Combustion

somedays, it is all I can do to not explode all over everyone about all the little things that have been building up. So I will stuff deep down inside and say "it is NOT their problem that it bothers me. It is my problem. I need to let it go, because its not really an issue, just an issue to me." But this doesn't stop me from wanting to explode sometimes, when the stress is just to fucking high, like now. And there really isn't anyone who gets it all and sees through my eyes..and the really real reality is that no one gives a shit, because everyone has their own shit to deal with and I'll be dead in 100 years and no one will even remember my name.

Magical Thinking

Someone told me I was thinking "magically". I instantly recognized it the term as the Joan Didion book, The Year of Magical Thinking. Its been sitting on my shelf for years, since a friend gave it to me. I have been paralyzed at the thought of reading it. Too close to home, I always thought. I'm going to pull it down once I send this..

So it got me thinking, if I am capable of walking around thinking magically that "'He' might wake up some day and come 'home'", and that "My guy wouldn't do this to me" what else of my thoughts have been magical? 

Maybe 'He' was right. Maybe I had created this nice little world that I was so resistant to leave that I couldn't do what he wanted? Maybe I had created him into this amazingly perfect guy who loved me and supported me all those years? Maybe I have been living in a haze and I have no idea what's real and what's not? MY guy wouldn't do this to me. Yet he did. MY guy will wake up and realize all that he's done and feel horrible and want to come back. He won't.

The truth seems to be somewhere in the middle. As I call things out in classic black-and-white absolutism fashion, I know those statements aren't entirely true. Yes, I created a nice little world that I THOUGHT all of us were enjoying, but he wasn't willing to help me care for the house and kids so that I could find the kind of job he wanted me to have. (And yes, I do notice that I am still acquiescing to the idea of him "wanting me to have" a certain job and that it wasn't what I wanted.) He certainly wasn't willing to help me with house and kids so I could go to school and get the career that I DID want, the one we agreed I would get after the kids came.

I think he used to be the amazingly great guy who was supportive at one time, and I carried that image of him long after he stopped being that person. I think if I broke it down, I would probably find that his support was only ever conditional, even from the beginning. I so wanted a man in my life to love me unconditionally (a father) that I molded my guy into that person in my head. I don't think he was that person, and certainly wasn't past college. But that need for a leader in my life, I twisted myself into all kinds of crazy thinking patterns around his ideas of what was good and appropriate. Granted, his ideas of good and appropriate got us to a certain financial level of comfort, but is that enough? I remember discussions well before the kids came about "having work" that paid well, rather than fed my soul, yet he could have work that fed his soul, because it also paid well, even though it maybe didn't pay as well as the X job, it still paid better than MY X job, let alone my soul-feeding job, which paid notoriously not well.

And I KNOW from the times in couples therapy, that he had given up working on "us". He felt he carried this family too long and that he wasn't getting anything out of it. (hindsight tells me he was already seeing his now-gf.) The man I thought he was, would have worked on us to find a middle ground. The man he is, was still demanding that I behave the way he wanted me to behave, not the way the *I* behave. Ah, so I tried to change him and he tried to change me. And neither of us got anywhere bc we had these visions of each other (?) that weren't rooted in any kind of actual reality. I needed him to be this guy, and I thought he was this guy, but he wasn't. HE ISN"T. Talk about magical thinking. He was right. I created a world. But since it wasn't the world he wanted, he left. Instead of talking to me about it, he demanded, he threw down, he insisted on "his way" or no way. I had this silly notion that I could choose my life path and that since we had agreed years earlier to work - have kids - I return to school, that we would still follow this plan. He insisted on "his way".  hmmmm.

I want to be angry at him. I want to be angry at his girlfriend. I want to be angry at her for taking what was mine. But I can't. What was mine didn't exist. And she IS exactly what he wanted me to be. She made all the choices I could have made if I hadn't birthed and cared for my boys. I'm angry that she pretended to be my friend, came into my house and chatted with me, while pursuing a relationship with my husband. I am angry that he treated me so shitty. He demanded things from me instead of trying to see my POV. He threw down ultimatums and left me quaking in my boots, walking on eggshells around him, hoping he wouldn't leave because I wasn't in a position to work outside the home (no help with the kids is one of the reasons I didn't get the stupid corporate career in the first place!) 

I gave him props for having the wisdom to walk away. I take those props back. He didn't have "wisdom". He found someone who is closer to his approximation of perfect and she has bent herself into a position that will make their relationship work bc she wants the money as much as he does. They believe that money will buy their happiness. And it will to a certain extent. He didn't have wisdom about how to end things with me, or talk to me about what I wanted. He saw everything as a balance sheet and believed (or at least told me) that I basically owed him. And I stood up and said no. When it all boiled down, I finally stood up and said that what I brought to the table had value. That the balance sheet balanced. That MONEY is not the only commodity we were working with. I still believe that. If I could have turned the tables and been the one with the career, I would have done it, knowing that my kids were getting what they needed. And he used to beg for that. "I'd stay home if I could." And I would reply, "If I could earn the money you do, I would." He didn't see the team work. He only saw his part and my life of comparative "luxury". I am grateful for the opportunity to have stayed home and raise my kids. I also see what destruction my "lack of paid work" caused. It caused a lack of confidence in me. It caused a lack of respect in him. 

