigger table how I lost my husband, but gained a bigger family.

Sarena Neyman  2:01  
My husband told me he had something he wanted to tell me after dinner. Why can't you just tell me now? I asked. Because I just want to wait. He said, I had a bad feeling about this. So what is it? I asked the minute the table was cleared. Here's the thing he said. And then he led a few beats past without talking. I could tell he was nervous. I need for you to know that I have never been exclusively heterosexual. I need to be able to explore that part of me more. What do you mean? I asked him. I felt like I was going to throw up. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. My husband and I were in our mid 30s. It was 1990. We had been together for almost 14 years. I thought we had a great marriage. We talked and laughed and traveled sharing a love of music and books and food and nature. He was a great dad to our daughters who are two and five. He satisfied me intellectually, emotionally and physically. I never had a reason to question his sexuality. I'm sorry. I never had the courage to tell you this before he said. He told me he felt he had no choice but to keep his desires hidden. Growing up in the machismo world of Miami's Little Havana in the 60s. He thought he was gay until he was 23 until he met me. He had never had unsafe sex, he assured me but he also had not been faithful. I was surprised I wasn't mad at him. I know my rage would have been infernal had he told me he had slept with other women. But this felt different. This felt like a dark secret he had carried with shame for over 20 years. I just felt sad for him. And for me. At first, we weren't sure we would have to split up. We still loved each other and enjoyed spending time together, including in bed. I joined a support group for straight people married to gay or bisexual spouses. Turns out I was not alone. I sought out academic journals and read everything I could on bisexual unions. I wanted to know the prognosis of our marriage for our marriage. Not good. Studies show that the couples who tended to make it or those who knew what they were getting into when they first got together. We weren't in that category. I wondered what an open marriage would feel like. I viewed myself as an open minded person but I had a hunch my husband's non monogamy would be too painful for me. Could I handle him going on vacation without me? Not coming home at night? I was doubtful. We decided to play it by ear We'd see how things progressed and then reassess. But really, nothing progressed, we worked, we took care of the kids, and we continued to live as we had before he told me as though nothing had changed. But everything had changed. It was almost exactly one year later, when it became clear that clinging to the status quo would not work. I knew I had two choices, and both were excruciating. Stay with my husband, knowing I would always have to share him, or end my marriage and be alone. If I left, my new world might be bleak and lonely, but at least it would hold the possibility of some future joy. At 35, I was still young, I wanted a relationship where I would be enough, I didn't want to compete with someone else. I wanted to be the only one. We both came to this realization simultaneously. We sat together on the couch one dismal night, we didn't even have to say anything. I realized I could not flourish in this union. He realized he could not live his life fully with me by his side. We held each other and cried. I remember the last week we live together before he moved out, there should be a name for this strange period, a divorcing Moon maybe it's the opposite of a honeymoon. A time when instead of starting to build your life together, you must begin to take it apart. Separating the books and photos and posters was the easy part. far harder was cutting up the fabric of our shared life. Soon, I would never see him when he came home from work. Soon I would wake up alone in the morning. Soon the marriage would be over. The first few weeks of starting a life apart were more painful than I expected. The house was so quiet when the kids were with him. I was always happy when they came back. I felt like I had not understood true loneliness until then, to have a full family one day and the next day to be alone. The separation started out gradually, we still spend time together as a family going out to eat or to the playground with the kids. We went camping on the cape. Once we even traveled to Spain together to the outside I we looked like a regular family. But we knew we were not. And then a few months later, he met someone. Soon we were spending less time with each other and I missed him terribly. But then a few months after that I met someone too. We had now become two families. The years past relationships came in when for both of us, we rarely met each other's love interest. They rarely joined us at our shared meals. They didn't feel like family. But then my ex met his big love. And two years later, so did I. I guess it shouldn't have surprised me that I liked my ex's new boyfriend, and that he liked mine, and that the two boyfriends liked each other. We found we shared so much in common and often had dinner at each other's houses. We all seem to have the same sense of humor and spent a lot of time laughing. Usually I'm not a big fan of socializing with other couples. It often feels unbalanced or strained because I really like both spouses. But this didn't feel like that at all. This felt like family. It's now been more than 20 years that the four of us have been hanging out together, sometimes every week. Sometimes more recently, our gatherings have gotten much larger. I've picked up a stepdaughter along the way. So now we are often joined by our three daughters, three of their spouses and three little grandkids. Last year, I had to buy a bigger table and four sets of benches. These days, the grandkids hold center stage at the table. Once the food is cleared, we'll play around Jr. Mad Libs, which will make everyone shriek with laughter. Then later, my husband and my ex will pull out their guitars and everyone will join in for a raucous round of wheels on the bus.

