Angry Days

When I was little, probably five or six, I woke up one morning to my mother furious. We had an outdoor cat that someone had let into the car during a storm in the night. The cat, trapped for hours, had peed in the car and my mom had to deal with the mess. She was certain I was the culprit. She thought I felt sorry for the cat and had opened the car to keep her out of the rain. I hadn’t done it. I’d slept through the night, didn’t even know it was raining, but nothing I said would convince her that I was telling the truth. My older brother was a terrible liar, but my mom had a hard time telling when I was in the middle of a lie. So, she assumed my guilt and confined me to my room all day.

I have a vivid, visceral memory of laying on the floor, my head pointed to the door, crying that I hadn’t done it. I didn’t want to be in trouble, but mostly, I just wanted her to believe me. She would not be moved.

Later in the day, my dad came home from work and she told him the story of my transgression. And my dad, who left the house in the dark, sometime between 4 and 4:30 every morning, said, “Oh. I needed something from the car this morning. The cat must have snuck in while I was getting it.”

I have no memory of the resolution of this. I don’t remember if I was happy to be vindicated. I don’t remember if my mother apologized or promised to do better in the future. I have another memory of sobbing in my bed in the dark and my mom coming in to ask if I was ready to hear an apology, but I have no idea if the two are connected or completely separate incidents.

The point is, I was telling the truth, but would not be believed, no matter what I said, no matter how hard I cried, no matter what I did. My dad came home and saved me. Only now, there’s no one that can walk in the door and vouch for my innocence. I’m standing here, again, crying into the dark at a stone wall of indifference.

And I’m so, so angry. I can’t speak through this anger. I can’t talk without crying, and she doesn’t get to see me cry anymore, so I can’t speak to her. Here is this person that I talked to every day, this person that I shared all the little bits of my day, the trivial and nonsense. The big and small, and I can’t speak to her. We can’t talk without arguing and there are so many things to be said.

She came in with me to work today so that she could have the car and set up for an art show she has this evening. We sat in silence for the 40 minute trip, the radio on as background noise. As I drove into my work, I noticed the physical changes to the place, things that hadn’t been there the last time she came with me and realized all of the things that have happened in my life since she shut me out. Things that I would have happily shared if she gave a shit about me. If she had a real interest in my life, and wasn’t just data mining me for more of her conspiracy theories.

I stopped feeling comfortable telling her things months ago, when she started using them against me. When I shared my fears, she used that as an excuse to look for things that indicated my guilt. When I shared story ideas, she used it as an excuse to look for hidden messages. I was never sure what was going to set her off, so I kept it all surface and light.

I don’t know how to work through this anger. It’s such a simple thing, to want to be believed. But she won’t take any of the things I offer as proof, she won’t listen when I say I’m telling the truth. She won’t consider that what she’s thinking isn’t rational.

Today is an angry day. And honestly? Angry days are better than sad ones, because I feel like I can get things done on angry days. I can remember that I am worth more than this. That I am not defined by how another person sees and treats me.

But it’s hard, and it fucking sucks.

I came late to love

I was queer in a small town, trying desperately to deny my orientation. I never dated in high school. I never dated in college. I focused on academics and hobbies. I read a lot. I wrote about love and affection and sex without having any first hand experience. Never believe people who tell you writers should write what they know. Writers should write what they love, what they long for, what they need. We can learn about things by writing about them. No one needs to read about a girl going to class.

When I finally was able to admit to myself that I was attracted to girls, I was terrified. I thought I’d never be able to be out where I was. I thought I’d have to move across the country. I was already a thousand miles away from home, but I thought my friends wouldn’t accept me either.

But I started dating and made all the stupid mistakes of teenage years as a twenty something. Which was awkward. I handled my first break-up badly. I hurt her because I didn’t know what I was doing. We weren’t clear when we started and she was more invested than I was and I should have been better about it. We’re still friends on facebook. She’s married now, with a baby and happy I think.

I still feel guilty.

I kept things casual after that, dating, trying. I’d almost given up after the woman who I thought might be a serial killer.

And then I met her. She was hot and funny and nerdy. She was so out of my league. But she liked me. She thought I was fun to be around. She wanted to be with me.

I lost my phone on our second date and I didn’t care because I had such a good time.

She was so many of my firsts. My first love. My first orgasm—I’d had sex before but she was the first person I was comfortable enough to come. My first valentine. My first flowers. She got me, she made me think I could do anything.

It wasn’t all easy. No relationship is. We struggled with money and chores. She’s a dreamer, always thinking big, making big gestures when we didn’t have the funds to back them up. I’m nervous by nature, afraid of new things. But I think that together, we balanced each other well.

