Cleanliness Is Not Godliness

Whenever I talk about my divorce, most of them say I took a hasty decision in ending my marriage. They can't understand how I could have walked away from a person like my husband who is so clean and well organized. But how can I explain to them that it was not just the cleaning or the midnight dishwashing or excessive care about the type of detergent? No... It was not just one big thing. It was all the little things piling up to choke me up.

I didn't divorce my husband because he was a cleanliness freak. I divorced him because he cared more about cleaning the dishes than he cared about me.

It all started one day when I was home alone, sick with the flu. I was in my pyjamas, lying in bed with a bucket next to me, coughing and trying to get myself to throw up. I heard the front door open and close, and then I heard him moving around downstairs, talking on the phone to his mother. He was telling her he was going to take a day off work to take care of me.

For a moment all I could think was how sweet that was, how he had come home early to take care of his sick wife. Then I heard him go into the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator and took out a carton of orange juice. I heard the sound of the juice carton being opened, and then I heard him pouring himself a glass of juice.

I called down to him that I was in the bedroom if he wanted to come up, but he didn't answer. He was too busy drinking his orange juice. He drank it very slowly, pausing between sips as if he was savouring it or something.

I was feeling much better by then, but I decided to go downstairs anyway. I walked into the kitchen and saw my husband standing at the sink, washing his glass.

"I'm feeling better," I told him.

He stopped washing his glass, but he didn't turn around. He just looked at me and continued with the washing. He said nothing. I stood there for what seemed like a long time, watching him wash his glass. I watched the bubbles form at the bottom of the glass and rise to the top. I watched him rinse the glass. Finally, he laid it down on the counter and looked at me.

"Do you want me to stay home for a couple more days?" he said.

"No," I told him. "I want you to go back to work. You should go back to work."

Ever since then I caught him being frugal with his time and affection with me, but I didn't do anything about it. It was so subtle, I couldn't really pinpoint what was happening. But I felt it. I felt like he was becoming distant from me, not just physically but in his heart.

And it only got worse after that. We fought a lot over the years because it made him angry when I left dishes in the sink, dirty plates on the table, used glasses on the coffee table, and empty water glasses on the counter. He didn't want to be around me when I left clothes on the floor, or when I used the same towel to wipe off the counter that I used to wipe my face. He didn't want me to have dirty feet, to leave the cap off the toothpaste, to wear my socks inside out.

He didn't want me to leave my hairbrush on the bathroom counter, to leave my toothpaste tube open, to leave the light on in the refrigerator. He didn't want me to have a messy kitchen, messy bathroom, messy bedroom, messy closet, and messy desk. He didn't want me to have a messy mind.

And he definitely didn't want me to have a messy heart for him.

He just didn't understand. I grew up in a house that was always messy, and here he was trying to make me act like I grew up in a house that was always neat—and clean.

We met in college. I had just transferred from an out-of-state school, and he was a senior. He was tall and thin and somewhat awkward. He was not only a cleanliness freak, but he was also a neat freak. He was always wearing pressed pants and ironed shirts. He was always folding his shirts and pants and T-shirts and placing them in a perfect stack. He used a certain type of laundry detergent, and he always used a certain type of bleach. He liked things to be neat, organized, and in their place, and he liked to be neat, organized, and in his place.

I was pretty messy, and he was the opposite. Maybe that's what attracted me to him. I liked the way he looked, and I liked the way he was. He was very clean, very well organized, very thoughtful, and very smart.

He had a great sense of humour, and he was very sensitive, too. He would often cry very easily. He seemed to have a very tender heart. He was a true romantic. He loved to be romantic, and he was also very spontaneous.

He was not afraid to say how he felt or how he felt about a situation. He was a good communicator, and he was very intuitive. He could sense things about other people, and he could sense things about me. He knew me. He knew what I wanted, what I needed, and what I was thinking. He knew the type of person I was, and he knew what I was capable of. He was very understanding despite what I thought was my lack of cleanliness. And despite my messy ways, he still wanted to be with me. He was a good person.

When we got married I thought it was because he wanted to be with me and be my husband, but in reality, he wanted to change me. He wanted to be my husband only because he wanted to change me.

Oh, he tried to sugarcoat it all by saying he was just trying to help me, that he was just trying to help me organize my life. He took over the housework, and he took over the laundry. He did most of the cooking, and he made all the meals. He tried to take over the shopping for groceries and for clothes. He coined it all "helping me."

He used to say to me, "I know you are busy, so I will take care of things. You just relax. You've had a hard day. I'll take care of things. Just relax and stay home and watch television."

He was supposed to be helping me, but he never said, "Honey, I want to help you. Do you want me to help you do this or do that?" He never asked me if I wanted his help. He just did things. He didn't realize that I thought he was controlling me. I thought he was being bossy. I thought he was trying to control me, to boss me around and tell me what to do. All he really wanted to do was to help me.

He didn't realize the difference between me being messy and me not wanting his help.

He didn't realize that when I left things out, I wasn't trying to be messy, I was trying to say "leave me alone." He didn't realize that what I really wanted was to be loved, wanted, and appreciated, not to be organized. He didn't realize that when I tried to please him by cleaning up after myself, I was really saying, "Honey, please love me."

I wasn't being messy because I didn't love him.

I was just being me.

I was walking home late one night when I decided to call my husband and ask him to give me a ride. I didn't want to walk alone down the stretch of road that was too dark and never seemed to end. The headlights of cars looked like different colours of eyes, shining in the dark. The rumble of engines was just enough to keep me alert - but not enough to make me feel safe. The road was just dark enough that it felt creepy and wrong at night, and it led to an even longer stretch that wasn't much better. It felt miles longer than usual after dark, long enough for me to worry about who or what might appear at either end. So I decided to call my husband and ask him to give me a ride. You know what he said. "Honey I just now cleaned my bike and kept it under the cover. I don't want to make it dirty. Why don't you grab an auto and come home."

No amount of panicky thoughts could ever match the feelings of loneliness that I felt when I knew my husband wasn't coming for me. That lonely stretch seemed to never end. But then I saw it. I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. When I reached the gate, my mind became clear. To my surprise, I felt light-hearted and free. I was finally sure about what to be done.

It didn't matter if his bike got dirt on it, or if he had just cleaned it. When my safety is at risk, coming second is not an option.

I made up my mind. 

This marriage is no more a meaningful one for me.