Reality hit home with a vengeance over the long weekend, it hit me harder than it ever really has done before and it over-rode everything I had managed to convince myself of over the last few years.
Here are just a small amount of issues I have managed to attach myself to :
- I am a control freak, due primarily to not having any input into previous relationships, I assumed the mantle of control in this one
- I’m not very good at being “a couple” (see issue 1).
- All of my problems are due to how I have been treated in life by people I have trusted and/or loved.
- I am self reliant.
This weekend, my big black shadow cast itself upon me in a way I actually hadn’t encountered before. I knew she was at my every footstep and that she has been for quite some time now, all the control measures I had in place fell far too easily by the wayside last year but being so sure of the fact that I had her in check, I continued on my merry little dance with this big ugly beast. I had come right before, why not again now.
Deep down inside I knew that I was slipping further and further into hell with my demons, but like a dog with a bone, I let myself slide into the deepest and darkest annals of hell and it comforted me like a long lost friend. Enveloped by this warmth and familiarity, I let it take me. Boy did it take me.
This wasn’t a little deviation from the appropriate path, it wasn’t a little slip of the defences, it wasn’t even a spike, this was a head first 3 metre high, diving board jump straight into the pits of despair. I went in with a wide open arms and a smile on my face. I knew exactly what I was doing, where I was going and didn’t care what was on the other side, all I knew in my heart of hearts was that it wasn’t my fault.
I was a train wreck of the greatest kind, you know, one of those events that ends up as a “Seconds from Disaster” piece for National Geographic or a “When trains attack” video clip for Reality TV, I was rushing headlong into dark and dangerous tunnel and the sheer fact that I couldn’t see any light at the end of it (even if I had wanted to) didn’t deter me one bit. As I said before, I welcomed it, it was familiar to me and I needed comforting.
It started Friday morning, the beginning of the longest of long weekends in my working year. My partner and I had made relaxed but filled plans commencing with lunch at my brothers and then on to a trip up the coast for 2 days to stay with some relatives. When I woke up on Friday morning something was definitely in the air, it was a beautiful day, but everything I touched turned to custard, in a fantastically sunlit room all I could see were shadows.
My mood was so black that the devil himself would have run a mile. No matter what my partner did, it was wrong, it was like he was doing it on purpose, so I sniped at him (and I can be fairly vicious), to cut a long story short, that afternoon my partner went to lunch late at my brothers house, came home an hour later (so unlike him) promptly packed a bag and walked out. As soon as he left I tore the house apart, literally and physically, I needed a physical and rage filled workout and I got it, I smashed and kicked and hurled my way through the house until I was a heaving wreck on the floor, then came the first step into the darkness, with nothing left in the house to demolish I started on my head, internal and external, the language coming from my mouth (although normally not the best) would have been ample to send the entire British naval fleet into exile. I could keep going but I won’t, lets just say there were a lot of tears, a small amount of blood and a bucket load of self hatred.
Friday and Saturday were spent in a dark and hazy place, I don’t remember too much of it, just that I woke up at some un-natural hour in the morning and had to clean. The house was spotless by the time I had finished and for the first time in 48 hours, I could actually see the sunlight. I still hated everything around me and decided today was the day I sorted out my problem once and for all. I started packing and dismantling my life of nearly 5 years, and my house.
My partner was due home later that afternoon and I didn’t want to be there after all it was all his fault. Right?.
I had packed all I needed to, separated out all of our own personal things (DVD’s, CD’s etc), all I needed was to find somewhere to go. What held me off from ringing someone to say can I stay with you for a little while ? The nagging, burning thought in the back of my head that had been there all along. It was me.
Imagine, if you will, this …
You’ve done an 8 hour day, sure there are 4 more of them left in the week but hey, today was a good day, you head inside to watch a little TV and relax, as the minutes progress towards 5.00pm you start to feel heavy, slightly dreading the next few minutes, you squirm a little, try to get comfortable but you can’t, then you hear it, the car in the drive (or the 4 horsemen, depending on which side of the front door you are sitting on). The door flies open, so do the gates of hell, you think to yourself, am I sitting correctly, is the TV on the right channel, are my glasses on straight or are they reflecting too much sunlight, is the wind blowing too hard, is the grass too green etc etc, this goes on right up until you retreat into the sanctity of your own TV room away from the rest of the house where you can hear banging and crashing as things that didn’t seem out of place are hurled into what you can only assume is its rightful place, do you venture out to see if everything is ok? Feeling brave, you do, you ask if there is anything you can do, the reply “No, I’ve already done it” in that mean and sarcastic tone, every spoken word from that point is forced and calculated. After about 7.30pm there is a calm spell, peace reigns for a little while then there’s bedtime, you wait and wait for them to fall asleep so you can crawl into bed without being told that you are making too much noise or you are in the way or you have too much hair on your head. You love this person with all your heart and soul, this is why you still sleep there, you know its mutual but you just can’t seem to see any proof, you lie facing away from each other, one trying to find something to bitch about, the other trying to remember why they love you so much. You wake up in the morning and they’re already gone, no kiss goodbye, no “have a nice day today and see you after work” just a cold and empty space where the love of your life was lying an hour ago. “today will be different, maybe she’ll come home happy to see me”
That’s my partners story. He loves me with all he is, he’s loyal, he’s caring, he’s generous and he’s kind, I’m the one riding the big black dog through the front door every night.
It was me. Sure he has a few faults, he can be the lazy bastard to my clean freak, but as I concluded, he would be fighting a losing battle if he even tried to do something, as regardless of what he did and how he did it, it would still be wrong to me. He did what anyone else would have done, he gave up trying and started hoping that this storm cloud above my head would eventually go away.
I delved deeper into my depressive hole as I realised I couldn’t place the blame wholly on him, was he coming home to tell me he’d had enough, I wouldn’t blame him if he did. Then came the self pity, followed by a bit of steely resolve for good measure.
I know I can handle being on my own, the single life has always been a good friend to me, the problem was, did I want to be that girl again.
We kept our cool exteriors when he came home, we spoke nicely to each other and he told me about his weekend, I told him the nice bits about mine (I mowed the lawns). We didn’t talk about the situation until Monday night where upon he fully expected me to go at him. Instead, I did the only thing I could do with a clear conscience. I apologised.
2 Hours later, we had managed to talk ourselves stupid, I got my point across and he his.
When you boil it all down, there are women out there who deal with cheating husbands, kiddie fiddlers, alcoholics, gamblers, drug addicts, verbal and physical abusers, what do I have to complain about, I have a partner with an aversion to cleaning and tidying up after himself. He has to deal with someone battling depression with an anger problem.
I’m still not clear of the woods yet, I got pretty low, so low in fact that I grabbed the proverbial shovel and started digging, but the way it stands at the moment, I have started filling the hole back in and I’m slowly making my way out.
Dealing with depression is hard, both on my side and my partners, he’s a pretty tolerant guy and leaves me to my own devices most of the time, he’s generally understanding of the pressure I put on myself. He tries to be as supportive as he can but as most depressives will know, there is never a supportive role available. Its hard for him to see me like I am, he’s not as good at enjoying silence as I am and he’s definitely more sociable than me. He’s aware of me trying to push him out and he’s at a loss as to what to do there, as am I. The easy answer would be for us to go our own ways, but we’re not looking for easy, we’re looking for … each other (so to speak).
So alls well that ends well, next week I see a grief counsellor, maybe she can shed some light on what I think I already know.
|
