I think this rage is okay.

I wish he would let me talk.


Sometimes I feel like I'm with a drug addict who doesn't take drugs. It's been so much work to get him to talk to me at all. He doesn't want to because it's unpleasant. He hasn't taken a look at what leaving really entails. It's unpleasant, so he avoids it. He's in control enough to just shut it off, so he doesn't have to get high.

I'm not talking about last night. He very sweetly asked for us not to talk any more that night. A perfectly reasonable request.

I'm talking about the years before. Refusing to make his needs known, then blaming me for not knowing what they are and meeting them without any communication from him that he's even unhappy. I get that I shouldn't have been such a freaking crab all the time with him. I'm not trying to excuse that--there is no excuse. But speaking up would have made it much more difficult for me to think that he was okay with things.

He said he's unhappy with the lack of sex lately. I think we're having sex about 3 times a week maybe? Pretty good considering I don't know if he'll be there the next week. Not good enough for him. I've never been enough. I jumped through hoops to keep him interested....not that he asked me too, but now he's punishing me for NOT jumping through hoops. He refuses to acknowledge his role. He was willing to be patient and wait...which is wonderful, but PROBLEMS DON'T JUST GO AWAY BY DENYING THEM. The couple of times I asked him to jump through hoops to keep me interested, he was dishonest.

I'm starting to think that I'm not the one who is deficient. He has a wife who wants him, who likes sex, and clearly all these years had been capable of not being sexually crippled, but he avoids. WE created this. Not me, not my "something wrong with me." US.

I would rather go on, make up for lost time, and live with the regret of the wasted years. He thinks throwing it all away might be the best way to deal with things.

Now I know he doesn't read this anymore. He doesn't want to. It's unpleasant. He only wants to read things that are pleasant, I suppose, or I just don't make the cut. (Yes, I'm aware of the butthurt, but it's my blog, and I can whine if I want to). He is okay with me talking, but not to him. He wants me to do things the way he does.

I feel a lot less messed up than I did a few weeks ago. I am brave and honest. Or, it's not so much that as that I get that problems don't just magically fix themselves. I feel driven to work on them. I don't have a narrow definition of what's okay in terms of sex, and I no longer demand comformity to it by my partners.

I understand that he felt abandoned. That makes sense. I guess I just deal with things differently, because even though it's scary, if I feel abandoned I HAVE to reach out to him, have to try, because I love him. It's not just a feeling, it's not just magic, it's a decision. He may run from this, but the problem will still be there, and, eventually, his next relationship will accumulate the baggage.

What's the matter with him? I'm a perfectly fine piece of ass. I'm sick of not feeling like I'm good enough because only being exactly like he is sexually is acceptable. That's tyranny, and it's delusional, because I could just as easily turn this on him and talk about how I'm dissatisfied, but I don't, because I LIKE sex with him because it's sex with him, it's fun, and I want to continue to have sex. But this casual sex with my husband stuff is for the birds.

No one else has ever felt they were lacking.

So I guess he did read this after all.

He said he doesn't want to.

He doesn't get to use my suicidal ideation as reason to disconnect. He doesn't get to use that as a sign that I'm too much responsibility, that he needs to break away, because he has expressed suicidal thoughts over and over and over and over....to the point at which the old marriage counselor had to test him to see if they needed to make a safety contract. It's not different. I have things that have never changed that would stop me even in the worse case, and he actually doesn't. Religious beliefs wouldn't stop him, fear of losing me and Helena wouldn't stop him (because he's thinking about it anyway, etc).

I absolutely WILL not accept this double standard--that's exactly what it is.

It's just more evidence of the "one false move" fear. Well, fuck that. I'm not perfect. I never will be. It would be wrong of me to pretend to be even if I could. This is a mature, adult relationship. I was hurting him, and he finally told me, so I stopped those things. If he wants to make me crawl or become codependent to make him feel better, HE's the sick one.

Thought about calling my mother in law, telling her I had to go to a doc in the box for migraine meds, and then checking myself in.

I was afraid I wouldn't be released in time for my voice surgery, and I really want my voice back. I also haven't done my grades.

It's good to know that I have a plan to stay safe in case these thoughts of the other plan get worse.

I ruined his Father's day. I wasn't doing it to make a point. I just couldn't pull myself together and guarantee myself that I wouldn't end up crying in front of his family. I've done a very good job of doing the normal wife thing and going to these events despite the fact that I feel even more alien than ever with them. But I just couldn't do it. I don't know what excuse he made for me. I am sick, so he probably went with that. I figure that's better than having to explain why I'm sobbing, right?

I'm sure it's another black mark, more ammunition, but I'm just not doing this "trying to be the perfect wife" thing. I'm trying to be how we'd be with the hurtful things that I did to him removed. I'm trying not to add on any more punishment to myself than the threat of losing him already is.

