So much has happened these last weeks that I'd be hard pressed to condense it all into anything resembling coherence. So let me put it this way: I've moved out, I've moved in, I've unpacked, I've fallen apart, I've put myself back together. Ironic thing is, the physical part is the easy part. The mental and emotional hoops I've been leaping through, however? Not so easy.
It's a work in progress.
Closing chapters, opening new ones. It's weird but I feel perched on the precipice of some huge new chasm and normally I'd be petrified because anyone who knows me knows how terrified I am of heights. Here I am though, walking to the edge and looking down for once without too much of that breath-stealing fear in my breast. It's liberating. There are thoughts and feelings there, new ways of being there, that I knew were within me but always just that little bit out of reach. Tethered by my choices. Now that my choices are new, I can let all of them come out of their self-imposed asylums. I am becoming. Does that make any sense at all?
Honesty. Integrity. Words I'd heard of, know the definitions of. Words I pretended to use. Not just words anymore. I want to walk into them and let them be part of me and stop staring at them from afar. That is my goal. I've done pretty well so far. I'm proud of myself and frankly, that is something I've not been able to say for a long time with a straight face and a straight backbone.
Before I moved into my own place I'd made some decisions that I thought would be best for myself during this time and for the most part I've kept with those decisions, with one pretty glaring exception. While I don't really wish to go into here about what that decision was and how I changed my mind about it, suffice to say that instead of feeling trapped by the consequences of that decision it has given me rare insight into the origins of some of my deepest, darkest, most disturbing feelings. It has given me a true glimpse of freedom and has offered me one very potent word: validation. I hear a resounding, "It is okay now." And I find myself glad for deciding to renege on that one decision. I made the best decision after all.
I've spoken a few times to BiB. Only short things, nothing personal or anything. Polite. Is this how it will always be, just polite? I don't know. But at least I've accepted that I don't. I'm just not in control here. Sometimes it's much harder to accept that you aren't. At least I've managed to do that. I'm moving forward here as well.
I've been subject to thoughts and feelings brought to the forefront lately because of my release from things I'd long accepted as crosses to bear due to the life I'd chosen. Those things that you consider tradeoffs in your life, you know? I don't feel like censoring my feelings or thoughts about these issues so I'm aware they'll sound shallow, or ungrateful, or just downright mean. Yet they are my thoughts and feelings, no matter how they may seem. I make no apologies.
My husband's mother's health is declining. I am quite sure she has emphysema and perhaps even COPD (though both are undiagnosed because she has no medical insurance other than medicaid.) While she has four children, I had always wondered if my husband and I would be the ones called upon to take care of her as she got older instead of the others because we made the best living. I have always thought fondly of my mother-in-law, I've valued her wisdom and warmth over the years, and even now she speaks to me kindly and gives me consideration even as I have chosen to leave her son. She is a good woman and I love her but I will have enough to worry about with my own parents and my future role in their golden years. I am not the sort of person capable of the inexhaustible emotional energy required for the job of caretaker for anyone that I have not given birth to or was birthed by. I would harbor resentment towards her, and that is a road I don't wish to walk. I am relieved that she is no longer my responsibility.
On that subject -- resentment. I have realized my capability for that particular emotion is high, and I've also acknowledged the damage I have done to people in my life by holding resentment against them that they had no way of knowing, much less fixing. So in the interest of my further well-being and for anyone that becomes dear to me, I have decided -- one of my many new determinations! -- that I will no longer allow myself to swallow my hurt feelings, to do things I don't wish to do, or to feel beholden to anyone. It is a lot more difficult to do than I imagined but I have been doing it. The relief I have felt is palpable. I am agog that it's taken me 40 years to grow enough of a pair to follow through. But it isn't too late, not at all.
Back to some of the things I no longer have to concern myself with.
My husband's youngest sister, while a lot more adult than she has ever acted in the past, still seems to struggle with money. She lived with us a long time ago and was irresponsible with her part of the bills, etc., and I admit to holding resentment against her for that even all these years later. I have a particular form of disdain for anyone who is financially irresponsible -- I can mix and mingle with anyone from all walks of life, except people who are nothing but fucking moocher bums and live off the pocketbooks of others. Call it the way I was raised. Poor, but proud, damn it.
Anyway, lately she borrowed a few grand from my husband to put in her checking account so she and her husband could qualify for a house. Now hub didn't have this few grand and decided to get a credit card and take out the few grand and give it to her because she planned to return it as soon as they qualified. You can guess where this is going, can't you? Their car broke down, they needed half a grand for repairs. The house deal fell through, have they wired the money back yet? No. So hub is paying interest and fees for this card, making payments, etc etc. All for "family." He's always been this way, it always bothered me. I don't have to let it bother me any more. My smile about that one is wide.
This third one is a bit more sticky to admit. It is, because it concerns my daughter. I am enjoying her and I am relieved that to some extent she is not my day to day responsibility anymore either -- meaning the push and pull, the arguments, the bumping of heads. I suspect that this relief will fade and I'll once more look forward to dealing with the day to day stuff, but she's a teenager now and a lot of her raising has been accomplished. She knows right from wrong. She realizes many things now and needs guidance and a ready ear much more than she needs a spanking and a harsh word. A friend of mine said recently to me that I needed to "keep your door and heart open for her......even if she never leans on you, she'll notice."
God, I hope so. I feel so desperately guilty sometimes. I think that I am her mother and she should be with me, that I am being a horrid parent, running away from all that responsibility and only wanting the fun stuff. But that's what I DO want, and there it is. All that nasty feeling revealed. I've noticed though, that my daughter is a lot more concerned with her father than with me. She knows he is hurt, she worries about him, and she is more comfortable talking to him because she knows he won't press her for all those "but how do you feel deep down inside?" questions that I do. She's not a girl that likes to talk about all that stuff. I'm learning that.
This too shall pass, I know. It will all be all right. I do hope and depend on that, and tell myself that daily. I have to.
A few more realizations. All this stuff aside, all this guilt and regret and self-hatred for making my hub feel unwanted and unneeded, for leaving him alone to make his own way after nearly two decades together.......I truly LIKE living by myself, sleeping in my own bed, making my own money. Yeah, I'm scared. I want to run back into the shelter of $80k a year. But a friend said to me a week or so ago that those feelings were precisely the reason why I shouldn't, that doing something scary meant doing something important, and that right now, doing something because of need was doing it for the wrong reasons.
I want to live honestly.
One last thing. I've thought a bit about my personal needs. Relationship-wise. I've long realized that I tend to seek out emotional affairs -- the easy way to get my needs met as opposed to doing the work that a relationship requires. As soon as it gets tough I begin to check out. A little special attention from someone new is addictive. The men I choose don't know me as a wife or mother, but simply as a woman. They are people who remind me of the person I used to be and hope to find again.
I hope that soon I won't need anyone to remind me of the person I used to be. I hope that the person I am and the person I used to be will finally be one and the same. Maybe, just maybe, I won't need to pretend anymore.
((Song: "Free" by VAST. Lyrics here:
http://lyrics.rockmagic.net/lyrics/vast/music_for_people_2000.html#02 ))
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