Frozen Nowhere

Starting over and learning to love MY life…

Alone

January20

Last night my relationship with R ended.

I knew it was coming, I had felt it and fought against it for months, hoping that something could miraculously change and I wouldn’t have to start again.

ALONE

It ended over IM. A sad state of affairs, but in a few key strokes it was over, by mutual agreement that things were NOT working, that too much was going on in our lives (for me– kids, divorce, ex, legal issues, child support fight, buying a house; for him—kids, cross border divorce, custody, child support fight, financial difficulties, depression) for us to see a future together.  He realized how bad it was, finally, only after I had given up on asking him to show some interest.

So, through type, the way the relationship started, it ended. With a whimper, not a bang. There was no fighting, no tears, no harsh words or recriminations. It just wasn’t anymore and we both knew it hadn’t BEEN for months. 

ALONE again

There were no tears. I didn’t expect any. After all, he hadn’t called much, he had stopped texting me months ago. I was feeling used and unwanted and I knew I had to end it. And yet, at the point of ending, when it truly hit home that he didn’t have any interest in fighting to stay with me? It hurt… a lot.

I sat, alone, on my couch staring at the closed computer, wishing desperately that I could run off and be supported by a friend or two.  But there is not one friend out there I knew I could call to ease the pain.

Not one.

Not one person who would listen and hold me.

Not one person I could call on the phone.

Not one person who would even be mildly supportive via text.

 The dark thoughts started to take over:

I am utterly and completely alone in this world now. I mean, I have my cats, and I have my kids… but I have to be strong for THEM, I am their support network they are not there to be mine. That makes the feeling of emptiness all the harder to face, somehow. I can’t crumble, because there won’t be anyone there to help pick up the pieces, and my kids NEED me. Without them I might as well not exist anymore… and that really is the truth of the matter now.

Not one person, besides my children, would miss me if something bad happened to me. It could be 2 weeks before anyone cared to seek me out, if anything happened. I’d bet that my cats would just happily chew on me… after all, my daughter tells me I am made of meat.

Only a few days ago there was someone who might have pretended to care. I know he didn’t, not really, not anymore… but the illusion was there

There is no illusion anymore.  

R is no longer someone who would care for me, who I could call. He no longer wanted me. And there was emptiness in my soul, there was a pain in my heart, there was gloom. There was utter and complete loneliness in the darkness and quiet in my house. Sitting in the dark and quiet feeling desperate to talk to SOMEONE, realizing that there was no one I could think of that I could lean against right now.

I felt disconnected from everyone.

I know that this is my own fault, not knowing quite how to make friends with new people, not knowing how to connect to people, how to stay connected… for being so introverted and hidden and afraid that now I am alone in a big, wide, TERRIFYING world, when what I need is support and caring and to be touched and connected to again.

My loneliness is MY fault

I don’t know how to change any faster than I am! I am unhappy feeling friendless. I am unhappy being disconnected from the larger community… and I know this feeling is motivating me to CHANGE how I approach social situations.

I can’t hide so much. So much of my life has been lived in fear – afraid of being punished, afraid of being “bad”, afraid to rock the boat, afraid to speak up, afraid to reach out, afraid to be rejected – and it has been very hard to overcome my natural desire to hide who I really AM. I’ve been trying so hard to figure out what everyone ELSE wants from me that my own MEness has been pushed aside in hopes that THIS time I’m doing it right.

But you know what? I’m okay the way I am.  Sure there are things I want to change, ways I want to grow… but I’m a good person and maybe, just maybe, if I let people see ME they might like me.  And if they don’t like me, then they aren’t my RIGHT PEOPLE (thanks Havi).

I don’t have to be a teetotaler to be “good enough” or “spiritual enough” (thanks Pace!), it only matters WHY I choose to drink or not drink

If I want a tattoo I can get one, there is nothing wrong with being a “freak”… freaks are some of the greatest people I have met so far (and just having a tattoo doesn’t make one a freak…) (Thanks Pace AND Kyeli).

If I want to write, who cares if I suck? If I am silly sometimes does that mean I can never be serious? If I get hurt, if I cry, if I am terrified… is that really such a bad thing? Can’t I reach out when I feel this low without worrying that asking for help will be annoying or bothersome to someone? And if it is, do I really want people like that in my life?

