Everything, All of You…
When Anna Morris was a 24 year-old hostess at a restaurant, she fell in love with the chef in the kitchen. Their relationship, and later marriage was filled with lots of love. But Anna could always feel something was off between her and her husband. One night last December, she found out she was right.
Transcripts may not appear in their final version and are subject to change.
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Nora: Depending on who you ask, marriage has many meanings. To some, it is simply a social construct or a legal agreement. Many people view marriage as a sacrament of their faith in god. Others see it as the highest expression of love and commitment. An example of your faith in love, and in each other.
No matter how you define marriage, if you're in one, you know it's a complicated relationship. It takes a lot of effort to stay married, but for some of us the effort is worth it. I’ve been married twice, and learned that I love being a wife.
There is a comfort in marriage, that you have a partner in life. So if a marriage ends, it can be a devastating loss. All of a sudden you lose a person who was once your friend, lover, co-parent, roommate and companion. It's a loss of what was, or what could have been. The grief in divorce is steeped in re-defining how you look at yourself and your life. In asking what does love really mean, and how do I give and receive the kind of love we need.
This month at TTFA, we are exploring the emotional roller coaster of divorce. Just like all of us have a specific, unique fingerprint, every marriage is as unique as the two people in it. Which means every divorce is unique too.
Anna: we were together for seven years. Throughout that entire time, I was just, super aware that he was deeply profoundly unhappy in some way. But there were always enough other layers of things that made sense to be able to rationalize that away.
Nora: That's Anna. She's 33, lives in North Carolina, and this year she started the process of divorcing her husband, Greg. The reason for the divorce is simple. And we'll get to that later. But the emotions around the divorce are incredibly complicated.
Today we're going to tell you the story of this one marriage — how it started and how it ended. Whether a marriage lasts 5 years or 50, being in a marriage will change you, because having a spouse is like having a mirror held up to you constantly. They see all versions of us, and sometimes knowing you have a witness makes us see parts of ourselves we weren't aware of.
In the ten months since Anna and Greg decided to divorce, she has stared at her reflection from the seven years they were together, and realized the person looking back was not who she wanted to be going forward.
To understand how the end of this marriage changed Anna, we first have to understand how it started.
When Anna was 24, fresh out of college and unsure of what she wanted to do as a career, she did what many 20 somethings do, she got a job in the service industry. She worked at a farm to table restaurant in North Carolina, hostessing and planning events at the restaurant.
One day, a new chef started at the restaurant.
Anna: I just was drawn to him. He was just like hot and tall and commanding and looked so good in his like, full chef outfit and would just stomp around in his clogs. And I was like, yeah, I like everything about this person.
Nora: The chef’s name is Greg, and he’s just so…attractive. And not just physically. He’s a guy who is doing what he loves, and honestly, that’s really hot.
Anna: I don't know what I'm doing with my life, but this is an opportunity and I'm just gonna commit fully to it. And I love the context in which like, we're both taking the things so seriously. You know, it's like theater, you know, everyone's just acting and putting on their costumes every day and doing the lineup and talking about what we're gonna do and make it special for everyone. And there's just so much magic in that. Like I just wanna be around him and, you know, talk about food and flavors and have him bring me little snacks in the office and go to the bar down the street after service and like, you know, make out in the alleyways. It was fun, like, um, Also there's an element of like being just kind of a person about town. we're leaving our restaurant and the industry vibe of everyone's getting off and having their shift drink and um, yeah, it just was so, it felt so fun and young, but also so adult at the same time. And I think that was definitely part of it, of feeling like, wow, this is a career driven person. And I'm like, um, yeah. I'm just like drawn in by not the power of it, but I guess just the decisiveness maybe.
Nora: And like many service industry romances, Anna and Greg were able to flirt and hang out at work, which was great, because that's where they both spent most of their time anyway.
