Nevermind Me

Someone recently asked me where I think I’ll be in five years. I said exactly what was the easiest, most acceptable answer. Married and working. What did the others say? More school, starting a business, masters, bachelors, managing a facility. So what’s wrong with me then? Married and working for some big company moving through each day like the next. Money. Sex. Sleep. Money. Sex. Sleep. Day after day the same thing. And eventually sex with be left behind. Maybe add a couple kids. Another end to my wife’s open relationship. And soon the passion is gone…

Ten years and there’s kids, divorce, anger, resentment, hatred. I loose my job with nothing to live for, she takes everything. No. I give her everything. I pay support from some dead end job flipping burgers and counting grubby coins.

I always tell her I will support her in what she wants to do. I say I will provide the financial support she needs to fill her passion. Meanwhile my entire life is nothing but a pathetic façade. I go to class, and put on an eager, happy face when I hate them all. I go to work and I scam children out of their money just to keep my weak, minimum wage position. I come home and write. I write to make her happy. I keep a journal so she can have fun later in life reading it and looking back on all this. But now I don’t even want to do that.

She seems to hate me so much. I know I make her feel ugly. I know she feels terrible about herself because of me. I hate that she feels like that, it really isn’t that I’m not attracted to her. I just feel so numb. The most reaction my actions seem to get is when her sister is there and then it just feels like a “who’s partner’s the worse partner” contest. I’m sitting right there! So after all that talk last year about trying to change and not please everyone around me guess where I am yet again?

Yep. That’s me. The words that stop the fights. The actions that get them to leave me alone. The mask that helps me fit in. The mind set that prevents my guilt for the unneeded up selling. And the only one that actually matters. The only one I actually want to make happy seems to always end with the short end of things.

Its just such a vicious cycle. I miss treat her. So she gets all hateful, and passive aggressive at me. I loose motivation to actually change my behaviour. She gets angry and aggressive. It just keeps going and I know I’m the fundamental problem. I just don’t know what to do.

No. I do know what to do; but there are things I keep thinking about. Things I can’t seem to shake from my fucking numb mind. But at least the near nightly bawling fits give me some resemblance of real emotion.

What the hell is wrong with me?

I should have been good. I should have been secure. I should have been passionate. I should have been skinny. I should have been healthy. I should have been real.

But all I am is this shell; longing to be entirely invisible.

Change

Everything I touch seems to fall apart. To break. For nearing on six years now I have been torturing the best thing that could have ever happened to me. But I talk about it, so everyone pegs her as the bad guy in all this. No one ever sees the truth and if they did they would hate me. Yet still I try to make them see it. Make them see how I promise to call, to change, to help her, and don’t.

And every time I fully intend to do it, but within a week those promises are gone. I don’t understand how information that means nothing to me can stick in my mind for years, when a promise that could break her heart all over again fades entirely. When we fight it almost feels like my memory drifts away so I won’t have to change, but as soon as I think about her again I can recall how terrible I have been to her.

And yet somehow I can never come up with a way to make it better. If I just stuck to my promises to begin with I wouldn’t have to always make her feel better, but somehow I always force myself into the hardest route for myself, and the most painful for her. And I hate myself for it; I never wanted to be like this. Every flaw she has only makes her a more whole, and attractive person. How she can still listen to all my stupid repetitive problems is beyond me. But she does, and I still stand before her as she cries and yell, or let my own tears fall.

She always listens to my every word, and she thinks every day of how to make me happy, make herself more attractive to me, how she can fix things up so my stupid OCD doesn’t go crazy. But me? No. I always take the most lazy path; I avoid situation that make her look better than me, and I let my ego, and insecurities rule my every decision, without any, or enough consideration for her.

So tell me. Is she the bad guy? Or has my left shoulder begun to outweigh my long favoured better half?

Narcissism

Its time I finally get this out and come clear about what I have been putting my girlfriend through for a good majority of our relationship. For nearly three years now I have been inflicting a great amount of emotional abuse upon her with no real reasoning. As an abuser I did what most do, I denied it every time. I made excuses for my behaviour and I promised I would change. I would never do it again. But somehow I have always landed back in the same role. She has been more than generous about giving me chance after chance to fix the problems, but I always get worse. Sometimes it gets as bad as me threatening my own life. Other times it is as simple as a display of serious narcissism when she is the one who is upset. It was made so clear to me that there was a serious problem a couple days ago.

She was mad at me for the usual stuff and I did the usual promise to get better, to treat her right, and when she asked how I was going to treat her better I froze up completely. I didn’t know how to treat her right. I don’t know how to treat people well. In that instant it felt like the whole world was crashing down on me. All these years of telling her I love her and I can’t even think of how to treat her with the dignity, and caring that she truly disserves.