I just don’t know where to START!!

  • I write, but I don’t know if anyone reads (is anyone OUT THERE?? And if you are, do you know how to get my analytics to work? Or how to upgrade my WordPress since it keeps nagging me to do it?)
  •  I try to comment on other blogs, although for the most part I am a lurker mostly because I read on RSS feed rather than visiting blogs.
  • I am involved in Boy Scouts,
  • I’m taking a dance class,
  • I joined a support group (Beyond Abuse),
  •  I think I got talked into a local writer’s group.

Any other ideas of how to build relationships (both online and offline) that are flexible and inexpensive?

I cannot survive ALONE anymore. I am a social creature…

What I *CAN* do…

December9
I read a LOT of blogs…
 
Because, I do. A LOT of them. I think I’m subscribed to about 300 right now.
 
The highest percentage of blogs that I read would likely fall under the category of life coaching/creative living blogs.
 
Some of them give me great ideas that I can transfer to other areas of my life. Some give me ideas to start creating things myself, to journal or draw or doodle or write. And some give me HOPE that things aren’t so bad.
 
But there are sometimes when I read these things and I wonder if the whole purpose of the “Life Coach” industry isn’t to create MORE life coaches, rather than to really improve the lives of ordinary people?
 
Everyone seems to be selling SOMETHING

 

Some have their collected wisdom on ebook format to get out there, some have downloads of music, some are offering e-courses, some have physical products to buy, some will allow you to contact them, some have membership sites… but it seems that so many people have something of value to offer the rest of the world.
 
I’m afraid that I don’t.
 
Sorry.
 
I’m finding, more and more, that I am here for a different reason.
 
I’m not here to sell, I’m here to connect.
 
But connecting to people without having something to offer them seems SO fraking hard lately. What I have to offer is so DIFFERENT from others that its practically invisible to the wider audience that I want to connect WITH (mainly other positive, creative, wildly aware of the world types that I find through the life coaching/creative and communicative blogs I frequent).
 
And it occurs to me that maybe, just maybe, I don’t NEED to sell something to have something WORTHY enough to offer others. Maybe I can grow into my own and earn respect through the things that I have to offer people who might take a chance and read my blogs.
 
If I am a professional ANYTHING it would be a professional INSTIGATOR
 
I’m available to be open to new people, new suggestions and new ways of doing things. I am the consummate Instigator — What I excel at, more than anything else, is the ability to get other people fired up about something new, to encourage people to check out new things and open others up to new products AND suppliers.
 
This hasn’t translated very well to the world of blogging, I’m sad to say.
 
While in real life I have dragged my friends through various projects and interests… enthusiastically building them up to start something that I thought was fan-freaking-tastic, then abandoning them to carry on that while I found the next wonderful idea to pass on to them.
 
I am a fantastic person to find niches for people, to help people find new things that will enrich their lives, and to promote ideas and projects that broaden the horizons of those around me.  I love exploring new things, adopting new ideas, and meeting new people… I like being a sounding board for improving ideas, for getting groups together…
 
I’m good at finding FIT for other people…
 
Just not so much for finding a FIT for me in the places I have been wandering.
 
It’s no secret that I’m the kind of person who adopts early and yearns to learn more before they can jump that far. Everyone who knows me knows how frustrated I get when I really get interested in something, but I can’t progress as fast as I want because the information isn’t there or I don’t have access to things that I need to get to the place I want, or I don’t have the people I need to help me to get the pieces that I need to put together a project.
 
I am the kind of person who can passionately BELIEVE in something, but I’m not yet the person who can afford to shell out a tonne of money (especially in non-Canadian funds) to get into the gated communities of the online world, or to take every e-course. I can scrimp and save to do these things and I can get there SLOWLY, but because I can’t jump, because I don’t have the support behind me that some others have, I have yet to find a way to get the point across to the biggified people, the people I look up to, that I am down  here, that my voice CAN carry, that my ideas DO matter… that I CAN help too..
 
I am wildly creative and flamboyantly enthusiastic reader… the kind of person that anyone should be glad to have on their team, supporting their ideas.
 
