Belle Burden

And that was so deeply hard for me.

And I happened to be in a community where everyone was married.

I felt like the only person who was not married.

And you kind of cross over from one day to the next from being a part of something.

to being different, to not being a part of that thing.

I don't know why, and I am in agony.

And the moment that he asked me for it to be, to say it was amicable, he tried to tell me it would be better for me.

I felt this full-bodied certainty that I could not do that, that I could not lie about it, that I would not survive this if I tried to lie about it.

So when I ran into people, I just said it.

And I never stopped saying it.

And some people could handle it and some people could not.

And I just knew I couldn't do it, which is contrary to my personality.

I'm shy, I'm very private.

But I just knew I could not spin a false narrative about this.

This was what was happening to me, what was happening to my kids.

Me too.

About a year after he left, when we were moving towards divorce, I felt like there were so many different narratives about what had happened, including from him.

A lot of people did not.

Yes.

And I understand.