Look at this... Count the times I say “I” or “me”... 15. And the rest has been all about me anyway.

At the beginning she was everything. I literally worshipped her. That’s all she has ever wanted. So why can’t I give it to her? She calls me names and stuff, but only because I treat her horribly. She smacks me around a little, but for the same reasons. So what is my problem?

Dearest Vivace;

I don’t know how to say this and have you not freak out at me completely, so here it goes. I’m not happy in our relationship as it stands right now. I know you aren’t either. I think we could be very happy together, but right now there are a lot of things standing in the way of that. Between my inability to grow up or follow through, and your discouraging nature nothing has changed in the last few years despite best intentions to keep every promise made. I know much of the blame can fall onto my shoulders, but I don’t feel I’m the only cause of our problems. I remember a time, long ago were there was actually happiness in this partnership. Before I forced myself into a more vocal, outgoing skin things were good. You were the voice, and I was the silent support network. But as peer pressure grew so did my stupidity and desire to fit in. To be cool. With this came a jerk. An ass hole that swallowed my kind-hearted, shy little Virgo and buried it in this Leo haunted by a wounded pride and a bruised ego.

I don’t really know what brought about this change, or why I allowed it to fill me so completely, but I did. And I will never forget the shame I feel for letting it happen. I am not going to pretend there weren’t times I appreciated the boldness of the Leo inside me, but there was a lot to be said about the silent, observant girl I once was. I know it’s hard to believe now, but at one time I was the living definition of Virgo. And I loved it. I was a helpful person. I was an honourable, thoughtful person. And I miss that as much as you do. All I know now is that when Nicole came into my life a lot of things changed; for the worst. Now that she’s gone. Now that all those factors that contributed to my shift in personality are gone I will find the girl I once was. I will remind myself why I loved myself. Why I fell for you. Why you were so attracted to me.

Five years is a long time for a person to change, but now that I’ve done it, it can only get easier from here. I know it will still be a lot of work, and maybe you aren’t prepared to wait for me to finish it this time, but by the fire in my soul I swear to you it will happen before I die, or I live a fiendish life beyond this one. I know you deserve far better than me, but if you can find it in you, somewhere to see past my faults and really see me I think this can be a beautiful relationship. I don’t deserve another chance. I’ve blown it so many times already, but just this last time I know I can fix my problems. Because I actually see them now. And this time I’m not of a mind that you are forcing this on me unwillingly. I’m of the mind that I am doing this for me, as much as you. For our future, and my own should we fall our separate ways. You always were the smart one, I just can’t believe how long it took me to really see the deepest roots of the issue.

Eating Me Alive

Recently I came to a very terrifying realization that has been eating me alive for a long time now, and is probably part of the reason I’ve been so incredibly tired lately. It’s not really that it’s been keeping me up at night, it’s just that I don’t know how to word it, so talking about it is hard. I guess if I start by giving a bit of a history that might help a bit. So I’ll start with the basic of the basic. First off I’m the oldest of four children to my mother. We live the five of us with two cats and two dogs. Now; my mother is on subsidy, in a dead end job, has a university degree and has just filed bankruptcy to help pay off her thousands of dollars in student loan debt. She will be forty nine this year. I will be twenty, my full sister is seventeen. My half sister is fifteen, and by half brother will be thirteen. Now you are probably wondering about the half and full siblings. Well the thing is my mother would have had eight children if each pregnancy had survived. And those eight children would have been from three different men.

And here the story begins. In the last two years my mother has been in this on again off again relationship, but apparently it’s over for good this time. The bigger deal is with the farther passed ones though. The first husband; Andrew, was looking for the perfect little obedient house wife. They split up before too long after the first failed pregnancy. After that she got pregnant with me and married my father; Peter. Two and a half years later out comes my full sister, leaving her twin brother a second failed pregnancy. Before too long his anger management issues were getting to the point of abuse. It was so bad my first conscious memory is off them fighting and waking me up. I would have been about three years old. Gradually it got more violent and add another divorce to the pile. Maybe a year after that my mother meets step-father number one; Erhard. Technically they were never married. Though they had a hand fasting ceremony and did end up being common law.

For six years it was relatively fine. Another failed pregnancy. My second sister. Another miscarriage. My brother. It wasn’t until she went to British Columbia to visit a long time friend of hers that she realized he was incredibly verbally abusive to my full sister. She received much of his petty rages because she was too scared to say anything, plus my father was incredibly angry anyway, and she was too young to know any different. After a restraining order and being kicked out he proceeded to break into the house. From there we missed the end of the school year, moved into a tiny townhouse and bang! Step-father figure number two; Bryan. Now this is where it gets really bad. For a while there was his custody battle for his son. Then there was my mother’s for my half siblings. But somehow they ended up getting together. When that started I was ten. My full sister seven, half sister five, and my half brother three. At the time I had no idea, but he would later be discovered to be hiding pictures of my rather insecure half sister in his porn album.

