Her undulating tongue moved wet and slippery against my hand as her trunk pressed the unpeeled bananas into her mouth. I wore a blue canvas bag, laden with sugarcane and bananas, and I was surrounded by elephants. It was my last day in Thailand after making the painful decision to abort my trip 10 days early. I was homesick and missing my 15-year-old daughter, Sophie, who was in Bangladesh with my soon-to-be ex-husband. It was our first summer holiday apart since the January night six months prior when he’d informed me that our 20-year marriage was over. “My soul is deeply unhappy.”He’d told me over a dinner of Costco salad.“I want a divorce.” Losing my marriage was difficult, his admitted infidelity was worse, and the summer away from my daughter was the hardest of all. My husband and I had been fighting with an explosive vengeance as we unravelled our marriage, screaming things that couldn’t be taken back during late-night phone calls and hastily-typed texts featuring f-bombs and accusations. After every fight, I’d felt ashamed of the horrible things I’d said in response to the horrible things he’d said — loop after loop after loop. Six months earlier, he’d been my best friend, and I couldn’t reconcile how quickly we’d become enemies. That morning, before visiting the elephants, my face had looked older than its 49 years. In makeup consisting of shadows and tear trails, I wore a mask of crepey, dehydrated skin. My hangover had nothing to do with beer and everything to do with a desolate night of crying myself dry in a cheap hotel room. Emotional pain this deep was corporeal. The fight had been a doozy that left me literally bruised, as I’d pounded my thighs with my fists at 2 a.m. after hanging up the phone for the last time. I needed help. I shouldn