It is absolutely gutting to think that it’s over. That even if she sees her behavior as the paranoia it is, even if she’s able to get the therapy she needs, we will likely never recover. Because, I think, she will always believe that I have tried to work against her and I will always wonder when it’s all going to start again.

I imagined our lives stretching out together endlessly. And now, now I see myself living in the spare room of my friends’ house. Finding an apartment alone. Living alone. Being alone. Because I can’t see myself doing this again. I can’t see myself giving parts of myself to another person just to be told it’s not enough, that I’m not enough. I love her, and I know she loved me and now she can barely look at me. It’s like living with a ghost.

I want better answers

I still spend a lot of time trying to turn my brain off, not thinking because if I thought about everything that’s happened, that’s happening, that’s coming down the pike, I think I’d go mad. It’s all too big to take in at once. The idea of un-twining my life from another person. What that looks like in three months, in six months, in a year.

So I read a lot, I play video games, I keep the tv on in the background, anything to fill up the silences. Car rides are the worst, because there’s nothing to keep me from thinking about what comes next. It’s just me, in the car, on the road.

I can see little pieces. In a week, I’m going to need to call my brother and tell him we’re not coming for Thanksgiving, and let him know about what’s been going on and why I’ve been dodging his phone calls. Each conversation about this is still scary as fuck, but it’s getting easier. In December I’m going to need to start packing my things and moving them to my friends’ house. I’m going to need a new bank account. I’m going to have to update my contact information. All of these things are small, terrifying, but somehow manageable.

And then there are the things I have no concept for. What are we going to do with the cats? My friends already have five animals. Are we going to split them up? Keep them together? When do I stop wearing my ring? I’m not the one who broke the promise, but it feels like a lie to wear it. What am I going to do for the holidays? How am I going to explain this to my mom, my mom who is not doing well? Who is having a hard time coping with her own things, who sometimes tells me the same thing two times in the same half hour conversation. How am I going to face the world without this person at my side? I’ve had a partner for eight years. How do I navigate life after that?

I don’t know. I wish I had answers. Sometimes it feels like there will never been enough time to process this. That there will never be a recovery. Other times it seems like I etch out a little more understanding each day. I don’t know.

Ugh

I think it’s the loss of what might have been our future that hurts so much right now. There’s this person, who was so integral to my very being, whose presence was so significant, whose existence made mine better now hates my fucking guts. The hopes and dreams I had, the things we planned for our future, there’s vanishing now, like Marty McFly’s hand in BTTF.

It’s so strange to grieve for something that’s not officially gone. There’s no paperwork, there’s no final decision. But we’re living in separate rooms. We barely speak. I’m making plans for January, when our lease is up.

It’s also strange to love someone so much and know that they’re hurting you. Know that the way they’re treating you is no good. Whenever I bring it up, she says she’s already apologized and she’s not doing it anymore. I tell her I don’t want an apology and she asks what I want. I tell her, I want it to stop. But she never has an answer.

Because the actual, honest truth is: she believes I deserve to be treated this way. She believes that I’ve hurt her, first, no matter how much, often and vehemently I deny it, she believes I hurt her, so any action she takes toward me is justified.

She can call me any name she wants. She can hit walls and sweep things off tables. She can loom over me, an inch from my face and tell me she doesn’t know what she’s going to do if I don’t stop. But she doesn’t think that’s bullying, or abusive. It’s her trying to get me to confess. It’s her trying to help me. And how fucked up is that?

I’m such a different person now than I was nine months ago. I’m smaller than I used to be. I made myself smaller to try to make myself more acceptable to her. I stopped doing the things I loved. I stopped being the person I was all in an effort to make her see that I was good. And none of it mattered. She’d already set up the rules to a game I could never win, rules she could change at any moment to suit her needs. She lined up a case against me of the most random incidents, things that literally meant nothing, and then got angry when I didn’t fall over in confession. Because there was nothing to confess.

She sounds so reasonable when we talk about this. Not when we fight, but when we try to talk. She doesn’t believe me. It sounds so calm and rational. Except it’s not true. And then she adds more and more things she believes about me, things she won’t be swayed from. Things she can’t prove and things I can’t ever disprove. She stacked the game against me in every possible way and uses it as proof that I’m lying.

More people know now. More people know how she’s been treating me and what’s going on. They know my plan is to leave in January. It makes it scarier, and easier at the same time. It’s hard not to feel like a failure, even though there is nothing more I can do. There is nothing more I could have done.