Anna: We just made every excuse to like plan events together and go to the farmer's market together and, run errands for the restaurant. Like we drove to like 45 minutes outside of town to take our blender to get repaired at this specialty shop, and, it was like playing house, but playing restaurant as our jobs,
Nora: Ah, this is so sweet. Very quickly, Anna was smitten with Greg. She loved being around him, and she started pursuing a relationship with him pretty quick. And he seemed to reciprocate. But after being together for a little while, Anna realized there was one issue with their dynamic.
Anna: There was always a sort of invisible distance between us. We obviously had sex. It was always consensual. Like it was always, we wanted to do it. But it wasn't great. Meaning like it felt very much like the act of the thing. Of course it feels good to have sex with someone. But it did not feel connective in the way, like it could have just been, I could have been anyone or anything. Which sounds so bleak I hear myself say it and it sucks, Even just in making out, it's, there was a feeling of not pulling away, but but also not pushing forward, if that makes sense. my like, codependent impulse was to just lean further forward, and say oh, maybe I'm just doing something wrong, or I haven't figured out what he likes or wants, or Yeah, like just deeply disconnected in what I see now is just like such an obvious fundamental way.
Nora: But Anna is still really into Greg, and their relationship moves along quickly: after 3 months, they move in together. And three months after that, when Greg is offered a new job in Charleston…Anna decides to move with him.
Anna: was there even really a full conversation and I think the answer is probably no, because that's again, sort of the theme of the whole relationship, right? There's a nugget of an idea and instead of like fully, you know, openly dialoguing about a major life decision, we just are like, yeah, yeah, that, that seems good. Let's just go do that and see how it feels.
Nora: In Charleston, Greg throws himself into his new job…and Anna is…just in a shitty little apartment, in an unfamiliar city, trying to figure out what she is going to do.
Anna: we were already on a different page about what we were doing, you know, to me I'm gonna move with my cool chef boyfriend and I'm gonna figure out how to have some sort of life in this foodie town and we'll figure it out. We get there and it's just a hot swamp and I'm just by myself in the basement with these dogs. And then comes home super late and we're just, again, not talking. We moved from the basement to our shitty apartment. lived there for about six months and that was like the extended Dark ages era.
Nora: This period that Anna calls the Dark Ages wasn't just about being lonely in a new city or missing her boyfriend who was at work all the time. There was also something else going on in their relationship, something Anna wouldn't know about until years later.
Before they moved, a doctor had given Greg a 9-month prescription for painkillers after a bad back injury. Greg had struggled with substance abuse before, but this was a prescription.
Anna: So he was, he was managing it super well. Which is, you know, classic addict brain. Like this is, I just need this little amount to be able to get through the day. And that's like I've got the timing down. I know when to take it so that like, I'm able to function and no one's gonna know. And then after work, we're all just gonna go get drinks anyway. And so it doesn't matter. And that, that point, like, you know, that's the cycle. Everyone at this age in this industry is just like getting fucked up all the time, every night, every day, whatever. And you do what you need to do to get through. He was also just like a pack a day smoker, and we went out and had three cocktails every night. So like there was enough, um, Like other context for being just like hungover and grouchy and, you know, sallow and all that stuff that I could rationalize, like, , yeah, of course we're tired and cranky and like having a slow start to the day or whatever.
Nora: Greg is distant – both emotionally and physically – and Anna isn’t working yet, so she’s really, really lonely.
Anna: I had some friends back home basically my, my core friend group was my, you know, college crew and like folks I had lived with after college for a couple years. Um, but when I broke up with my college boyfriend, we all just lost touch. And then because I got into this relationship with Greg so quickly and threw myself into it so fully, I really lost all of those people and connections. And then when I moved away, it was just like cutting ties, like cutting the anchor from my hometown, from my friends. so I really did just let everything go and fold into just this life with Greg and then wait for it to start, you know, blooming in another direction.