I don't like using the word 'lack' tho. I wasn't really lacking anything. There was no real team work once the kids came along. We could say he was lacking there, but he never once suggested anything to the like. He was perfect and I was lacking because I didn't work like him. He didn't participate in family life like I did. But was he lacking? No, because that is valueless work. So, he disappeared to work harder once Kid 1 came along. I didn't go back to work at that point bc the money I was earning was about equal to day care costs. and then we pulled further away every year. 

So I am upset at the hurt they (my ex-guy and his girlfriend) caused this family. For I am still hurt that anyone would treat my family so poorly, while thinking so highly of themselves, let alone that it was people so close to me. But I don't really care for them now. I don't care enough to be angry at either of them anymore. I don't care enough to do anything but sigh and walk away when I see their faces or their names. He found a much better match for himself. He found himself in a woman's body. Someone who sees fair as being equal, just like he does. I was going to say I feel sorry for them. But I don't. I don't feel anything for them but apathy. 

He used to be so paranoid by "burning bridges". And I took that on. Why "unfriend" people on Facebook, when its like burning bridges. What if you needed those people to be on your side someday. Who cares. Those that matter will step up, those that matter already have. Those that haven't, well, the axe is sharpened. 

I've started discriminating. I've started writing again. Not fiction, but this. The work is going deeper and I'm starting to see how "he" and my mother are the same. I think I was attracted to him because he was comfortable. He was comfortable because he is passive-aggressive like my mom, but thinks of himself otherwise. They are both artists. They both think they are direct and "right" all the time. No wonder I walked around feeling stupid and inadequate for so many years. My entire life was critiqued, first by one, then by both. Everything was constructive criticism to make me into a better person. Better by their standards, not by mine. In truth, I have people who love me unconditionally (which was all I ever wanted, remember?). They are people I call my friends. 

Shadow Work

30/06/2013 0 Comments The work I do is deeply hidden in the depths of my mind. Long-held beliefs about "how", "should", and "right way". I scour these for any semblance of truth, to see if they are valid and if they bring quality to my life and those in my family. And since I see us as all connected, by the fact that you are reading this, you are part of my family; my Universal Family. Virtual hugs! Like many called to this work, I was thrust into it by a circumstance I didn't choose, but here I am working through it and hopefully a few folks along the way will learn from my experiences and not repeat the mistakes I have made. It came from loss and a simple question. "Who am I?" My best friend and partner for 23 years suddenly walked out during what I would have called "difficult times". Death walked among us, taking close family members. Work wasn't going as desired. I wasn't working "enough". I wasn't meeting expectations. I was, essentially, fired. He wasn't coming back and my greatest fear now stood in my path. Life without HIM. I was speechless and my heart skipped beats. Pretty sure it stopped at one point, but I was too numb to notice. What I was left with, was the question. Who Am I? If I couldn't see this coming, I clearly didn't know him the way I thought I did. I couldn't possibly know me either. So I went looking for me. Who am I, if not his wife? Who am I, if not their mother? Who am I, if not their teacher? A daughter? A massage therapist? A writer? A student? A philosopher? Am I Jewish? Buddhist? Hindu? Wiccan? Do I like the color orange? I used to like orange. Is it still relevant? Do I still like orange? My mind swirled with questions. I was lost in a twister and couldn't tell you which way was up. The last time I knew myself alone, I was a teenager. 23 year later, I'm closer to that teens mother. What I knew in those days before him were not quite so relevant anymore. Although tempted, putting a poster of my favorite band or actor on the wall just wasn't going to help me feel better, not even David Tennant.  But the relationships from those early years, those I could grasp onto for glimpses of "me". They remembered "me". These friends reminded me of who I had been before him. Much of that me was still in here. Indeed, the very me he was attracted to so many years earlier, was the me who stood up and said "no" when he started falling apart and making strange demands.  Who is this me? Is she still driving? Keep looking, I heard inside my head. Tough love and time have been my allies. These habits of thought came over time and will take time to unwind. In the beginning I forced myself to face the behavior and Introspection is now my guide. Facing those enormous fears, those bits we squish down inside, have become the work that fills much of my life. Its called the Shadow in some circles and it needn't be feared, but embraced. I'm still looking for "me". Reading books, working with reiki, making changes all help. But I'm still looking for the answer to the question, and that's okay.