Elis de Guerre

I am nine months into marriage and already have regrets. I do not regret my choice of partner, or our choice to get married, but do regret who I was prior to marriage and what I did (or didn’t do) when I was single.

Raise your hand if you feel like you want to make new friends as an adult, but have no idea how anymore. Oh, good. It’s not just me.

Everyone has their inner critic, the voice in your head that whispers all manner of terrible things:

You look fat in that outfit.

t interests me that I can immediately think of the gifts of anxiety, panic, and even my spurts of agoraphobia. Being tense in body and mind, living with fear that feels real even though I know intellectually it isn’t, experiencing the migraines, chest pains and choking sensations — these aren’t things that lend themselves to my happiness.
Yet the compulsion to stay at home, brought on by edginess and unease outside, keeps me productive. Anxiety makes me communicative, even if just through electronic means. The worry about judgment pushes me to write better, to edit more thoroughly, to answer the voice in my head saying “You’re not good enough” with a defiant “Then watch me improve.”

I am 27 years old, 10 months into my marriage, and have been separated from my husband for two weeks. Consider this a letter from the trenches of impending divorce.

If you see me with my partner, you’ll more than likely think that I’m a straight girl in a heterosexual relationship — and there’s nothing I hate more. Being with a man seems to negate my sexuality, rendering it secret or private when I’m anything but.

Learning is the best thing for us, and the best place to look? The sequestered nooks, and all the sweet serenity of books.

Over the past few months, my partner, Christopher, and I had continuously kicked around the idea of introducing other people into our relationship. Contrary to stereotype, these talks weren’t centered around satisfying his fantasy of sleeping with two women — though he certainly didn’t mind the idea. No, we spit-balled ideas about other women for my sake, to see how I could explore my queer identity within the context of our commitment.

Last week, my mother came home from work, found the shower faucet leaking hot water, and told me to "get my head out of my cunt, and start thinking about other things."

I first went on disability when I lived in Rochester, New York.