[DanaC]

It'd break my heart in two if J was unhappy and alone. I still feel at least partially responsible for his well-being and happiness. I know he shares that sense of responsibility when it comes to me.

When Mum and Dad split, Mum's life took off in happier directions (give or take a couple of years of hell courtesy of her mad-as-fuck daughter:P) . Dad never quite seemed to find his peace. None of us know him well enough to know whether he was as unhappy as that life would have made any one of us...could be that he enjoyed hislife immensely until illness struck. But there always has been a slight air of isolation abut Dad. I know that mum worries about him still. They've been divorced longer than they were married (24 years divorced, 22 years married) and neither of them has had another partner (though mum had a couple of flings and Dad may have had entanglements that i don't know about). But they still look out for each other.

When Dad got ill a couple of years ago, and was living in that wreck of a house with no water supply, he'd come and stay in Halifax from time to time. A break for a few days at mum's house, where he could do a bit of laundry and rest for a while. On one occasion he stayed a little too long. he was dreadfully ill and was unable to travel for about two weeks. I remember mum starting to get seriously depresed. Him being there was changing the atmosphere of her house; rocketing her back into the stultifying air of a dead marriage, finding herself falling into old patterns of interaction.

She kept the visits short after that. Started being 'away' sometimes when he phoned. Broke it up a little, without withdrawing help and friendship entirely. She doesn't see him very often these days, maybe a few times a year. She still worries sometimes. She's still the one his friends call when he's been taken into casualty in the middle of the night. He still looks out for her. He still feels a sense of financial responsibility to her and to my brother and I, but most particularly to her. She has to be very careful about what she says on the phone because if he gets an inkling she's struggling, he'll turn up with some cash.

There is tension and sadness in their friendship. They are like two different generations, though he is only 9 years older. There are secrets and things never said, and old hurts that are close enough to the surface to bleed once in a while. But there's also a quiet acceptance of that. They're both such different people to the ones who divorced, it's almost inconceivable that they were ever together. All such a long time ago, with periods of years inbetween with little contact. He's more like an aged relative, than an ex-partner.

It depends on the person I guess. Maybe it is more of a female thing than a male one, but I suspect it cuts both ways overall. I think if you've truly loved and cared for someone, something of that remains after that love has died/turned to something else. That's my experience anyway.