Everyone I’ve talked to has believed me, and understood what I was saying and had my back. Every single person has said, yeah, there was something not right, but I didn’t know what it was. I’d forgotten what it was like to be around people who like me. What it’s like to feel validated and cared for.

This is the right thing, but it hurts and it sucks and I feel like I’m walking around with a gaping hole in my chest. How do people not see that I’m bleeding? But every day, I get through one more day. Every day it gets a little easier to think about what comes next.

I still want things to get better. I want her to get help and I want her to see what she’s done and for her to stop doing it. But I’m not holding out hope anymore. I’m not doing nothing in the hope that it will make things better.

How many times can I say the same thing?

I’ve been staring at a blank page for too long. I’m not sure what to say, today. Every day feels exactly the same and also a little bit worse. How is that possible? We’re getting farther and farther apart and it feels more like the end all of the time. I don’t want it. Especially when I remember all of the good things we’ve had together. But there’s a part of me, a part I don’t really like to acknowledge, that would find it a relief for it just to be over.

I feel like I’ve done this all wrong. It took me too long to realize what was happening. But no one gives you a guidebook for what to do when a person you’ve known for eight years starts acting so very differently. I took everything so personally. I kept thinking that if I could just get her to listen, if I could just explain enough, she would see that she was wrong. But there’s no logic to be had, here. I can’t love her out of her paranoia. And now I’m afraid it’s too deep to ever change. She won’t even talk to me. How can I broach the conversation if she won’t talk to me?

I didn’t see it. It took me too long. I thought she was just scared. I didn’t realize it was something much bigger.

I miss her. She’s right there in the apartment with me and I miss her.

Is it a sign that I like survival games?

Yesterday was a hard day.

It’s hard to separate the knowledge that it’s her paranoia that’s driving us apart and the pain that the separation is causing. It’s hard not to blame her, to want to know why she just can’t see that I love her and would never do anything to put our relationship in danger. She’s all I’ve ever wanted. I never thought I’d get to have what we have. Or had, I guess. I’d never jeopardize that.

I took the weekend off. I wasn’t feeling well, so I spent most of my time in solitary, stationary pursuits. The Shipwrecked update on Don’t Starve came out for XBOX and I’ve been playing it like it’s my job. I love survival games that don’t put me in a first person POV. I like the repetitive nature of gather, build, survive. And the Shipwrecked DLC is kind of awesome. The new characters fit the expansion really well and the new seasons are challenging enough to keep me coming back. I’ve only made it through to volcano season once, but I’m getting better each play through. At least until I’m killed by some stupid reason. Once, I sank because I just wasn’t paying attention and I had a really, really good set up for myself.

I also finally watched Stranger Things, which has been on my list since it came out. I thought we might watch it together, but since that may never happen, now, I decided it was something I wanted and went for it. And it was so worth it. I have a lot of thoughts about the style of the series and how it reminded me a lot of Stephen King—which I read a ton of when I was in junior high/high school—only, the plotting was really tight, the characters were really good, and it didn’t leave me feeling sad and kind of miserable. I like story telling about people doing extraordinary things that keep them from being able to function in society, about fitting in and learning and how sometimes, there is no fitting.

I’m back to writing again today, focusing on me. It’s hard and it hurts. I think I mentioned that. There are so many times that I want to bounce ideas or just talk about my day. Instead, we’re uneasy roommates.

I tried to talk with her last night and she just said she wasn’t ignoring me. She was giving me my space. Only I never asked for space. I never wanted it. She’s removing herself from me as punishment, because she knows I hate that more than anything. And it’s hard. It’s hard not to be angry and then feel guilt at the anger.

Which is why I’m focusing on me, today. And am going to try doing that the rest of the week, as well.

I talk a lot about her, when I’m supposed to be focused on me

I took the weekend to process. I met with friends, I explained what was going on, and for the first time since all of this started I feel like someone heard me. It’s not even about being on my side. I just had someone hear me and validate my experiences. With no hesitation, not judgement, they offered me a place to stay, short term or long term. Support.

You know, the thing I’m supposed to get from my wife. Because we’re supposed to be partners.

I’m kind of angry still, but the anger makes me feel guilty. I know it’s not her fault. I know it’s her brain telling her that there’s danger. But it hurts. And she’s hurting me. Not physically. That would be easier to deal with. She’s hurting me in more subtle and insidious ways. In ways that are hard to pin down, and easy for her to dismiss. The way she dismisses all of my feelings about this. Because she thinks I’ve done something to deserve being treated this way. She thinks she’s helping by pushing me, trying to get me to confess.