How can I leverage infectious enthusiasm for new ideas into something REMARKABLE!?
 
Because, it is the REMARKABLE people who get noticed by people. And after you are noticed, that’s when people want to know about you and what you think. That’s when you can find the people who will “get” you… that’s when I can help those who I believe in… That is the moment I am looking for, that moment of CONNECTION, when I have found the people who get what I am talking about, who are supportive of what I am doing, and who can see me as more than “just another nonsense blog” and see me as someone of value to the wider community.
 
I’m still finding my way in the world… but that doesn’t mean that my voice isn’t one of value. I’m reaching out, I’m stretching… I’m looking for connections and support and community even though I’m not able get into the gated communities (yet).
 
I will find someone willing to mentor with me, willing to take a chance that I have something of value in me beyond what I have in my bank account.
 
I may not have something to “sell”, I may not have recognized expertise, but I know that I am good at reviewing and connecting and supporting those I believe in.
 
I believe in the power of the stories that we have to tell, that no matter if we are willing to go into business for ourselves (and right now I am not) or we are out here just to tell the stories of our lives and connect to like minded people, we all have VALUE.
 
So why am I thinking about this now?

Partly it was brought upon me by the feeling of frustration I have right now.
 
I’m a single mom, and because i am single I have no other adult in my house to support me. And because I am a parent, I am not only responsible for myself. I find myself in a situation where, if I fail I don’t only take myself down, I risk losing my children (if I can’t support them I lose them). And so, unlike a lot of people who have been able to make the leap to being online entrepreneurs.
 
I’m jealous.
 
I would love to have the kind of idea that could be shared with others in that way, and be enough to not have to work full time away from my kids… but that’s not my reality yet.
 
I would love to have the resources to even know enough people to ASK for emotional support for the ideas I have.
 
I am frustrated because I WANT to reach out to these people… but I feel so small and unremarkable and insignificant without my own business or BIG IDEA behind me (yes, I know that’s silly too)
 
I want to HELP the few people out there who HAVE been kind enough to talk to someone like me, someone starting out who is in a tougher place, who is reaching out. I want to be able to be someone who can become the kind of person I am looking up to and be able to reach out to people who might be in a harder position than myself and give them a hand up too. And I can’t figure out how to get there from here.
 
I got an email yesterday from Pace and Kyeli regarding interviews and guest posts that they are scheduling right now to promote their upcoming 52 Weeks of Awesome.
 
And I really REALLY wished that I could have said, “Hell yeah, I want to interview you, I would LOVE you to do a guest post on my blog, promote away”.
 
But I couldn’t.
 
I’m not big enough and I didn’t want to waste their time on a no-name blog with no readers.
 
For a moment I was embarrassed of all that I have achieved here, because it doesn’t seem like ENOUGH when I can’t help anyone else. And for a few minutes I worried that I wasn’t gonna get “there”… wherever there was.
 
And I realized, right now I am only able to be a FOLLOWER… and that that has to be good enough. I’m not ready to sell things… I don’t even know what I’d SELL…
 
But I know I make a damn good and LOYAL believer. I make a wonderful follower… and if I can I will promote the HELL outta the things I believe in…
 
Community WILL come… because I want it
 
posted under My Life | 5 Comments »

Becoming Visible again

April29
The draw of the internet, at least for me, has always been that it has allowed me to be both visible and safely invisible.
 
At least for the most part.
 
Unless I accidentally give out my real phone number to people who threaten to send me dead rats via Canada Post* (which, in case you are wondering, really REALLY pisses Canada Post off… they do not approve of dead rats in the mail. I’m not sure they approve of LIVE rats all that much either… but if you label the box “careful, live animal” I think they will take it. But I haven’t tested the waters on that one yet)… and thus become somewhat transparent.
 
Being an online being means that I can be both out there — after all I write a blog (or three), do a podcast (ocassionally), write a diary, have a facebook page (not that I do a lot there), post pictures on Flickr, have an account on almost ANY messenger program you can name (its true), Twitter, and play WoW (not often anymore, though) — and at the same time stay relatively hidden — I lurk on other blogs and diaries, I don’t really do a lot of chattering on FaceBook, I don’t actively hunt down friends on messengers, I am shy about commenting on blogs, diaries, facebook, Flickr or Twitter, I am afraid of promoting my blogs or podcasts, and I generally lay pretty low.
 
