I Am Stronger Than Love!

“Why after 25 years did you decide to leave me?” James Holland demands from his wife Susan while sitting on the sofa, his eyes on her single suitcase at the door. “What do you plan to tell our children?”

Standing at the closed front door, Susan fought years of pain, cruelty, cheating, and his lies, pushed them back in the trash can beside her brain, and shared, “our youngest son is 21 years old James. Maybe if you were involved in raising them you would have been aware of their ages.”

“I did my best!” He snapped jumping up off the sofa his right hand massaging his forehead. “I did more than what your father did, and your mother stayed!”

“Because her love for him was stronger than her,” Susan notified.

James glared at her with furled brows and Susan elaborated, with years of pain yanking her back in. “I must leave because it’s time I live the life I want like you.”

“I didn’t stop you from living your life,” he defends plopping down back on the sofa.

“And I didn’t stop you from living yours with, Jen, Elizabeth, Lara, Sandy, Georgia, Rachel, Diana and all of the others you lied about!”

James' eyes popped, and he gulped down the trap he caught himself in and foolishly said, “I came home every night, didn’t I?”

“In body only, and you bought home the scent of their cheap perfume too,” Susan’s memory recalls.

“You still stayed,” he went on. “I retire in four months. We can tour the world like you always wanted to,” he pleads.

“Oh, I intend to,” Susan explained. “But with the strength I have left. You see, I stayed in this unhappy marriage while you verbally, emotionally, and psychological abuse me giving me reasons to leave. But my love for you was so strong I just couldn’t walk away from the pain.”

“I am still here,” he reminds her.

Nodding with a smile of relief, she went on, “Years of waiting for you to realized the love you had and returned it, I suddenly became stronger than my love for you. And that gave me the strength to find happiness. Many females are in unhappy relationships and friendships and they stay because they are weaker than their love for the ones putting them through hell. The moment they become stronger than love they understood their value and change their lives. And to do that, they must walk away from the unhappiness that rendered them weak in the past. I am stronger than my love for you James!” Susan declares.

“I am sorry,” James pleads, almost on his knees. “I am a male. You knew I was a dog before you married me. Not much has changed,” he confessed.

“That is a mistake all humans make,” Susan confessed, turning away so he couldn’t see the pain in her eyes. “We believe that love or marriage will change the ones in our lives. And many held on to years of pain, agony, and regret to a love that was never their own.”

“Are you saying that I didn’t love you?” James demands.

“You fooled me. I too held on to a love that was never mine,” she said as the tears pushed past all of her strength and rolled down. She reached out, opened the door with one hand, lift her suitcase with the other, turned to look back at more than twenty years of cruelty and unhappiness, then release, “Pain gave me the strength to become stronger than my love for you. So, in pain and love, I leave!”

Susan walked away with strength stronger than love!

We were told that love and hate are the strongest emotions. Love made many humans weak. That weakness allowed many to stay in toxic relationships and friendships.

The year 2022 taught me many things in its attempt to end my life. People I loved and were always good to realize that I was weak with love and gave me reasons to be stronger than love. I held on to that tiny bit of pain and cruelty and restrengthened myself, ultimately becoming stronger than the love that held me captive in pain. With that strength, I walked away from all things toxic in my life.

When you become stronger than love you will see life as it really is. Then you can clean up all of the negative elements and hold on to the positives.

I am stronger than LOVE! You are stronger than LOVE! We are stronger than LOVE!

Thank you for reading this piece. I hope you enjoy it.