He gets angry and thinks I'm being melodramatic any time I mention any of the realities of getting divorced: me being the custodial parent, me not coming to his family functions anymore, me not wearing my rings. But this ISN'T melodrama. This is the practical reality of what he wants.

A work friend asked me if I thought I could afford the house by myself. I doubt it, but I guess I could see a financial planner. Helena and I could always move into a 2-bedroom condo or something like that. I'd prefer not to rent. None of these things is melodrama. This is what divorce is, this is what he may well be choosing. Waiting around until the decision is final to start sorting these things out is crazier than thinking through them.

One of my friends says, "He's happy enough to fuck you." I don't know if that's real intimacy, or if it's casual sex to tide him over until he can start to experiment with that greener grass I've heard so much about.

My God. He told me that that 50% of him doesn't WANT to forgive me, work things out, or stay with me. That's up quite a bit from a few weeks ago.

I guess I have enough self respect to not beg him to leave, to not stand in way if he wants to leave. I think he's either a liar who is incapable of loving me, or he's crazy for leaving the wife he supposedly loves, but either way, I hope I have enough love of myself to see that I shouldn't want to be with someone who doesn't want to be with me.

I told him that even I deserve better than that.

He basically saved this all up and expected me to do all the destruction myself. Instead, once my horrible behavior was brought to my attention, I repented and stopped, and now he's still looking for the right excuse to leave and not look like an asshole. All this waiting around and ambivalence is probably about waiting for me to hang myself. Well, I'm definitely not perfect, so I'm bound to give him his fatal flaw sooner or later.

Right now, his story is "sexually incompatible," and he's sticking with it.

He said I shouldn't have married him.

Ouch.

It's one thing to put me through this and then ultimately decide to stay. In time, I think we'd be much, much better off than if this hadn't happened.

But to do this--wait until it's "too late" to even talk to me about it, then do so assuming I'll end the relationship, then wait around as if there was hope, looking for a decent excuse now that the (understandable) reasons for being unhappy have been removed....

...I think that would be...

Well, still better than notice at all, but I don't want false hopes. I have to be realistic. Prepare. Picture. Plan.

Still can't accept that he's leaving even though, 7 weeks later and with the behavior that has caused those thoughts gone, he's still 50/50 at best.

Today he said he wished he was dead. I didn't bother telling him that the time I spent just sitting on the steps at the East Rockaway train station, I thought about how quickly it could be over. That wouldn't be the station at which to do it--it would have to be one in which some trains fly though and skip that station. That, or I'd have to walk a while to be halfway in between stops. I really let myself sit there and think about it, because (1) I knew this wasn't the place to do it, unless a train happened to fly through and I had the nerve to just jump, and (2) because one of my former students did this earlier this year.

He did this right after his girlfriend broke up with him. That's not really a burden I care to leave with anyone. I can't think of a stronger or more cruel way to say "fuck you."

And, of course, I remembered that suicide is off the table for me and has been for some time. That period of my life is over.

I think that's why it feels odd to me to hear him talk vaguely about suicide--because now I'm on the "I wouldn't do it" side.

Or maybe it would feel odd either way.

I always was on that side, though. I really wouldn't have done it. One, it's cruel. Two, I was never so mentally ill that that fact got washed away. Three, my religious beliefs leave too much doubt.

But I did let myself indulge in considering it for that time. Honestly, I think a lot of people in my position would do the same thing. I don't think it's even a borderline thing. I remember when my brother was going through his divorce, he mentioned fantasizing about what it would be like to just take a sharp right while on the Delaware Memorial Bridge. I think this is a dark place you're allowed to go when you're going through this.

I did cut, though, with the saddest worst razor blade ever. I went to 5 drug stores, and none of them sell them any more. I had to get them from Ace (this was weeks ago....just for something to focus on...I never used them). Well, they suck ass. Super dull. It was a really lame experience.

It's not that I don't have a support system, or friends, or whatever....But right now, I feel like there's almost no one with whom I can be vulnerable. I've recently got back in touch with a dear friend from group, and I know I can talk to her, but we've just gotten back in touch, and I don't want to dump on her. I was going to call her today to catch up (I owe her a call), but I've had such a crappy day. I think I'll wait and see if tomorrow is better. Or, if I can pull myself together, I'll call on the way to or from the ENT.

“just stay”
you said
“we’ll build a nest”
so I left my
Life
Tried on your
friends
Tried on your
opinions
So when the Bridges froze
and you
did not come home
I put our snowflake
under a microscope
After all what was I
really looking for and I wonder
when will I learn
Maybe my wish
knew better than I did
and I wonder
when will I learn
when will I learn
guess I was in
Deeper than I thought I was
if I have enough love
for the both of us

19 years.

I still wonder what he's telling other people, but not me. Last night showed me that he's not telling me everything, but I am afraid he'll get mad at me if I ask, because he doesn't think I'm entitled to know certain things.

