Written @ 11:06 a.m. on 2007-07-17
Breakthrough
Wow! Thankyou so much, everybody, for the outpouring of support that my last entry stimulated. I truly do appreciate it. Perhaps we have finally done it...created a community!
My ex. I don't like to talk about him here. I don't want him to find this and burn my house down, but jesus. I came to a realization about him last night. I called him. Says his phone wasn't working, so he didn't call the girls for two days (when they called him about 10 times), but funny how it works now, right? Nice as pie, I asked him when he was seeing the kids this week. He told me thursday, so that's nice, and he mentioned that he would like to take them on a trip to the U. P. in michigan for about five days. That's about 15 hours by car from here. Great.
-When?
-Well, I don't know. Next week sometime.
-Ok, just give me more than one days notice, ok?
-WHY? Are you going to make this difficult for me? What does it matter when I take them?
-Well, there are schedules to arrange. We might have plans.
-Well, if I take them, then you don't have to watch them, so what is there to ARRANGE?! FINE! I JUST WON'T TAKE THEM!
-Ok. (pause while I scratch my head in confusion) I'll see you on Thurs. after the girls' dance class.
- I just don't know what day it will be. Why do I have to tell you ANYTHING?
- There is nothing to fight over here. I will not argue with you. See you thursday.
-Ok. Bye.
The man. Is clearly. Insane. I mean, tinfoil hat wearing insane.
I have spent ten years of my life trying to understand his motivations, his feelings, where he is coming from. He is coming from Pluto! There is no A+B=C with him. His reactions to things have nothing to do with the situation at hand. All that time, I was trying to understand him using logic and reason? THERE IS NO LOGIC AND REASON! It has nothing to do with what I do, or what happens to him during the course of a day. He just flips out completely unprovoked.
So, perhaps that is a bit of a relief. It wasn't me. It wasn't me having to try harder, or be more understanding, or more forgiving, or prettier, or smarter, or tidier, or anything. It wasn't stress, or his health, or the responsiblity of raising the children. It's just, oh, I don't know... a loose wire.
I was killing myself thinking "if only I was nicer," "if only I didn't piss him off" "if only I could just create a relaxing enough environment for him". I completely turned into a zombie trying to keep myself safe from him, and I just COULD NOT UNDERSTAND.
Now I see! It's random. There is no pattern. If there is no pattern, then there is no way to predict. If there is no way to predict, then there is no way to control when it happens.
There was no way I could stop it, fix it, or even lessen the severity.
The only thing I could do was keep the babies and myself safe.
And that's what I've tried to do.