And so we found a really sweet, sweet house up in this like cute neighborhood, 15 minutes outside of town. But going from like the bad apartment, dark ages, first few months of Charleston to this like really sweet park circle house where we had a screened in front porch and could walk to a coffee shop and like, you know, have, I was like, oh, we've done it. Like we're doing the thing. Like that to me is the golden period where like, we were super happy. I had found this cool bakery job. He was doing his job with his friend, and we had found some people, we had started doing our little vegetarian popups and, you know, finding our little food community of folks and we're, and so that in my brain, that was enough of a foothold where I thought, okay, like now we've turned the tables and we're doing it. We're like, we are doing a life here. We've got everything back on track.
His personality just like changed in a way where I thought, oh, okay. Um, yeah, he seems different. He seems happier now. He seems better now. Maybe we really did just need to get into this like different house, different situation. Like this is, this seems great. Like we're really on it. I mean a yeah, a few months into that probably, um, is when I proposed, Because I thought, okay, yeah, we made it through the hard part. Like had a few really hard dark months, but now have like, found our footing and now we're back on the, the clear path forward, which is okay, we both have our cool food jobs. We're fully committed to this community. Um, we've got our house that we love so what's like, now what, now what in our relationship, because we're still not feeling that connected. Like what do we do?
From my perspective, I thought him feeling lighter, seeming happier was just because our cute life was happening. I was like, great, okay. Like perfect. It's all like what we thought it was gonna be. It was really hard for a while, but now, like everything's great and of course he's just so in love with me that that's like why he feels better.
Nora: Things don’t feel perfect, but they feel better. And Anna takes this as a sign that the two of them should take their relationship to the next level.
Anna: My little bleeding romantic heart was hoping like, okay, he's gonna come home to the house full of candles and he is gonna be so charmed and I've got this beautiful proposal planned and, you know, said my little speech. And, um, that's gonna be the thing that like lights him up and I'm gonna know for sure that he's happy inside. And this is the thing that, that's all it took. Like, okay, now we're in it. And, um, that's just not what happened. Like, you know, I, like, he seemed super overwhelmed. Um, it was, it was his birthday. He had worked a long day. He got home from work that day and. I, I, I was sitting there sweating in my room full of candles and was was like, you know, do you wanna be married?
And he, he sat on the couch and kind of quietly just said, of course. super low key, super, super underwhelming. Um, not sparkly. And that was that. My sick puppy, little brain, I was like, okay, well I did the cute thing. I like did the moment I crafted the memory. Um, this is our story now. This is how it goes for us. And, um, maybe it just doesn't feel like people say it does. you know,
Nora: Ohhh, the way the whole team here winced while listening to this tape. Ooooooh.You can see it. We can see it. Anna in the present day can see it.
It was one of the times in her relationship that Anna ignored her instincts. She could feel at a cellular level that she and Greg did not have the kind of connection she always imagined she'd find.
But instead of listening to the voice in her head that said "girl is this really what you want? Does this really feel right? Do you want the answer to – do you want to spend the rest of your life with me to be – SURE?", she instead decided that voice was wrong.
If she'd listened to that voice, the voice might have told Anna to ask more questions. And maybe Anna would have gotten the answers she needed: that Greg was not just distant because he was stressed out, that when they moved into that cute new house with the front porch… Greg was also in withdrawal from the painkillers he'd been prescribed, that Greg didn’t know himself well enough to even say “sure.”
But Anna didn't ask any questions, and she wouldn't have answers until years later. All Anna knew was that she and Greg were getting married, and it didn’t feel like she thought it would…
Anna: I kind of just thought everyone who was actually in love was just lying. Everyone's just lying to themselves , and everyone around them um, and no one really feels that good. No. Like, that's not a, that's like, that's a fake story thing. Um, and, and then from there, my, my brain also goes to, okay, well no, it's like, it may be, it may be true for other people, but like, I'm just defective. Like, I'm just never gonna feel that way. Um, and so I was just like,maybe,this is just what it feels like. Um, And thinking, you know, I'm really great and I think this is like cute and perfect and he doesn't seem that into it, but like, I guess maybe that's okay. Like, I guess that's just what it is.
