I obviously haven't posted much about my relationship history yet and I hope to do so soon so that you will be able to better understand the place that I'm currently in and just how I ended up here. However, I'm a little hesitant to start posting about my relationship's demise simply becuase I'm a little afraid of how many wounds that doing so may open up for me. I'm already in a very very volatile place right now and I'm terrified about making it worse.
To give you a little bit of insight, my ex and I haven't really been speaking much in the last month. He moved out of my house almost a year ago but we have been off and on quite a bit throughout the time since he moved out. I suppose we naively thought that we'd use this time apart to work on our relationship. So, we pretty much went about the relationship part of it but did it from two seperate places. Inadvertently though, the same issues which were part of the reason that he had moved out in the first place would quickly rear their ugly head again and we'd start fighting. This is where I learned that there's a huge difference between fighting with someone you live with and fighting with someone that you have this immense history with but you live in two seperate places. When you're in the same household, you have time to cool down and can pretty much come back together fairly easily and talk it out. Or, if all else fails, you just get over it when the other one does something silly and makes you laugh. Not so when you both have your own places and spaces. Especially when you're as hard headed and stubborn as D & I. Nope, the two of us would slink to our own seperate corners to pout and punish the other one. This would usually last no more than a day or two but over the last (almost) year, the time in between the fights and the "lets make up" talks would get longer and longer.
I also need to be very clear about something: D is much more stubborn than I am. At least, he has a much stronger will than I do, it seems. I was always the one that would give in first. I was the one who would initiate any "I'm sorry", "I was wrong" or "Let's talk about this" talks. Always. It's just the way it was. So much so that it almost became a game to see if he could pinpoint the date and time that I would call him to make up. I guess I should have gotten a clue then. Well, there were ALOT of times that I should have gotten a clue. My parents & family, my friends, my therapists, my own intelligence (when it wasn't so dang wrapped up in him that I couldn't see straight). . .all of them have been telling me for years that this isn't working. I needed to move on. But, I just couldn't.
Anyways, we would drag ourselves through this cycle time and time again. Each time I could feel a little piece of me dying inside. Each time, I would get a little bit angrier and angrier at myself. Not for the damage that it was doing to me. Not for the stress that it was adding to myself. You see, it wasn't just D & I dragging ourselves through this cycle. We were dragging our son through it with us. Each and every time that innocent little boy got caught up in our drama. There was nothing good about the fighting and this vicious cycle that we lived through when we were in the same house but it was exponentially worse when we were both in our own houses. Not only was our son able to tell that we were at odds with one another, he had to constantly deal with seeing Mommy & Daddy together and enjoying the time that we spent together as a family and then be thrust back into spending time with only Mommy or only Daddy whenever we were on the outs. It just isn't fair to him. The poor little guy never knew what was going to happen from day to day. That made two of us.
So, about a month ago (a month ago Sunday, to be exact), we had another one of our episodes. D had lied to me about where he was going to be that night. I found out. I got angry and desperate. I tried calling him and he turned off his phone. It only got worse from there. Let's just say that I got very little sleep that night. The next day, I went over to his house and we ended up talking about it. But, not the kind of talk that we normally had. I asked him if he wanted to be single. He said that he did kind of want to be single. So, I calmly stood up, quietly whispered goodbye and walked out of his house. I was determined this time not to be the one to cave. I told myself that I was too tired of living in this cycle. It wasn't fair to me. It most definitely wasn't fair to our son. And it wasn't healthy for anyone. I've spent 8 1/2 years of my life with this man and alot of that time has been spent being in some immature fight or battle. Enough was enough. Or was it?
Over the last month, I've been really trying to focus on myself and my son. I've been spending more time with friends which has been both good and bad since I can't seem to handle being around friends who are happy right now. There are two girlfriends in particular that are in similar situations to mine and while hanging out with them reassures me that I'm not, in fact, alone in what I'm going through, it's also kind of depressing! Our times together tend to consist of talking about our issues, crying for ourselves or each other, and generally just being sad. Not sure that's working out too well for me at this point. I've also been focusing on school and since it's my last semester, the workload is damn near impossible to keep up with. School has been a good but stressful distraction from what is going on in my personal life. It's hard to focus on school when I'm in the emotional state that I'm in. Trust me, the last thing I want to do when I'm feeling lost, hopeless, tired, nauseous, and heartbroken is to sit down and write a three page paper on the Globalization between the U.S. and Mexico. But, I've been trying really hard not to dwell on the relationship (or lack thereof). There have been a few slips in resolve. I've text him a few times to tell him that I miss him or to wish him a good day to which he will usually respond that he misses me too or that he hopes I have a good day. We've talked very briefly over the phone a time or two but nothing too deep or too personal. That is until last Tuesday night.
In a meeting with my therapist, we were discussing some of the issues between D and myself. The therapist point blank told me that there was no chance in hell of this relationship working if we didn't get ourselves into couple's therapy. We've been there done that. D. stormed out of the last therapist's office and vowed never to return. So, I didn't think it was going to be an option. But, on my way home that night, I decided to see if there was one last hope for our relationship. I know, this is the time where those that know me are banging their heads against the nearest brick wall. But, I felt like I owed it to someone to try. I'm just not sure yet who that someone is. So, I called him. I asked him if he would be willing to give it one more try in therapy. He admitted that he was caught off guard and didn't really know what to think. But, in the end, he agreed to go back to counseling. He said that he loved me and that he would do it for me. I was actually proud of myself when I told him that was the wrong reason to agree to do it. I told him not to waste his time or mine showing up to a counseling session just because he "loved me" and that I didn't want him to turn it around on me later if the sessions didn't go the way that he envisioned and throw it in my face that he was only there because I had somehow lured him to do it. Again, another brief glimpse into the depths of our despair. D. is manipulative. And he has a cunning way of always blaming someone else for everything. I honestly don't know if he could admit to one thing that he's ever been at fault for in his life. Everything is always someone else's fault. I knew that he wouldn't hesitate to throw it back on me later that he was only coming to counseling because of me. Or, he'd twist it around later to make it look like he was doing me some grand favor by being there. So, I told him that the only way I wanted him to go was if he recognized that he needed it as much as I needed it. And that the only valid and acceptable reason to go was to do it for the relationship not for me. He said that he understood and that he would still go.
(Somewhat) Happy Ending, right? Not quite. So, then comes the time to schedule the appointment. I have appointments scheduled with this therapist already for the next three weeks. None of those dates and times work for D. He has appointments scheduled at work for that day or he doesn't want to miss our son's Scouts meeting that night, etc. It took about ten minutes for me to realize that he was willing to do this but on his terms only. Am I surprised? No. Welcome to the last 8 1/2 years of my life.
Thus, leads me to my question and the title of this post. Where do I go from here? All I want is to be happy and healthy. I want to be in a relationship with someone who loves and respects me. At times, I think that D. really could be it if only we could get over some very specific (and extremely deep seeded) issues in our relationship. At other times, I am confiident that he's not the one for me. That he'll never be mature enough to be the man that I need for myself. That he will never truly stop being self absorbed enough to love me the way I want, and feel that I deserve, to be loved. In my head, I can rationalize everything that's going on and I can see that maybe this just isn't the right relationship for me. But, my heart. . .oh, my heart. It's broken right now. Sometimes, when things are broken, they just don't work, right? When your heart is broken, it almost goes into overdrive and spills toxic and painful emotions everywhere. With nowhere for those things to go, they just invade every part of your body until you're left tired, nauseous, and in pain so deep that you'd swear that even your fingernails were screaming for mercy.
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