Missing the Relationship I’ll Never Have

I’ve written before about my mother-in-law and how growing up in a home where she allowed my husband’s abuse had such profound, lasting effects on him.

In turn, that also had lasting effects on me and our children. He was never very comfortable expressing his emotions and the one emotion he didn’t allow himself (or any of us) to show was anger. That’s not surprising; when he was growing up, seeing someone angry always led to him being hit.

But what I’m thinking about now is my sadness over the fact that she ended our relationship…