going to the shrink was the best possible way to start my day.
it minimized the time i mentally obsessed over ever's sister last night.
and what we came up with is the following:
i decided that it's not okay to be his emotional dumping ground.
maybe he feels like he has no one else to talk to. but that is because he has not tried to find anyone else to talk to. he hasn't found a girlfriend or a shrink or a friend since i have been away.
he has made the choices that have led him to this point. he has chosen not to work. if he worked, he could get insurance that way. he's getting denied because he's trying to get it without employment.
he's in his financial situation because he won't work. and it's affecting my life. the one i've made for myself since i decided to stop supporting him. and now i'm going to have to support him again. or clean up his financial mess, rather.
he scavenges food by choice. these are all his choices, not mine.
he's in his health situation because he has not taken care of his body since he was 15 and living in the krishna temple. if you know you have a short life expectancy and need surgery, you quit smoking and start working to get insurance.
i gave him several chances to talk to me before now, and it is okay for me to deny him now, at the end, and not let him remain tethered to me. kim at work today said, 'cut the apron strings'. i don't know that saying, but it's kindof like kit coining 'off the tit' a long time ago. weaning him off.
she also said that i was doing much better before i let him interact with me. that it was good to have a wall up against him, because he is bad for my head.
she said more than once, 'this dynamic is why your marriage didn't work'. referring to him dumping his problems on me, but that i don't reciprocate.
instead, i have taken steps to create a network of people around me, a support system. and i'm not supposed to feel guilty about his decision to not act in the same way. and it's completely inappropriate for him to think he can confide this stuff with me.
if he had tried, if he had gotten a job, if he had helped around the house, if he had treated me like his wife, then these would be my problems and i would be his wife, and this would be my life. but he didn't.
and now it doesn't make me a bad person to continue to say 'these are not my problems'. and i'm the only person who understands. it's because he made it that way.
it's too bad he didn't call me before i came to my senses this morning. because i gave him three days to. and the fact that he didn't, whatever excuse it is with him, is his own fault. and now he is cut off.
eventually i'll start to feel the old feelings again. the ones where i stayed mad at him for being lazy and unmotivated and a jackass. eventually, i'll not feel like a horrible person for not being there for him right now.
because you know what? when i came crying to him, on so many occasions, and he didn't listen and didn't act on it, this is what he gets in return now. he had every chance to help me then. and he didn't. so now, i have a chance to help him. and i cannot. because it is detrimental to my 'recovery' from him.
she didn't say this, but i think that making him feel like i am there for him probably also gives him a false sense of hope that we could work things out or something. after this past week of the calls and the texting, i feel like he hasn't let go of me. i didn't have a clue until he started being clingy, as loosely as that can be used. daily texts and daily calls and daily emails.
it's just strange.
and he is going to have to move on without me. she said that by letting him use me in this way, i'm actually doing him a disservice, because i'm enabling him again, in a different way. i'm letting him get away with not building something apart from me. and because i know that i want nothing to do with him after this phase is finally over, it is almost like letting him think that we're going somewhere, when we really are not.
i can't be his friend.
as she pointed out, there's no middle ground with him. it's all or nothing. and it's high drama vs silence. so i have to check out.
he's going to continually re-realize what he lost when he lost me. and that, in a way, is the karma for what he did (or didn't) do to me. he's going to be reminded of all the things i did for him.
i cannot take care of him anymore. i don't want to. and it sucks that things are this extreme, but this is all part of that decision. i can't pick and choose. 'well, i'll be there for you if someone dies, but not on a daily basis'. that's not how it's going to work.
she was right to apologize for sounding callous a few times. but the bottom line is, if i was going through what he is, he would be the LAST person i would talk to about it. i'd use about ten other people before i got to the bottom of the list. and then still try to go lower before using him. her being callous is what helps me to see past the shit he intentionally stirs up in my head, trying to draw out my inner caregiver. he is completely aware that i'm an empath. and he is actively using it now against me, and causing me harm. even if it's all in my head and my heart.
and that is the point, i guess. he is starting with me at the top of the list. things get super shitty, and i'm his number one? it seems impossible, but at the same time, it doesn't make sense to be anything different. and if i'm his number five, then no problem. now that i have told him i'm not going to talk to him on the phone, he has all the people ahead of me to tell that i'm a total dick, and then follow with his emotional dumping. better them than me. i have had a lifetime's worth.
i'm not a one way street. and i'm not going to let him tug on my heartstrings any more.
yeah, i pity him. his life right now, if it was mine, would feel nearly unbearable. but it is no longer my problem.
he has nothing to offer me but pain and trouble and more heartache. and, thanks, ever, but no thanks. i'm all good on that. enough of that for eternity.
i liked it better when i worried about my life and my problems. the way she put it today, being one person is hard enough. dealing with one person's stress and anxiety is more than enough.
and it's not possible to be two people, to bear the weight and burden of a whole other person. that's what i did my entire marriage. even before that. his sobriety was my problem. his history was my problem. his fucked up family was my problem.
and now, my life is stressful enough, without him adding to it. again: why i left him.
i've done a great job of rebuilding my own life. it took a lot of work and a lot of determination. and it has really not been easy. but i have done it. and i'm too far along now to backslide to the place i was ten months ago. which was taking care of him instead of me, and fixing his problems instead of my own.
i had an amazing dinner with lauren last night. and because it was a lot of talk about each of our own issues and stories, i can't share much of that here. but it was so nice to have someone coming from a long term relationship to bounce words off of. easy stuff, hard stuff, light stuff, dark stuff. to feel like someone really gets it. the intricate parts. the parts that people don't talk about. and all those stupid emotions that make a big mess of what should be blatantly obvious.
when i left dinner, i felt pretty good. definitely better than when i went there. and then got that text from him about amanda.
tonight i'm actually excited.
somehow, my brain is through the cloud of the last week and a half of him. and i'm excited because i've been scheming with aubree.
because it appears that i won't be home the beginning of the summer, but the end, and because it looks like i'll be in the house by myself sooner than i am mentally prepared for, she wants to get her internship up here. to graduate in august after spending a summer here, doing what she has to do. living in the house with me. and just being here.
it sounds pretty awesome. it will take some serious help to make this summer here tolerable when i thought i would be out of here by then. if anyone can make it happen, it's aubree.
i will spend my day tomorrow trying to find a spot for her.
and cross my fingers for a super fun summer...
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