The UK's "DAILY RECORD" Runs Erratic Excerpt of Split in its Scottish paper.. Interesting.

This is the UK / Scottish/ Australian Paperback Edition of "Split." what you see below is the extract the Scottish chose to print.


Divorce Papers
Jan 21 2009

Mum Of One Reveals The Emotional Rollercoaster Of A Journey She Made During Split From Husband
Suzanne Finnamore Turns Diary Of Her Real-Life Marriage Break-Up Into Book About Surviving Betrayal

SUZANNE Finnamore had been married for five years and had a 15-month-old son when her husband suddenly announced he wanted a divorce.

She went from happy family to single mother when he revealed he was leaving.

Then she found out he had a girlfriend, then that they had a baby on the way.

Suzanne kept a diary of the events. The book it became, Split, details - with raw pain and humour - how she recovered from the end of their relationship. Here, she calls him simply "N" and their son "A".

*


At 6.10 precisely, he walks through the door and kisses my cheek. He tells me I look beautiful and walks swiftly to our bedroom to change his shirt, though we have no plans that I am aware of.
And yet here it comes.
"I deserve happiness," N says. I hear him say divorce - and then the word lawyer coming at me like a javelin.
I was being informed and he was leaving at once. I realise with a wave of nausea that this is what his "happiness" meant - a euphemism for my removal.
There were signs but I ignored them. He stopped calling me during the day and went out for long lunches.
When his mobile rang he would say: "I'll call you back." He never told me who it was.
He taught me not to ask.
I found a book of poetry with the inscription "To N x Me."
N calls one night and says he still loves me as a person, as the "mother of his child".
The kiss of death. Demotion. Mothers are not always wives.
"I miss Da Da," I say to A. He hands me his dummy. He always knows what to do.
My mother tries to warn me, asking: "Is there someone else?"
I say: "No, I don't think so, he was home virtually every night and we were still having sex all the time."
She adds: "Well, if I were you, I would prepare yourself. A woman may just pop out of the closet."
At the very next full moon, A tells me that Daddy and a woman took him to the zoo. Signs matter and the most dangerous ones are those you refuse to see coming.
One day, I will have revenge. I understand that I am expected to forgive N and his girlfriend and make this so much easier and more pleasant for all concerned.
However, it's fairly simple, my state of mind. I want N dead. It comes on suddenly, a meteor of repressed anger.
One day, I hope I can stop hating A's father, but not right now. He has betrayed and abandoned me.
I have to look it full in the face and say: "I was left and it's over." Two very hard truths to swallow, but both at once? Ghastly.
I can see why my mind took this long to process it.
My brain was simply waiting for me to be strong enough to bear it, and I can.
I am not going to die. I am far too angry to die.
N has been calling all day, leaving messages about how he wants to take A to Hawaii for Christmas with Her.
"A is too young to be away from home for Christmas. He will be here with my family as usual," I tell him.
"I can make that difficult for you," N says.
"Yes, I am sure you can," I say, "but why not let A have his traditions? After all, he has lost a father this year." I hang up.
I am involved in the biggest bargaining project of all - the very final divorce settlement.
My system is that I keep sending the agreement back to N's lawyer unsigned until I get what I want. I don't have a lawyer.
Why should I pay someone pots of money for something I don't desire?
Is this love? I wonder. Divorce is love's miscarriage, bloody and shot through with loss.
We hold hands. We confide. He spends the night, something he has not done since he left.
"This will never happen again," he says, emerging from the bathroom fully groomed. His mobile is apoplectic with missed calls.
I feel good. I'm kind of winning.
Then, without preamble, N announces that his girlfriend is pregnant. The news hits me like a blast of warm but potentially dangerous air.
I think about what this means. He is 52 and already has one toddler he cannot fully take care of, seemingly.
And I do something that is very unexpected, given my historical preference for tears - I laugh and laugh.
I want the prancing, ugly legalities done.
I grow tired of limbo. I intend to triumph in whatever way possible in such a banal and common situation where I get dumped like a sack of flour.
When I need him, he comes. Yet I notice I am always glad to see him leave.
In a just world, there would be a place where love and marriage go to die. There ought to be a body you can bury. One could visit the grave.
Instead, I am faced with an acidic sense of loss. Grief engulfs me. For the first time in my life, I feel truly spent and uncertain of the future.
Nothing can be done, I know. That desired, mutually conceived baby of theirs is coming. They're coming, three of them.
Now we're going, we're just two left over.
One night, I find a photograph where his whole face emanated an intense and gentle love.
He hasn't looked at me that way in years.
I am seeing a ghost, yet a person who is still alive and available in this fashion to someone else.
I go down to the cellar in search of other photographs, editing our entire marriage down to one box, a small box of memories and the wedding album for A. I drag the rest upstairs and begin to burn them.
I use our marriage certificate for the foundation and put his love letters on top.
All untrue. All trash. All burned into ash.
I gently dismantle my carefully dried wedding bouquet and drop the flowers, piece by piece, on to the blaze.
I walk down the street and realise I can smell leaves again. A simple contentment, not happiness, but a lack of suffering.
N has somehow missed our boat but it's all right for A, now three years old, and me.
It is enough.
N has a new family now and there is no going back for us, even if we wanted to.
N may have a deficient moral sensibility, but most people do.
I am leaving one life and beginning another, trying to take all the good, only that. Becoming whole again, even if some parts are maimed.
N brought firewood up from the cellar and fixed a few things round the house.
Divorce has its upside.
I miss his capabilities when he is unavailable. But those capabilities slew the marriage - as in, capable of anything.
But we are at ease with each other.
We have had an ugly divorce and I can still become angry with him, yet i can't hold onto the grudge for long. I muse on how difficult it is to completely, emotionally and psychically un-marry ... even with divorce ... especially with a child.
Despite the death of the marriage, ours is a blood bond: tenuous, but for life.


THIS IS AN ABRIDGED EXTRACT FROM SPLIT - A STORY OF LOVE, BETRAYAL AND DIVORCE BY SUZANNE FINNAMORE, PUBLISHED BY VIKING, PRICED £7.99