While I like attention from other people, while I CRAVE the feedback that comes from being able to be more visible, I am still worried, a lot of the time, to draw any attention to myself.
 
My friends can tell you this about me: I have a “thing” about contacting people. I feel very uncomfortable about reaching out, even to “my” people (to use a Serin-ism). I have a phone, but its only a cell phone. I no longer have a home phone… even though long distance would be cheaper. Why? Because I can’t justify having a home phone and a cell phone when I barely use my cell.
 
Calling people makes me nervous. I’m getting better… but I still have a lot of issues actually reaching out to people other than Reg and Serin (who was the unfortunate recipient of my most recent growth due to Rapport training, back in September)… and even then I am really nervous dialing either of them.
 
I prefer to remain hidden, in plain sight. Its a weird mixture of being invisible and yet seen…
 
On the internet people only see what you let them see, they only have as much access to you as you allow (for the most part).
 
I write online (visible) but I don’t comment a lot on other blogs (invisible), other people’s facebook pages (invisible), or on OD (invisible). I have a facebook page (visible) but I have it locked down against a few people (invisible). I do not check out Reg’s facebook page (invisible) and I try not to make a lot of comments on his status or such things (invisible) because I kinda worry about the comments that will come from his large number of female friends about having a girlfriend (I’m kinda worried I’m not pretty enough for him sometimes).
 And then I wonder my no one comments on my blog (being SEEN), OD (SEEN), Flickr Page (SEEN), or FaceBook (SEEN). I wonder why no one responds to me, friends me, contacts me or wants to chat, subscribe, email… and on and on and on.
 
Because (and this is IMPORTANT here so take NOTES) there is a difference between being VISIBLE and being SEEN…
 
Being visible is there, you’re there, you’re not actively HIDING, but you are not actively seeking out other people either. Its like having a phone but not giving anyone your number.
 
Being SEEN is making your prescence KNOWN to other people. And its UNCOMFORTABLE. Its going against the grain of “being seen but not heard” that my mother was so found of saying (children should be SEEN but not HEARD)… It goes against the way I have lived, never making demands for attention and always meeting my OWN needs rather than ask for what I needed from other people.
Being SEEN takes a lot of courage for some people. It means that we have to admit that we are out here, that we are more than just passive participants in the social network, but that we are active and vital and that we are open to not only the positive feedback but also the REJECTION that can come from not only openning yourself up as see-able, but to also be INTERACTIVE as a whole person responding in a social environment SEEN!!
 
Rejection is SCARY shit.
 
It is the reason that in school I didn’t speak up in class a lot (until university, when I was the ONLY person who talked) — I didn’t want to be humilated if I was wrong. I was afraid to be SEEN as intelligent.
 
It is the reason I don’t seek out new social groups – I don’t want to be rejected for not being “cool enough”….
 
It is the reason I don’t comment on other blogs – because who really wants to make their presence known only to be asked “why did you think I would be interested in what YOU have to say?”
 
It is the reason I don’t note other open diaries – I don’t want to bother people.
 
Its the reason I don’t phone up my boyfriend or friends when I am lonely – I am afraid that I am an intrusion into their busy and interesting lives and I don’t want to be an obligation.
 
Its the reason I stayed in a marriage that made me feel like I was not a real person who was genuinely cared about and loved by her husband – because the idea of not having someone, at the end of the day was scarier (at the time) than having ever aspect of my life controlled.
 
But being AFRAID to be SEEN meant I didn’t really LIVE!
 
When I didn’t speak out in class I didn’t get noticed by anyone. I didn’t get the opportunity to voice the thoughts that I had in my head, and I didn’t give anyone else the chance to see me as more than the shy girl in the back. When I started to speak up in university classes I became a full member of the class, I was seen as someone who KNEW their stuff and I was invited into groups and sought out for my opinion. I was SEEN.
 