Nora: Anna has done the thing that only happens once, or maybe a few times, in someone's life. She looked at another person and said I want to be tied to you forever. I want to rely on you. I want to support your dreams. I want to build a life with you. I wanna wake up to your stinky, garbage breath every morning.
And it feels…eh.
We've made marriage the apex of romance. Like the ultimate expression of love you can reach is ask someone else to sign a legal document tying your finances together.
But historically, marriage wasn't about romance. It was about joining families, or creating partnerships, or giving women stability in a world where they couldn't work or earn money. Women couldn’t get their own credit cards or mortgages until the 1974!!!
And even the romantic gestures we all think of, are actually just products of capitalism. Like…the reason diamond rings are the tradition is because in the 1930s, De Beers diamonds had a popular marketing campaign pushing diamonds.
Being in a marriage, even a loving one, is about so much more than sex and romance. There is SO MUCH ADMIN TO MARRIAGE! Who is paying the water bill? Are we out of milk? When did the dog get her heartworm pill? Is it a pill? Do we have a lawnmower?
So as Anna and Greg planned their wedding, she thought, there's so many great things about this relationship. We have similar goals and ideas about the world. Why can't that be enough?
Anna: I had given him an engraved spoon as an engagement gesture. Um, and then I bought myself a tiny, like just a plain rose gold copper band as like my own engagement ring thing. 'cause I couldn't wear anything with like, um, stones or anything at the bakery. But it's just funny that I was like, I'm gonna just set this whole thing up. Like, I've got you the spoon. Don't worry. I got myself this little ring we're engaged. This is new age she's proposing to him. This is fine. I'm totally into it. And, um, we're not gonna do a big wedding because the thought of everybody looking at me um, tends to make my stomach turn, but I think also on some level I was like, that is just absolutely not what this is. Like, this is not a love to put on display. We are not that type of couple that you wanna, like, I, I cannot imagine us having a wedding. It would like not only would be the like most awkward, weird event of all time, like he would fucking hate it. I would hate to be looked at and maybe someone would actually see it for what it was, you know, on some level. Like, oh no, someone's gonna call the bluff if we throw a big party and say, look, we're doing it. You know? And um, so we skipped all that. And again, it would've been an opportunity for me to like, reach out to all of my friends who I had lost and, and lost touch with. I think of it now, like, of course you should just really want to have a big fucking party why wouldn't you want any excuse to just get all your friends together and dance with your boo? But I just like did not feel that way at all. Um, and wanted to just keep on our little isolated train of we're doing our own thing our way. It's different. We love it. Um, I'm deciding it for us because I'm asking questions and he's saying Of course. And not an enthusiastic Yes. Um, but that's good enough. And so yeah, keep it moving.
Nora: Some of you listening might be confused about how someone can so easily ignore their feelings like this, how they could ignore the many, many red flags raining down upon them.
And to you I say... congratulations! You don't struggle with codepenency. I on the other hand, very much relate to Anna.
If you're not familiar with codependency, here's a brief summary: codependents are often close to addicts or other emotionally unavailable people, and we think we can **fix** them. Codependents hate upsetting other people. We let other people's opinions dictate how we feel about ourselves. We ignore our own feelings, worry about other people's feelings and think we have to earn love through our actions- and not just for being us.
It's exhausting..because you're constantly doing and saying what you think other people want from you. And it's lonely because you lose yourself along the way.
Anna is deep in codependent behaviors when she meets Greg, when she dates Greg, when she proposes to Greg, and when she marries Greg.