Nine months of this is too long. It’s hard not to think badly of myself, that it took me so long to see. This is not going to change. Not without help. And I don’t think she’s going to listen to me that she needs help.

I’m going to try and talk with her tonight. We’ve had more than a week to process the last fight. A week of silence and separate rooms. It’s time to check in and see where we are. I mean, I know where we are, but I want to know if there’s a chance that it might change.

I’m pretty sure I know the answer and it’s gutting me. I promised. I said sickness and health and this is a sickness. It feels wrong to walk away. But she chooses. I can try and try and try as much as I want, but she chooses.

It’s not so secret anymore

Yesterday, a friend texted me. We haven’t talked or seen each other in a while, I haven’t been able to talk to my friends because I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know how to hang out with them and hear about their lives and not tell them that it felt like I was dying. She wanted to know if we could hang out, the two of them and the two of us.

I stared at her message most of the day, not sure how to answer, not sure where to even start. The last time we all got together, it had been after months of silence on my end. We had to explain part of it, but not all, not the part where we were having problems. And my wife was so sweet to me that night. It was the nicest she’d been to me in ages. Smiling, laughing, rubbing my shoulders, touching my hands. Putting on a show. Look, look how happy we are.

But at this point, we’re barely speaking. There’s no show, there’s no point to a show. She’s sleeping on the couch. We can’t be in the same room. Even though I have a dozen different thoughts all day long about things I want to share with her, even though I catch myself saving a story to share with her later in the day, we don’t speak.

Finally, after most of a day of indecision, I told my friend that it’d be great to see her, but that it would just be me, because we were having problems. She was cool about it, asked if I was okay, but I know when we get together, that’s when I’ll have to explain.

It’s never felt more real.

When all of this started, my wife told me that she wasn’t going to tell anyone about our fights. I thought it was a kindness. All I could see is that she didn’t want me, didn’t love me, and I was grateful not to have anyone else know. It felt like she was being mindful of me in a small way, protecting me from what others might think.

I realize now that what she was really doing was finding another way to control the situation. The less people who knew, the less people would have a chance to weigh in, or provide me with some kind of support. I languished for months and months feeling so alone and so stuck.

The last two days have been particularly hard. She keeps making small comments that could be the opening to a bigger conversation, asides that could set us back to where we were before. When we pretended that everything was okay until she had a major blow up. And I want it. I want it so badly. I want to laugh and say, ‘Isn’t that funny, we were both at the same place today?’ ‘Oh, that’s where you hid the extra cooking spray so we would use the old one before we started the new can.’ I want it to be easy and familiar, and it wouldn’t take much. But it doesn’t fix anything and, as has happened over and over and over again, it just makes it that much harder when something sets her off and she goes after me again.

It feels like I’m making a mistake, being so cold. It feels like I’m trashing any last hope of reconciliation. But then I remember. She chooses. She told me from the beginning. She will never believe me. And I have to remember. I have to remember. She chooses. And this is how I protect myself.

Pokemon as a meditation

I installed Pokemon on my phone because she was excited about it. She had me play for her while we drove around on errands one day, not long after it came out and I had more fun than I expected and I thought to myself, why am I playing her game, when I could have my own.

It’s a mild distraction, with not enough content to keep me coming back for hours at a time. The perfect kind of game. It’s like a slightly more interactive version of Neko Atsume, only I get to go out and catch things, instead of waiting for them to come to me.

Now I use it as a walking meditation. It’s a way to get out of the apartment, spent fifteen, twenty, twenty-five minutes walking through my apartment complex. I wait until late evening, when it’s dark, when no one can see me if I start to cry, or when I’m talking to myself. Talking myself through this process.

It hurts. It hurts because I love her and I want her to hug me and tell me it’s all right. Tell me it was all a mistake, a misunderstanding. That she knows, now, that she was wrong and she was just worried and took it too far. I take these walks to remind myself that it’s not going to happen. This isn’t an episode of a drama, it’s not a novel. There’s not going to be some last minute revelation.

So, I walk and I catch Pokemon. I hatch eggs, and I remind myself with each step. She chooses, she chooses, she chooses.

A hard day

Today was a hard day.

I know they’re going to happen. I just thought I might get a break of more than one day before it all felt too much and too big.

I keep telling myself that she chooses. I keep telling myself that I’m all right.

But it’s hard. I love her so much. I thought we’d have forever. I know for a fact that this is it for me. I’m not ever doing this again. I gave too much of myself to her, to have it come to nothing in the end. To find out she thought I wasn’t enough all along.

She chooses, and I’m looking into the future where I am a whole person again and it’s hard.