When I didn’t talk to other people or try to go out and find groups who shared my interests I succumbed to loneliness. Once I started to seek out others — other mommies, other Pagans, other singles, other needleworkers, other knitters, other WRITERS — I started to create connections that enabled me to further venture both into who I was and OUT to different ideas and opinions that made me a more genuine and deeper person. I was SEEN and I SAW myself.
 
When I don’t comment on other blogs I force MY blog to remain invisible. When I do comment, occasionally other people come to check out MY blog too… and once in a while they might leave a comment. And that gives me a chance to learn about new blogs to read… So I am SEEN and I get to SEE other people too!
 
When I don’t note other diaries on OD I don’t give people the feedback that (maybe) THEY are looking for.
 
When I don’t call my friends I don’t give them a chance to SEE that sometimes I need them… and I don’t get to know what is really going on. Sometimes THEY are feeling the same way I am, that they can’t just call someone up because everyone ELSE is busy. I am SEEN by my friends and I am better able to SEE them clearly too..
 
When I stayed in a marriage that made me unhappy I was, quite simply, not living. I had given my power to someone else, had handed over the my intrinsic right to have friends, go out, have hobbies, and be a social tour de force in my own life. I allowed fear of being alone to make me feel like I had no power to make my life what I wanted it to be. I allowed someone else to determine what I needed, and by doing so I lost a HUGE amount of who I was. Once I realized that I no longer recognized the woman in the mirror, that I no longer had essential connections to my family, I no longer had any friends of my own, I knew I had to leave. Leaving allowed me to start to allow myself to be visible, and through reaching out and learning to date again I have become able to be SEEN…
 
I am fighting my way back through invisibility now… back to being merely visible to being genuinely SEEN as a human being…
 
And sometimes I think that’s what all of us are doing…
 
 
______________________________________________________
* for the record, I only did this ONE time… and the person who threatened to send me a dead rat was none other than Serin, who is now one of my closest (but far away) friends. I seem to have forgiven him his penchant for sending weird things through the mail. Mostly, though, he’s all talk when it comes to mail, so there is no real threat in all his bluster…
 
posted under My Life | 1 Comment »

Instigator….

April25
I have been called an ‘instigator’ by most of my friends. And then you get them all in one room (like for my birthday party) and they all compare NOTES you know… and then it just really looks… bad really…
 
I’m sure they mean it in the nicest possible way. Even being that its *technically* true… kinda…
 
You see… I am the kind of person who likes to think up new plans. I like the concepts of doing things, but I don’t always have the courage to do them myself.
 
But I’m good at “selling” the ideas to people… people whom I can usually talk into doing things.
Its how I got my friend, Serin, to start a podcast (which he seems to have dropped by the wayside) so that he could test out how to do it before I tried to do one (that failed spectacularly, of course).
 
And how the“embrace the suck” project was born, and sorta left by the side of the road.
 
How my friend, G, got sucked into the universe of NaNoWriMo (which I told her about and have subsequently NEVER actually participated in)…
 
Or how about how I started the bi-weekly scrapbook sessions at a local shop, but have only gone 3 or 4 times (because I also started doing the online dating thing and kinda wanted to go on DATES with MEN on Friday nights when I didn’t have the kids… and then started dating Reg… who now doesn’t seem to want to spend weekends with me anyway, but DID 6 months ago when we started out… and really… I might NEED my weekend nights to date AGAIN sometime)…
 
And now I have *almost* talked Serin into doing the speed dating thing.
 
Because, of course, its something I always thought might be kinda interesting… but I haven’t had a chance. When I was newly single I had the Stalker clinging to my ankle like a ball and chain and it was likely he would have shown up to an event like that JUST to keep tabs on me… and then I started dating Reg… and besides that the only 2 events that were held during the time I was doing the online dating thing were on weekends when I had my kids and no babysitter…
 
It is something that I will definately look into if things with Reg go south.
 