Anna: Got married at the courthouse with just our parents as witnesses, um, and one of his family friends took photos , on our wedding night, we, and this I think is actually really beautiful and pure. Our wedding night, um, we got a hotel room at this like cute arty hotel in town. My dad was friends with someone and got us a deal on one of the like very top floor rooms with a little terrace. And it was cool and beautiful. And, um, so he checked in and. Um, drank champagne and took a shower in the fancy shower and put on our fuzzy robes and got room service. And we're watching Sweet Home, Alabama on our wedding night. And like, I think we probably had a quick fuck, but it was just like, not about the sex at all, it was just like, we're just having a good time as friends. There was just like a sort of specific resignation to not celibacy, but like that our, that like, we are just not connected in that way. It, and, and that's like, we both were aware of that um, and it was too uncomfortable to talk about it that like, I had tried so much at that point, or well, poorly, but anyway, it seemed like in getting married, we both were just saying like, yeah, this is like good enough I guess. , and so like it really wasn't. We were just fine to have a bad sex life and we were like, it, this is just what it's gonna be.
Nora: And that's what it was for a while. After they got married, the biggest change in their relationship is with Greg: he finally gets really, truly sober. Back when he’d tapered off the opioids, he’d replaced them with drinking, and would, occasionally, take a painkiller if he could get his hands on one. Anna had no idea how bad it had gotten.
Anna: he just kind of came to me one day and was like, I'm not good. I gotta, I actually have to stop everything. I'm like, I am not gonna be drinking anymore. I'm not gonna be smoking anymore.
So much of the unhappiness and shame that was so apparent in him, I had assigned to... his addiction or at least that made sense and that was the core thing that we talked about. Again, I'm like, dude, you're still like you clearly hate yourself. You clearly just are like on some level, do not love yourself. And so how could you possibly love me? Which, yeah, oh my gosh, that was like, that was the hardest part. And so then it became this weird this weird like internal contest with myself where I thought, okay, if I can figure out how to help him love himself, then he'll love me the way I love him. And we'll be happy. Again, my brain is just locked into the addiction mindset and thinking like, okay, you're like, you just are. You've never addressed all of the shitty things that happened in your teen years with your parents, and there's the deep shame coming from that, and you just don't think you deserve anything good, and so like, those were things that made sense to me to lock into, and I, thought that the sexuality stuff was just bleeding from there.
And once he got sober there was, like, a distinct shift in our sex life, and that was really hard for me because of course I can't say our sex life was better when we were just wasted all the time and that's obviously not what I want for someone but it was like it it was just an obvious correlation that I couldn't ignore, that oh like you seemed more into this when you were also less conscious of the experience and now that we're having sex sober, you're even less here with me.
our schedules were just so bad, like we barely saw each other, we had one, one day off together a week, and then other than that truly we're ships in the night, so it became This awful rhythm of, okay, do, it's our one time to hang out. Do we have an intense conversation or do we go to a movie? And, so like you're really making snails pace progress at that rate.
So the night that it started unraveling, we had gone to a movie and had come home and I was like fixing a snack in the kitchen and was feeling a little bit emotionally neglected and and so I did say, I said I'm like, I'm feeling a little prickly about this distance between us right now. I just wish you were in here hanging out with me, basically. And he was sitting on the couch and just said, I've been talking to my therapist a lot about these feelings that I've been having and we're trying to work out what they mean and what I want to do with them.
He said yeah, I think I think I may be gay, but I'm not sure. And I said, okay let's talk about that. Thank you so much for sharing. What does that mean to you? Where is that coming from? And he said, I've just been having a lot of these like specific fantasies and these impulses.
It was like being hit with a fucking psychological Mack truck. I thought I had done such a good job of skirting any possibility of being blindsided by some something, um, when in fact I had, I had just like been teetering around, these half swept up like breadcrumbs of something that I was just like ignoring for years. it felt like this sort of iceberg where he's He's willing to share a little bit. I can tell there's so much more underneath, but I have to be very delicate about approaching it because I don't want to shut it down. But I am, like, it's, again, it's I know that there's more to it. And it just bled into days long conversations where I just was trying to ask a lot of questions, and hold space, and remind him that I love you no matter what, and I this is all I've ever wanted is for you to just actually be honest with me and... Again, at first it was, okay, you're having these fantasies. Tell me what they are. Like, is this a fun, sexy game? Do you want to talk to me about the things that you're thinking about? And we'll see if that's like fun. Is it something that you want to do you want to go on dates? Do you want to open our relationship? Is there, do you do you want to try pegging? Is there any like version of us being together that is something you want, Or are you saying this isn't it at all? And so that's that was the question I was just asking over and over in as many different ways as I could because he just at first was so unsure for days and days.