Allison Langer  9:31  
Yeah, I love this so much. So I first heard this in second draft because Serena is in my second draft group. And she read it and I was just like, oh my god of divorce the moon. Yeah. Just yeah, there's so much but I just want to point out one thing before we get started. This narrator is an expert at landing the paragraph on the best sentence like you you Okay, everything. Let's see, I could go through it. But I just want to say I never had a reason to question his sexuality. I just felt fat sad for him. And for me, we weren't in this category. But everything had changed. I wanted to be the only one we held each other and cried. Soon the marriage would be over to have a full family one day and the next to be alone. We looked like a regular family, but knew we were not. We have now become two families.

Andrea Askowitz  10:30  
Are those the last sentences of a bunch of paragraphs? Because that is yes, yeah. Wow. What you just did reading those like that? Yeah. Damn it landings.

Allison Langer  10:41  
Wow. Good job. Serena. Her voice is so great, too. Don't you love it? The way she reads Eve it is good. Like, it just keeps you hooked. And you're just dying to know everything. What do you think?

Andrea Askowitz  10:53  
There were two times that I got chills. And one was that last line where she was sad for him. And for me? That just oh my god. When I heard that, I felt her. Like I felt her compassion and her love for him. And I really got a sense of who that she is as a character. Like, rather than like, I don't know, it just said everything. It really did. It was like she's super kind and understanding. There was another time that I got Oh, but everything had changed. Yeah, I didn't realize it was the landings. But oh my god, I'm so excited about that. Because that, for when you're writing a story meant to be told out loud, the let last lines matter. The lat the landings of each sentence, the landings of each paragraph, and the last last line. And the last line really did pull me into the wheels on the bus. So her to her X and her current husband are pulling out their guitars like, that's so cool. Like they're so similar. I loved I loved seeing that inaction.

Allison Langer  12:08  
I have a question for you. Because when I had read this when she first submitted it, I want I thought it could end with this felt like family. And but she really wanted to keep going with the last two paragraphs, because in her mind, it was it was family, but she wanted to show. I think she was adamant about keeping them. And I was wondering what your thoughts were and why you think she wanted that. The

Andrea Askowitz  12:35  
line this felt like family did hit me. And I questioned it right now in my mind. And I didn't question anything else in this story. Seriously, I was like, well, sometimes family Isn't this good. And also like this felt like family sounds a little cliche. It's not the full picture. Her family picture is different. And so I'm proud of her for pushing back because she did show us golf, all these three grandkids, three daughters. The games, they play the guitars and the wheels on the bus. So yeah, I'm on her team.

Allison Langer  13:16  
Yay.

Andrea Askowitz  13:17  
I'm on our team, too. We don't like it when the when the writers push back, but good work on that one. Sorry that for pushing back on Allison.

Allison Langer  13:26  
Yeah, really good. Yeah, no, 100%. And I think sometimes when you know something in your heart, and you feel it, it's worth explaining why. And I mean, she didn't even really I think she maybe did explain because she's so polite, and sweet and awesome and wonderful. She was like, Well, this is why I just I don't know when i And I love that you and I both get to read things and have our opinions and discuss. Because sometimes with only one editor, you're only getting one opinion. But in our case, you get to read it. And I don't I didn't tell you that. I just know it came to him fresh.

Andrea Askowitz  14:00  
Well, for our listeners, I want to explain that there's a two part editing process for every story that you hear on this podcast. So Alison worked with Serena first. And then I did. And it wasn't a lot. God no,

Allison Langer  14:12  
I barely did anything. I just asked like a couple questions. And then you came in and asked a couple questions. And that was it. Yeah,

Andrea Askowitz  14:18  
exactly. This is such a beautiful story. I wanted to say this last thing about that landing because now we're talking about landings. And I think I learned this from Joyce Maynard, one of the writing teachers that I've taken many classes with and I admire and she has this idea that if you can land on a scene that explains your where you are now like I'm walking into the sunset, and that's actually what this is. This is a walking into the sunset scene. It shows what she meant by family. Yeah,

Allison Langer  14:51  
I mean, the story itself is also pretty amazing. I know that we're not necessarily talking about that. We're talking about the writing but also the story does matter. And I cared about this story, it was slightly different from some of the ones Oh, my spouse decided he was gay. Now I hate his guts. I mean, this is, this was a beautiful story of real love, and the wrenching of love to make it work, even if it wasn't ideal. And

Andrea Askowitz  15:22  
for a long time, and many, many different phases in this story, we know that it's not working. She was so lonely. And then first when he left and she had not understood loan true loneliness before her house was quiet, oh my god, I really felt that. And then again, when her ex found his partner before she found hers, another very, very sad, lonely moment. But what's so this is a really interesting case of, of perspective. They've been hanging out now for 20 years. So she's telling us the long story. And so we know that it's like, happily ever after? Because she's been through it.

Allison Langer  16:05  
I love the part where she said she had a choice. Because don't we all have choices? I felt that was very universal. Even if you're not in this situation. There's always a choice. You want to just revel in your misery? Do you want to be hateful? Or do you want to choose a path that's better for everyone? involved? Like, yeah, feel the loneliness, feel the grief, feel the pain, and then look at it with a different perspective. And I just thought that was very hopeful.

Andrea Askowitz  16:33  
Well, she didn't say that her choice was I have a choice to be pissed, or understanding that wasn't her choice. Her choice was to stay and share. Or be alone. Yeah. And I thought that it's true that she had choices, emotional choices that she made, but instead of telling us that, like I was saying before, like, I'm such a lovely, great understanding person, she showed it. And then she told us about those choices. And she made God damn did she make the hard choice? Yeah. Who wants to choose to be alone? Fuck.

Allison Langer  17:10  
But then look what happened. Yeah, she had to go through it to get to where she is now with this awesome relationship. You know? So did her husband they ki had to be brave and stand up and say I love you. But no, yeah,

Andrea Askowitz  17:22  
everybody's courageous here. Oh, I

Allison Langer  17:25  
just love them. Ah, that's so good. Thank you for sharing this story with us. I find it so important. It's really really sharing stories. So yes, it is.

Andrea Askowitz  17:35  
Thank you Serena for sharing your story. And thank you for listening. Serena naman has been writing for numerous human rights groups for more than 20 years. She works on causes from digital privacy to affordable housing to marriage equality. She has been published in cabin life and peace voice. She lives in Western Massachusetts.

Allison Langer  18:10  
Writing class radio is hosted by me Alison Langer and me Andrea Asquith, audio production by Matt Cundill. Evans, Stravinsky and Aiden glassy at the sound off media company. The music is by Justina Shandler. There's more writing class on our website including stories we study editing resources, video classes, writing retreats, and live online classes. If you want to write with us every week, or if you're a business owner, community activist group that needs healing entrepreneur and you want to help your team write better check out all the classes we offer on our website, writing class radio.com. Join the community that comes together for instruction and excuse to write in the support from other writers. To learn more, go to our website or patreon.com/writing class radio. A new episode will drop every other Wednesday.

Andrea Askowitz  18:58  
There is no better way to understand ourselves and each other and by writing and sharing our stories. Everyone has a story. What's yours?

Tara Sands (Voiceover)  19:10  
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