(Not that they are… i’m just sad this weekend because it will be the very first weekend (and the first time) in 6 months of dating where I haven’t seen him at least one day out of a week. And that means, if you’re following along here, that I won’t be “getting any” — which for me is practically a TRAGEDY!!! Seven months ago I could barely stand the thought of “hooking up” with a boy, physically, because what I had with theEx and the Stalker was just not really worth it. But my libido has really woken up since I have been dating Reg, and I find that since we only get an opportunity about once a week, I look forward to that… and now I have to wait and wait… because I can’t go out there and he isn’t coming in  :(
 
Colour me sad right now… or frisky…  
But that’s neither here nor there yet… not looking at dumping him… he’s just distracted by his own divorce and custody drama that have come to a head lately (as mine seem to be petering out) 
 
Hey, this girl has NEEDS too… and its come as a big shock to me of all people!)
 
So… the point of the story is that I tend to not want to do things that I think of, but I make people do them and I observe… and I have been wondering if this is more an indication that I am too afraid to really live my life. 
 
It’s well known and well documented that I am afraid to fail at things. I hold impossible standards for myself that I don’t hold for others. I am afraid to write, date, go out and meet new friends, start hobbies, or be rejected.
 
And so I instigate social experiments in order to try out new things without risk of failure…
 
But I don’t WANT to always be that person. 
 
So, this year (my 35th) I have decided I am gonna try to be more than an instigator and try to go out there and DO some of these things MYSELF.
 
OBVIOUSLY, though, Serin is just going to have to go do the speed dating thing FOR me because I am not gonna risk losing Reg over a social experiment.
 
And Serin NEEDS a girl… he might not like me pointing that out, but he does (and quite a few of HIS readers agree with me). The point is just getting him out and out there, where the girls are, to talk to real people face to face!
 
… and to write about it, of course.
 
It isn’t at ALL about entertaining me. (Even though he thinks that it is) (well… maybe a little)… its to break him out of the rut he’s in…
 
And entertaining me… of course. 
 
He’s my best friend, I just want to see him HAPPY at the end of the day… 
 
But I have decided that I will be doing things myself too. 
 
  1. I currently own over 20 blank books. I have decided that I need to start keeping a daily journal again, and what better way to do this than in one of the multitude of blank journals I own? I am gonna take pictures and see if anyone out there is interested enough to give an opinion on which I should use!
  2. Obviously I can blog. I am going to keep up with the blog. And I am gonna try to translate SOME of the blogging into my scrapbooking. I have started an “Embrace the Suck” scrapbook all about myself and the things that make me tick. This will be featured mostly on the Embrace the Suck Project blog, along with my attempts to knit and sew :)  
  3. Back to the Podcast!
  4. More hobbies… but the part that I need to work on is to get OUT THERE and be with other people.
  5. Take my kids travelling (Toronto this year)
  6. RELAX and play more with crafts and stuff…
 
So yeah… less instigating…
 
I do have ONE idea that I’m gonna keep a bit secret for now until I work out how to do it :)
 
(I heard that!!)

posted under My Life | 1 Comment »

NO! He didn’t!!!!….

January16
Oh yes, yes he DID…
 
The night before I was gearing up to deal with the whole legal and financial mess with STBX and our lawyers, our (not so) friendly (blog)neighborhood Stalker Boy was back at his stupid, juvenille tricks aimed directly at getting me worked up enough to respond to him.
 
Now, I have detailed the various things I have tried to get him lay off on me. I agree that I might not have been the most CLEAR in what I wanted from him… and I guess that might have been confusing for him. But at the same time, it really didn’t NEED to come to this.
 
If he had laid off when I asked him for space, back in September, instead of clinging to me in the hopes that we could be friends which might lead me back to him… well then we might not have had to stop contact altogether. But he didn’t. He COULDN’T let go. He couldn’t give me space. He couldn’t let me THINK.
 
No. He couldn’t stop.
 
He took the “give me time” thing and gave me all of 1 week.
 
He took the “we might be able to be friends” and pushed it. He decided what KIND of friends we would be (best friends forever!! ooh **squeee**), and he determined his behaviour on that assessment in his mind.
 
He started emailing me “vents” about how truely annoying, bitchy, and what a horrible person and friend I was. When I emailed him about how, if he really wanted to be friends he needed to stop emailing the freaking things to me — maybe get a live journal, an open diary, hell even write to a fake email address???  — he actually stated that as a good friend he felt that it was not only necessary that I KNOW what he really felt about me and every thing I said and did, that it didn’t “work” for him if he didn’t confront me “directly”, but that as a responsible friend he had to let me know all the ways I had failed to live up to what he thought I should be.
 