The first 24 hours I was clinging to the possibility that there was like some shape of us shifting things or opening things that would work and make everyone happy. He didn't want to go on dates. He didn't want to like open, the relationship. He wasn't feeling confident or interested in actively exploring. After, I think it was like just two or three days He said, Anna, I just, I'm just gay. And I said, okay yeah, I think, that makes sense. It sounds to me like what you're saying is you want to be in a monogamous relationship with someone with a penis, and that cannot be me, so I guess we're getting a divorce.
I felt my body take a deep breath that like reached places I hadn't unclenched in seven years. Um, because it just sort of like this thing washed over me in a way where it just all made sense and I finally could hear this person that all I wanted this entire time was for him to just say anything real and have me be able to hear it. I probably took 30 seconds to, for that deep breath moment and then, um, Just immediately felt like, I wanna just hold this person and make sure that they feel so safe and loved and seen and okay.
I just said, you know, thank you for saying it. I'm so proud of you. Um, I know you mean it and I love you no matter what. And, I probably said everything, all of you always, which was one of the parts of our wedding vows, because at that part I do mean, that's really one of the things I, I have clung to is that I didn't get it wrong. Like I met Greg and I thought this is a person that I wanna know forever. And I still feel that way. You know, I like all I've ever wanted is everything, all of you always. And I don't think that's unreasonable. I just wanna know what is real, what is true. And I wanna know you forever and I want you to continually update me on the things as they change. And I will love you through it all. And that is still true.
Nora: Greg came out to Anna in December 2022, a few weeks before Christmas. They were both emotionally wrecked, and the idea of family time and holiday cheer seemed impossible. Anna volunteered to make up an excuse, and call both of their families.
Anna: he, he was like, no, I just like, I just wanna tell them. And for him to say like, I'm ready to tell my parents and your parents that I'm gay. I was like, if he's ready two days later to sit my dad down and tell him what's going on, from there, there have only been galvanizing moments where like my brain finally got what it needed, which is like the truth washing over and like, like reaffirmation of this is, this is actually what is real. And so it was just like, continuously overwhelmed by those two things being true. Like the before times and the, and like the now and the, and the future.
Being confronted with an absolute truth, like my husband is gay, it was, oh no, he is programmed differently than I thought. I've been with a person who's been in hiding this entire time. I kind of thought so. I asked a million times, couldn't get a straight answer. No pun intended. And, um, and now, now here it is. And so buckle up. I've gotta process like all these lies I've told myself and let myself believe and I do not feel like Greg did anything to me. I have at no point felt angry or lied to or, um, I don't blame him for anything at all. I like, I feel so sad for every turn and circumstance that that set him up to feel how he felt for so long and how heavy that must have been for 35 years. And I feel proud of having created a life and, um, a partnership in which he did ultimately finally feel safe enough to trust someone outside of himself to say it out loud. And to know that he would be okay no matter what. And to trust me enough, um, as a person to trust that I, that I did mean what I said, that I would love him no matter what. And for him to be able to believe that that part felt really good, um, and sacred and special.
And again, in like the, in the fucked up, codependent way, it just was like, okay, well at least like this was all worth it. You know? Like at least I did, you know, I was able to like, serve this purpose for this person. You know, like he, like, I, I know that his life would've been totally different if it wasn't for me. Not to say that I saved him by any means, but I can say with confidence that I, that I tried every single way that I could have to be supportive and open and encouraging and shame free in every sort of dialogue that we had. And, um, and it just took seven years for him to believe me and then for him to believe in himself and to be clearheaded and clear-eyed enough to look inward and be able to pull that out.
Nora: You can't grieve something you didn't love, and Anna really loved Greg. And when he came out to her, there was tremendous loss for both of them.
