I went to a Catholic high school. I'm not religious. If I was, I would be Jewish. However, the Sister who taught my religion classes for my Junior and Senior year was full of wise words. She was very modern for a Sister. She wasn't an extremist when it came to homosexuality or birth control or even religion, for that matter. She was just a very sweet woman who found a life path which worked for her. One of her many wise sayings that has stuck with me and has become a bit of a personal quest is this: "The opposite of love is not hate, it is antipathy. For to hate someone still requires that you care, which is also required for love. Antipathy is the real opposite of love because it requires the absence caring".
The last few weeks I have been doing a lot of hard work with regards to two very difficult relationships in my life: my mother and my ex (my daughter's father). I am trying to let go of the deeply held negativity that I have. The hate. I am trying to allow myself to accept the grey area with regards to those individuals. That they were neither fully good nor fully bad. They were human.
Interestingly enough, I am finding it to be much easier to do this with my mother than with my ex. I would have expected the opposite. With all of the things that I have been through as a result of my relationship with my mother, I thought that I would have a far more difficult time acknowledging any good in her. Yet, the wounds that my ex inflicted upon me have proven to be far deeper than what I had originally suspected.
I went through a similar process with my ex from high school. My "first love". The one who took my virginity and then turned into a drug addict with no moral compass. When we initially split, I was full of this sort of righteous anger. Which proved to be a need to show myself that I didn't need him. Something that was a valid concern for my 19 year old self. I then went into this phase where I found myself dismissing all of his wrongs and trying to remember the good. I believe that this was in an attempt to soothe my own conscience for having stayed with the guy for so long. This backfired and I suddenly went through this almost post-traumatic phase where I relived all of the horrible things that I had been trying so hard to dismiss. Finally, after about a year and a half, I was able to acknowledge that he was just a kid and he never meant to hurt me. That I was the one who was allowing the hurt to perpetuate and continue impacting my life.
I say that it was a similar process in a very loose way. The reality is that my process with my daughter's father is far more complicated and intense. I think that I have primarily made it through the phase of righteous anger. For the most part, that reached its peak close to a year ago. It still rears its ugly head upon occasion; but it is no longer the central focus. I also think that I burned through trying to acknowledge the good things about the guy in the nearly three years that I attempted to perpetuate our broken relationship. However, I am trying to find some things so as to not feel my heart break every time that our daughter has to be with him. I think that I am currently immersed in the phase of post-traumatic reliving.
I really do mean that it is similar to post-traumatic stress. The thing that perpetuates PTSD is the way in which the victim understands time. To someone with PTSD, to remember a traumatic experience is not to recognize it as something that has happened but to experience it as though it is happening all over again. The memory is relived through emotions and sensations. It is not correctly placed in the past, where it belongs.
That is what I am currently experiencing with my memories from my ex. I am not sure how best to go about overcoming them. I don't know if I should try to spend some time delving into them and allowing them all to come to the surface and to process through them all. I don't know if I should just allow the phase to continue as it should naturally. All I know is that this is having an impact on my current relationship. In fact, both of these past figures (mother, ex) are haunting my current intimate relationships (friends, family, boyfriend).
The biggest area which is impacted for me is trust. It is so hard for me to trust. My mother made it hard with everyone from the start. My ex made it seem impossible within the context of an intimate relationship.
I constantly feel as though I need to protect myself. That I need to ensure that I am not put in a compromised position again. That I make it clear from the beginning that I don't intend to bend on any of the things that are important to me. That I will not lose anything or anyone to maybe gain one person. I find myself bristling my fur. Expecting that I will have to deal with the same kind of opposition that I had before. When, in reality, I am shouting "FIRE" at the lighting of a match.
Last night, I had this sense that my past was impacting my current relationship all but confirmed. I took a strong defensive on something that had been a serious issue with my ex, even though I should have known it was a non-issue with this man. At the end of the conversation, I heard in a very loving and understanding voice "I get that this is your shit. I'm patient. I am. But how long is it going to take until you realize that I am not him? That I am not like all the douchebags you have dated?". All I could say was "I don't know. A while".