And I didn’t really appreciate the nastiness that he was spewing into my email box. And I created a filter there to make sure that if he emailed me it was marked “read” and put into a separate area so I didn’t have to read these things.
 
And I blocked him off of every one of my IM accounts (both Gtalk, Yahoo, MSN, AIM, iChat, ICQ) as well…
 
I took him off my friend’s list in FaceBook as well, since the way he was acting I didn’t consider him a friend.
 
Then, feeling “free” of him, I started the online dating thing…
 
I had been “free” of him for almost 2 weeks… sure, I was still getting emails from him in my in box, but I was not responding to them. They varied, at this time in the way that most abusive/stalker communication would:
  • all nice about how much he had changed, how things were going good but how he missed our friendship and how he was sorry for his past behaviour and was “ready to try being friends again”
  • whining about how things went wrong and why I was wrong in letting these things stop me from seeing how great he was to me
  • sad posts about how much he missed me and how he wasn’t “right” without me in his life, how he didn’t want to live and how it was bad because I was just so mean to him after all he had done for me (notice, here, that he brings up things I didn’t ask for or even KNOW about all the time)
  • attacking emails about my serious flaws (lack of empathy, not listening enough, not caring enough for the things he did for me and how much he did without being asked and without me KNOWING (creepy), not trusting) and how I wasn’t perfect and how I needed to be told (by him) all the things that no one else in my life would ever tell me
  • piles of shit about how much he felt I had to work on, all the things I needed to think about and do differently, how much I was failing at everything in my life, and how we could be perfect together
  • back to the apologetic emails promising he was “done” with that and that he had had his say and that he was ready to be friends again…
 
Anyone else see the cycle of abuse?
 
But it had the effect he wanted, because when it got to the attacking or shit piling emails, he got a reaction. And so he learned, through that process of  nice-whiney-sad-attacking-shit piling- apology that the harder he attacked the more likely he was to get me to respond to him. So, the attacks started coming closer and closer together (hmm… CYCLE OF ABUSE???) and the more I got these “attacking” comments and discussions and texts and emails and phone calls, the LESS I wanted him in my life, the less I could see standing to have a friendship with him.
 
When he was not whining, when he was not talking about wanting to die, when he was not attacking me or telling me what I needed to do I could see my friend under all that.
 
But my friend was being CONSUMED by the desperation and NEED to “vent” or “have his say” or “say his peace” with me.
 
And the attacks got more frequent, and often were INCLUDED in the same emails that started OUT nice and ended with “But I still love you anyway” type comments, synthesizing the cycle of abuse in each wanderingly pathetic email missive he sent to me.
 
And after a while I finally SAW the cycle myself… and I pulled further and further away from him.
 
Which made him more and more desperate for my attention…
 
But you know what? The fact that his behaviour became more attacking and less FRIENDLY through this process made me see him in a completely different light. He went from being just a guy whom I had dated and was having a hard time changing gears and becoming “just a friend” in the sense that he still seemed to want more than friends even though I obviously didn’t, to a guy who felt that I needed to be TOLD, in no uncertain terms, things that HE thought I needed to hear no matter how bad they were… and there wasn’t anything that was going to make him see that he had crossed that line.
 
The attacks were mixed in with the friend stuff to the point that we’d start off a night with him being nice and friend-like, and end with him laying on my bedroom floor lecturing me on all the things he saw wrong with my life and my current life path and our relationship and how things went with us … and… and… and…
 
Until I he had me sobbing and screaming in emotional pain and unable to breathe.
 
And that happened MORE than once while I let him have his “Say” on things… hoping against hope that it would end all the nasty negativity that he was spewing…
 
But once abusive behaviour starts there is no hope….
 
And I openned my eyes the LAST time I allowed him to stay on my floor simply because I didn’t want to be a bitch and tell him to get out (because, I had STARTED OFF when he showed up at my house by telling him to leave and he actually refused!! And instead of calling the police, like I should have at that point, I talked to him and hoped, again, that with THIS retelling of his story and his side of things he would get it out of his system and leave me alone) where he detailed to me
  • how horrible it was that I dated and slept with the FireFighter,
  • how horrible FireFighters were AS PEOPLE,
  • how dating “strangers” was akin to self-harm and self-destruction
  • that having “fun” in the sexual sense was abusive towards myself
  • how I was going to be abused by yet another man because it was my pattern (obviously)
  • that I was likely infected with something because of the relationship with the FireFighter
  • that i HAD TO stop seeing the FireFighter (it actually came down to a “Promise me that you won’t see him again… PROMISE ME… PROMISE ME!!!! type thing)
  • how I was doing it to get back at him
  • how I was going to lose my children because I was going down a path that wasn’t “good” for any of us
  • how he loved me anyway… but he couldn’t continue to “be with” me because I was putting him at risk (um… #1. how does it risk YOU, since I have pretty much stated that I never EVER want to sleep with you EVER again? #2. safe sex? #3. NOT YOUR BUSINESS)
Until I literally cried my heart out, sobbing and gasping and screaming in pain… which is the reaction he wanted because then he could swoop in and “rescue” me from the badness that was my feelings…
 
And this was all followed by a nice little shit nugget encrusted email…
 
Which put an END to any “FRIENDLY” feelings I had about him…
 
And I did what I should have done a long time before that. I FORGAVE myself for getting involved with him, for using him to get out of a marriage that was killing me, for looking at him like he was going to rescue me, for leading him on (by, in his words, “misrepresenting” what I was and what I liked to him when I first met him). And I saw that I had given him many MANY chances to say what he wanted to say, to get over it and become a friend… and he failed to do so… and it was no longer my fault.
 
And I changed the filter on my email account filter to DELETE anything he sent to me from his email account. I no longer even SAW things that he sent, he was free to write all the nastiness he wanted, to apologize for the meanness, to go around and around in his crazy circles, shitting on me and doing everything he could to get a reaction from me… and I simply would NEVER EVER see it to respond.
 
And I took him off my friends list on FaceBook. And when he noticed he was gone and started using the FaceBook inbox to contact me, I BLOCKED him on FaceBook.
 
And I took his number off my phone. And when he realized I was no longer calling him, he started calling ME, trying to get his say in over and over. And when I made it clear to him that I didn’t miss him, I didn’t want to talk to him, and I had NO intention of calling him ever again…. 
 
He wrote a comment on my BLOG which he knew was “over the top” and which he admitted was to get me to react to him and confront him.
 
Which lead me to state, on FaceBook, that I didn’t APPRECIATE the “Stalker” behaviour that I was getting from an EXBOYFRIEND. Which someone he knew obviously saw was HIM….
 
Which led to him sending me a series of TEXT MESSAGES on my phone, asking and then DEMANDING for me to call him and discuss this, and ended with him stating…
 
“I have been whiney and annoying you have slandered and been rude. time to forward things to [STBX]? Play at your level?” 10:28pm Mon Jan 12 2009 from [DO NOT ANSWR]
 
(that was the LAST of the messages in the series, which I didn’t get to until midnight because I was up WORRYING ABOUT MY STUPID LEGAL CASE THE NEXT MORNING!!!!)
posted under My Life | No Comments »
« Older Entries

This is the blog of a 30-something woman. I am a single mother of 2 children (7 year old son, 5 year old daughter). I am a Solitary Wiccan. I am walking a Pagan Path. I am separated and going through a divorce. I am a geek girl. I am a nature’s child. I am a seeker. I am a talker. I am sometimes jubilant, sometimes creative, sometimes anxious, sometimes bitter… I run the gamut of emotions as I go through walking not only my Pagan Path but my everyday daily LIFE Path. 

My interests include creativity, art, crafts, magick, nature, spirituality, writing, collecting blank books, pens and office supplies, technology, myths, massive multi-user online role playing games (WOW, Second Life), kids, colours… hell… I might write on ANYTHING that strikes my fancy.


Subscribe via email update

Enter your email address:

Delivered by FeedBurner

Goddess Leonie’s Wonderful Goddess School!!


Click here to view more details



2010 Goddess Workbook!
Goddess Leonie's Guide to 2010 Goodness!!

Categories

Calendar Widget

March 2010
M T W T F S S
« Feb    
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
293031