This is grief. There is not just the primary loss, but the waterfall of losses that follow. Seven years of a relationship is a lot of threads connecting you. It is not a single snip, but an unweaving.
I was grieving what I thought was gonna be the path of my life. Um, but if I'm also really honest, the path was always like, kind of blurry, you know? Like we, I never could quite picture what it was gonna look like for us.
Anna: That's the biggest like, heavy thing that I carry now. I start to try to poke holes in things that are good because don't feel like I can trust them. Yeah. Like I have to trust other people to tell me things. Yes, that's true. And that's a thing that I have prioritized and, um, made very clear in my personal relationships. Um, I've had kind of like really lucid confrontations with pretty much everyone in my family about the way that we do or don't actually address things um, and said, you know, like, I know that I'm coming at this with pretty intense energy right now, but I just need you to know that when I make this sort of effort, I need you to meet me where I'm at. Because if you don't, I have been made aware of this tendency in myself to lean too far forward in a way that is not good for me.
I do remember googling how to cook rice because I even have a rice cooker and it's pretty intuitive and straightforward and I have done it almost every day, for years, but just, um, felt so, on my ass, like someone had just pulled the rug out from under me in a way that I did not see coming, but um, yeah, I just felt like the veil of reality was just so thin at that point where I just like, um, it was just a dreamlike haze of, that liminal existence of like being completely outta breath, you know, you just, um, because it just overshadows everything, right?
I thought I was just waiting for this person to get happy and I just needed to wait long enough. And it just was starting to make me unhinged. I was like losing my grasp on reality because I thought I was just doing. this is by, oh boy, this is by far the most human experience I've ever had. This is a very specific type of thing to go through. Um, it's not uncommon. It does happen. Um, but it is like that. My particular version is, is especially layered, um, And, and like, it just had to take this time. I hate that. It did. I hate, I hate that it took the time from me. I wish it, you know, I wish it wasn't now eight years of my life or whatever, but, um, I wish that Greg hadn't spent 35 years in the closet. I wish that, um, you know, grief wasn't as messy and time consuming as it is, but like, also like in that moment was aware like, okay, you cannot rush this part. Like this is, this is the part where I want to take our time. And so, and that was, that was, that was what I said to Greg in, um, in finding a therapist. I said, if there's anything I could ask for you at this point, it's that you let me take my time and with processing this in the way that I feel like I need to. And that is just, that's what I need. And I, like, I need someone to help me and talk through and understand way less about like what is, what is real and what's moving forward, but like, how do I make sense of everything that has been our life for the past years and years.so there really just are, there really just are no regrets.
Nora: If your definition of a successful marriage is unconditional love, is having no regrets…then maybe this could be considered a successful marriage.
There’s a sun catcher in my kitchen. It hangs on a string, and it turns and sways through the day, throwing rainbows across the room. Any movement, any passing cloud, and the color changes.
Our stories are like this, too. Turn it over, let time pass, and you see something new.
In the ten months since Greg came out, he and Anna have slowly transitioned into this new phase of their relationship.
They've been in therapy together for months, and are now creating new lives independent of each other.
Anna: Greg moved out in April of this year, after several months of us, um, being in therapy together and taking care of some of those like logistics to-dos, like we separated our banking and we, uh, we got covid together, one of our dogs died suddenly we had these like deep grinding gears of moving forward experiences. And, um, finally got to a point where, um, uh, his folks are local And so he started spending weekends over there. So we were like trying to separate ourselves physically a little bit more, and then finally reached a point where we were ready for him to move out. And so once he moved out at the end of April, I immediately became aware of like, it's the isolation piece right all over again, except I'm in my own house, in my own town. And I thought, shit, I need to. I have to actively connect. And so I started just like being much better about building my platonic web of connection. And just being kind of doubly invested in work stuff and work friends and, um, my, my core group of freaky weirdos who I have met in town.
Greg and I lived in our house for almost, yeah for three years and never had anyone over. Like we, I think I had two friends over two times or something. And I like, was like, oh, I'm gonna have a dinner party. It was actually a dog birthday party to be a very specific shout out to Ophelia, the 13 year old pit bull. Um, so I hosted Ophelia's birthday with all of our queer friends and I was out in the yard with my dogs and like looking, you know, in the middle of the night and just like looking into my house and it was knowing that it was full of my friends and I just thought like, this is like what I want. My house is full of people and it never has been. And it felt, it felt like my house, not this is mine and Greg's house that's weird and empty now. It's like, this is, I can build my life here.
That's like the, that's obviously the biggest takeaway is knowing that I can take care of myself and, um, that I can, I can trust my instincts and identify the people who are worth putting in the time and, and worth trusting and worth building things with. Um, and Greg is on that list, you know, like, we are better than we've ever been. Like, this is all I've ever wanted, which is just to actually know who he is and what he is thinking about and how his brain works and, um, how he's feeling about stuff. I would love for us to still spend significant events and stuff together he's just like one of my best friends on the roster.And so, you know, like at the end of all of it, I just get a gay best friend who I've had a lot of awkward sex with. Um, but I, you know, love that for us.
Nora: Anna is at the point in their break up where she is ready to move forward and find a romantic relationship. She's starting to date again, and is finding it much easier to tell people what she's looking for, what she likes and she's making sure to listen to her instincts.
Anna is at the beginning of a new chapter, and she is excited about what's to come.
Divorce has been a part of many stories we've told on Terrible Thanks for Asking, but it's never been the center of the story. And our dream for an episode was to talk to two people, right? Two sides of a marriage, two sides of this story. Greg wasn't ready. to talk. Um, Greg wasn't interested in that when we were interviewing Anna, but then our producer Claire McInerny got an email.
Claire: I emailed Greg and, uh, um, I kind of, I was, don't worry, I'll keep you honest. so I was just kind of telling him, I'm just double checking. You're okay with us talking about your sexuality and your drug addiction, you know, as Anna understood it, um, kind of told him what was covered. And then I said, and of course, if you wanted to talk to us, the door is still open. And he responded like three days later and he said, I'm in.
Greg: We were still sleeping in the same bed and she would be crying herself to sleep every night and not, not like a soft, quiet cry, like fucking wailing and I can't do anything about it. And I, like, if I touch her, like touch her back, like that's going to make it worse. And so I just, I stayed in it. Because I've, you know, I was like, you deserve this, like, you did this to her, this is your fault,
Nora: You did not hear Greg in this episode. But you're going to hear him in the next one that's in two weeks.
That's in two weeks.
Thank you Anna for speaking with us. We have tons of other divorce stories for you this month. Over on the Terrible Reading Club, we have an interview with Betsy Crane, author of the truly gorgeous divorce memoir This Story Will Change, and an interview with Harrison Scott Key, the author of How To Be Married: The Craziest Love Story Ever Told. Harrison talks about his wife cheating on him, and how he decided to stay with her and try to save the marriage.
TTFA Premium subscribers also have access to a bonus episode with a financial expert talking about how to navigate your finances in a divorce.
Terrible Thanks for Asking is a production of Feelings and Co, an independent podcast company. Our team is me, Marcel Malekebu, Jordan Turgeon, Claire McInerny, Megan Palmer and Michelle Plantan.
Our Supporting Producers are Kim Morris, Bethany Nickerson, Rachel Humphrey, Jamie Zimmerman, and David Far. Supporting producers are listeners like you who support us at the highest level. If you want to financially support our show, you can subscribe via Apple Podcasts, right in the app. On Apple you'll get access to bonus episodes, ad free episodes and our full back catalog. You should also consider joining us on Patreon. You get all the same perks, plus live Office Hours with Nora and sometimes marcel!, video bonus content, quarterly mail, and all of our back catalog organized by topic. We have a lot of fun over there connecting with you and seeing other Terribles connect with each other.