I wish that I could say in a month. I wish that I could say that I would be able to process through nearly 6 years of emotional, psychological, and sexual abuse. I would love nothing more. That would be a lie. That would be a feat that not even my level of determination could achieve. Granted, I have already been trying to process through all of this for the last 10 months or so. I am still angry. I am still hurt. I am still scared.
I came to expect that all of my wants, needs, feelings, and desires were irrelevant. That there was no point in expressing them because it only made matters worse. It was better for me to be complacent and simply do what he wanted. I mostly have to forgive myself for that. I should have stood up to him. I should have walked away. I came close dozens of times. Then he would always reel me back in. He would play on my insecurities and my fear of being alone. He would tell me pretty lies to make me believe that it would be better this time. I wasn't stupid. I knew that it wouldn't be. Unfortunately, he made me believe that I wasn't strong enough to leave him. That nobody else would want me. That my body, my mind, and my heart were broken. He told me that they each were. I am not being metaphorical here. He told me I was crazy. He told me I was fat and a horrible lay. He told me that I was a bad girlfriend to him and that he cheated because he didn't feel loved. I never told him any of the things that he made me feel. I never told him any of the things that were wrong with him.
I have to wonder if that will be the closure that I need. I don't want to feel spiteful. I don't want to feel as though it is driven by a need to grind his face in the dirt and do a pirouette on the back of his head. I don't think that it is; but, I couldn't stand myself if it turned out to be. I just would love to tell him straight up how awful he was to me. How deeply he has hurt me. How spineless he is. How selfish and childish his actions are. I want to be able to express these sentiments to him for his own knowledge and potential growth. I want to be able to express all of this in a way in which it feels mature and steady; not desperate and heated.
I think that will require that I come to terms with all of it on my own. That I acknowledge the totality of both of our roles in the way that the relationship played out. The unfortunate thing is that there is no easy way to understand it. It's not like how it was with my ex from high school. I can't say that he was just a kid and he never meant to hurt me. That's a lie.
He meant to hurt me. There were plenty of times when he would apologize and say that he had said or done things, that he didn't mean, just to hurt me. That it made him feel better to know that he had hurt me. I don't know how to forgive that kind of behavior. It is more than behavior. It is his personality. His motives were not just to hurt, but also to control. He balanced every abhorrent behavior with a loving one. He would buy me flowers or take me out. He would watch our daughter so I could sleep in. He would make me breakfast. It was all very tactical. Yet, it was confusing nonetheless. It completely wreaked havoc on my ability to view any actions as being without motive. My love life became a murder mystery.
I have to work so hard sometimes to just allow things to play themselves out. To suspend my disbelief and try to trust that someone actually cares about me in the same way that I care about them. I pull back when I am in doubt. I don't want to leave myself open for that kind of hurt again. I am willing to dive deep if they are diving just as deep; but, I can't always get the proof necessary to know that. That isn't practical. Life doesn't work that way. Love doesn't work that way.
I spent over 5 years under someone's thumb. Walking on eggshells and putting up with things that now fill me with disgust. I finally severed that relationship almost a year ago. I have done my best to forgive myself for staying when I knew I should have left. I have done my best to believe that I am capable of taking care of myself. The last year has shown me that much. Now, I must work on recognizing the differences in people. Further, I must begin to trust in my own judgment again.
Maybe I can allow myself to trust for the time being. Maybe I can play the wait and see game? Suspend my disbelief for long enough to allow someone to show me it is safe? The thing is that I don't think that is actually possible. In my mind, I will always wonder when is it done? When do I start to hear that I am broken again? Maybe not always. The sad thing is that I really do think of it as a maybe. I don't know if I will every really put any stake in the concept of permanence.
People come and people go. It is the impression that they make on you in between that counts. Right?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment