I knew something was up. I could feel it. I couldn’t sleep properly the night before. The words from our latest disagreement had just been ricocheting around inside my head like the shrapnel of an emotional and psychological explosion. Something was up, but I didn’t understand what at this point.

I went to work as usual, without saying anything about what I had been feeling about something strange or different in the air between us and in our household. Around 10:30 a.m. I started to get piercing headaches in my right temporal lobe. These are not something I have ever experienced before. I just kept on working without thinking too much of it.

The headaches eased up a little and later on at lunchtime I was sitting in the general office at work and I noticed an old New Idea magazine sitting on a table. I flicked through the pages of fluff and bullshit until I noticed a crossword puzzle. I spent some minutes wondering over some of the clues and then I noticed 77 across: 9 letters - [parted, estranged]. The answer was, of course, separated. Unfortunately even this little hint from the universe went unnoticed.

A quarter past five and I arrived home. The first thing I noticed was that it was quiet. Too quiet. There was a large fluffy toy (out of place) in the middle of the living room floor. She was gone, without warning. There was a letter.

At this point, the devastation becomes tangible. It is like a sticky, black and foul-smelling liquid that becomes stuck to your hands and then in subsequent attempts to clean it off becomes splattered all over you. You feel yourself as though you were falling into a deep pit; a slimy and unforgiving fiery napalm of desolation and emptiness.

I have not yet been able to travel to see her but I am hopeful I can repair our relationship. I even turned 40 just recently but this has in many ways become just another empty milestone in my life. Without one’s family life becomes a ritualised void without deep worth.

Love conquers all ? I hope so.