Stages of Grief

I am mourning my marriage, I acknowledge that. As that popular animated film K-pop Demon Hunters song "Free" said, "We can't fix it if we never face it". So here I am, facing my shame, defeat, and failure. 

Except the survivor in me is protesting those emotions. Why should I feel shame? Why should I claim defeat and failure? I did nothing wrong. I did everything right. I was supportive. I faced my partner's issues. I begged him to fix it. I asked him to heal himself. I left so he wouldn't have to stress about taking care of me (and also because his silence and his ignoring me were becoming unbearable. It was emotional abuse, and he didn't know any better. I left because this was a deal breaker for me.) 

Anyway, I even gave him the tools he needed to heal, d@mn it! I wasn't the spoiled wife we liked to show in public at all. I was slowly teaching him the tools to help him feel more secure and handle adversities on his own. I made him feel secure. I was the least troublesome wife there was. I humored him, kept things interesting, tried not to be too demanding (except for food and the number of hugs he had to give daily). I even got him a dog, despite my allergies. 

If this feels like a rant post, it probably is. It just feels so unfair to do almost everything right and still fail spectacularly. So, after 3 years of crying and heartache, I'm on the anger stage. My weirdness really comes out in the strangest times. This emotion usually comes in the beginning stages of grief, not at the tail end. Maybe it's because things have been in limbo for so long my patience has worn thin. And as more people are aware of my situation, the injustice of it all is making me feel annoyed and mad at him for being so slow in the uptake. Like why do I have to suffer his emotional incompetence? He's not the only one with childhood trauma in this relationship. I handled my shit long before he came to the scene. I deserve the same courtesy.