I am back... after a week that made me to feel alone and abandoned. I stayed away to try making a new plan for my life... one more time that I have to change a plan.

Life plays a strange game with me but I have learned to accept it. It plays without rules and offers me surprises but I am tough and stubborn person and I stand up after each stroke.

Last Monday a court placed an end to 24 years marriage... my marriage. It was something that I expected eagerly. The death of my marriage lasted 7 years. Slowly but constantly the life's paintbrush drew the last pixels which closed the long cycle.

I am free... I am back to my first surname... I am again Ms. Fotini Eleftheriadou. Eleftheria is the greek world for freedom. I gained again my freedom and I am so happy...

Well I have never imagined that I would be totally free...

Three days before the divorce my son announced me that he decided to stay with his father as he took the promise to live at the same house... I can understand that after a life with constantly moves he wanted to stay at the place where he lived the 3 last years. I couldn't offer him something that he missed most at his life. A place to spread his roots... to keep the friends he made...

That was something impossible for me. I could not keep driving 100 km per day to be at my office and I have not enough money to keep the old house and pay at the same time for the gas I need for my transportation. What I did? I accepted his decision...

My daughters have also decided to stay at the same house for a while until comes the time to start making their nest. The current home is closer to the oldest' office and more convenient for the youngest' transportation to the university.

Well... this marriage has ended and the family has been split. That is the same sad story after a divorce.
I will be totally alone but I am ready to jump in this new life.

I have never been alone. I married at my 17th and I made family... a real family. A family according to what I have learned from my family.

Greeks keep tight family relationships. Family is the main issue in our life. We try to keep our kids at home until they decide to make their family. We care for our relatives and we like to celebrate our name days with the presence of our family relatives and friends' cycle. We are connected the way we dance... all together... joined.

At this point I failed. I broke the chain... I decided to not accept my ex husband's affair but that is Fotini... that is me.

I believe that I deserve a better life. I deserve to find a true love. I am not the person who would make compromises to keep joined this family.

I am free and ready to start a new life. If I have to be alone... I will accept it... and I will be happy.

The amazing with me is that I have started discovering a new Fotini. I have started seeing life from a new perspective. The deep diving to ourselves brings new pieces at the light... new pieces of the complex puzzle we are.