But before that was discovered there were several warning signs everyone missed. For instance; the dirty magazine I found under my dresser when I was twelve or so. And the accusations my half sister brought up to her father when I was thirteen leading family and children’s aid services to be called on suspicion of sexual abuse. Now that didn’t go anywhere, because no one else said they had seen or had anything done, and her stories kept changing. Now she had been a bit of a compulsive liar at the time, but I realize now she was probably just becoming more open about telling the truth. The thing is I lied. In my interview they asked me if anything had ever happened at home with him that had made me uncomfortable. I told them no. I talked about how great he was during the day, how fun he was, but I never told anyone about the things that would have saved my poor sister years before my mother found out.

No one ever knew the magazine I found was his. They thought it had been left by the previous tenants, but how did it end up under my dresser then in the room I shared with both of my sisters. No one ever found out about the fact that I had seen him walking around the house naked many times with our bedroom door wide open. No one ever found out that he would hang around the house in his boxers more often than clothes. No one ever found out about the night I woke up to feel his arm over me in bed with him asleep next to me naked. He was on top of the covers, but that isn’t the point. The fact is that it terrified me, but I failed myself, and my sisters when I didn’t tell the social workers. It wasn’t until after my mother got engaged to him and found the pictures of my sister that she finally got rid of him. But that wasn’t till I was fifteen. For five years we dealt with it, denying it because we didn’t know any better. And my half sister never told again, because if no one had believed her the first time, why would anyone believe her a second time?

Since then there has been two short term boyfriends. And one on again off again one. There was also another short term one in there somewhere, he was the only one to make her really happy though, but she won’t even try to get it back.

I don’t know what brought all this up all of a sudden, but I just needed to get it out there. Needed to be released from the cage it has held me under for so long. I just wish I had been able to speak up when it really mattered.

Blech

I can't believe I'm going on about this stupidity again, but here it goes.

It really hurts when I'm having a bad day, or want to talk because I'm stuck in a rut and all she wants out of me is a reply to our roleplay. I know it's her only one, and its really important to me too, but somedays I just can't do. And I'm sorry about, but I don't know what to do.

Guess it's my fault though. I have a habit of pretending its all fine, or at least it comes across that way on MSN. When really I feel like just closing everything away and wallowing in my own misery for a while till I fall asleep.

And so it goes reply, post, turn everything off, wallow, sleep. Wake up work, gym, her house, stuff, sleep, wake up, stuff, be sad about leaving, come home, wallow, sleep... ounds like a grand old time to me.

HELP ME!!!!!!!!!!

There is something very wrong with me. I keep having these panicky episodes where I get all jittery and my breathing gets all shallow and painful, and I start to cry for no reason at all. And then I end up wringing my hands repeatedly until it hurts, but I can't stop. No matter what I do I can't stop. I can't calm down. I've also been noticing that I dread things I really want to do. I can't get myself to start things that I know I enjoy. I have also begun to notice some repeatative behaviours. I always seem to be chewing on my cuticles, and picking at zits without even realizing it. I want to stop, but I just can't seem to do it.

I don't want to talk to anyone. I don't want to do anything. I've even been gaining weight... something I've never been able to do in the past. I want to loose the extra, but I can't stay motivated enough to work out, of join a gym, or club or anything. I was all excited about going back to school and now I am dreading that too. At one point I blamed it all on being transgendered, but I'm not. At another point I blamed it on being in love with two people at once and not being able to do anything about it, but that's not the case either. I just wish I knew what the hell was wrong with me.

The thing is that whenever I'm around people all that gets shoved under the rug and a mask is put on. Only one person has the slightest idea, and that hasn't really proved helpful yet, so why should I tell anyone else. I thought about going back to counselling, but I never told them the truth last time, so there's no point to that either. I'm just going to put on that mask and make believe they're helping me when really I just feel rotten inside. I want to feel alive again. I want to be happy. I want to feel motivated to do the things I love. It feels like there's this hole in my life. The biggest issue is that I know what I need to fill that hole, but I have absolutely no way of filling it.

My girlfriend wants us to be more honest with each other. She wants to know this type of stuff. She told me the other day that when she read previous entries she had known nothing about any of and that scared her, but I can't bring myself to tell her because it always feels like I have nothing to complain about when I actually say it. I just wish she could understand that when I don't reply to our roleplay (yes we are nerds) it isn't because I don't want to, I simply can't get myself started. And I hate it as much as she does.

I have no idea what to do. And I'm terrified.