It still feels like a betrayal.

"...because....FUCK it...."

We had our second session with the therapist last night, and I think it went a little better. She seemed responsive.

I learned some things I didn't know. First, he was afraid of me being "mean" to him, not myself. I thought he didn't speak up because he was afraid I'd attempt suicide (or at least self-injure). I thought he thought he was "protecting" me. He was protecting himself from whatever wrath he imagined I'd unleash. I have no idea what that fantasy looked like to him, but it was very real to him. It's just puzzling to me.

I also learned that he really doesn't know if he WANTS to continue. All this time, he's said he loves me, he just doesn't know if it can be fixed. Almost every time I've described his feelings toward me as being "ambivalent," he corrected me...but, last night, it became very apparent that he is VERY ambivalent toward me. Or at least toward our relationship...but really, what's the difference? The therapist was trying to communicate to him that this is the kind of thing that a couple CAN move forward together from, and even up until the moment the words, "He's not sure he WANTS that" came out of my mouth, I expected to be corrected. But no. He said that part of him DOESN'T want to heal from this "because...FUCK it."

I also learned that he was expecting (and he was more honest about the fact that he was hoping for it) me to end the relationship a month ago when we had this first talk. He admitted that part of the reason he hasn't left (yet) is that he just doesn't want to be the bad guy.

I don't know what I'm supposed to do now. Beg him to stay? Hold my head up and pretend it's going to be okay? Tell him to either grow up and love me or fuck off? It's a little humiliating. I can't sit around forever and wait for him to decide we are worthy of his time and trust, but at the same time I don't think we should divorce. I forgave him--and it was something that I HAD spoken up about, over and over, and he looked him in the eyes and lied to me about what I knew in my body to be true.

He insists he COULDN'T have spoken up--it would have been disastrous. But he can't say that with 100% certainty, because he DIDN'T. I won't accept that as fact; I don't have to, because he didn't try.

Apart from wondering if the lyrics "You were never been to blame" is forgivable...because, otherwise, I can't shake this song

I need your love / I need your time / When everything's wrong / You make it right
I feel so high / I come alive / I need to be free with you tonight
I need your love
I need your love
I take a deep breath every time I pass your door
I know you're there but I can't see you anymore
And that's the reason you're in the dark
I've been a stranger ever since we fell apart
And I feel so helpless here
Watch my eyes are filled with fear
Tell me do you feel the same
Hold me in your arms again
I need your love / I need your time / When everything's wrong / You make it right
I feel so high / I come alive / I need to be free with you tonight
I need your love
I need your love
Now I'm dreaming, will ever find you now?
I walk in circles but I'll never figure out
What I mean to you, do I belong
I try to fight this but I know I'm not that strong
And I feel so helpless here
Watch my eyes are filled with fear
Tell me do you feel the same
Hold me in your arms again
I need your love / I need your time / When everything's wrong / You make it right
I feel so high / I come alive / I need to be free with you tonight
I need your love
I need your love
All the years / All the times /You were never been to blame
And now my eyes are open / And now my heart is closing
And all the tears / All the lies / All the waste
I've been trying to make it change
And now my eyes are open
I need your love / I need your time / When everything's wrong / You make it right
I feel so high / I come alive / I need to be free

I'm sick of having such trouble sleeping. I can't say I don't sleep, because at this point I just drug myself until I sleep. For the next 3 weeks, I have to do whatever I have to do.

My NP says 50 mg of Seroquel should really be enough. It's not. 100 mg always worked, though, until lately. Now it's 100 mg Seroquel, and then when I don't fall asleep by 10:30-11, I take an Ambien. (I've been consistently avoiding food after 6:00 in case I need a "rescue" Ambien). Two nights ago, I took 1 mg Xanax, and I slept okay but not well. Last night, it seemed iffy after my 1 mg. Xanax, so I took an Ambien, and I actually did sleep well.

I don't even care. I don't even care about mixing pills. I'll be fine. We're not talking about 20 mg of Xanax and a bottle of vodka. I think an OD is such a remote possibility, and I'm not 100% sure I'd care that much if I did (except for the fear of getting my stomach pumped).

What I care about is that he's going to leave if I don't have sex with him enough, or if it's not good enough. The latter has me just completely in despair, but the former....I know I would be better if I wasn't so anxious. Helena has been going to sleep late-ish, and I have to take heavy duty stuff to sleep at all (before, I could just stay up and then taken Ambien whenever and get at least 5 hours of sleep). Now, I'm run down from all the emotional stuff, anxious about sleeping (I'm fine during the day, and I'll look forward to sex after H goes to bed, but I dread bedtime), and then I'm watching myself destroying my marriage.

I wish I just wasn't someone who cared about sleep. I mean, I don't care if I don't get 8 hours of sleep, but unfortunately, my body has shown me that I'm completely capable of taking something and getting literally not 5 minutes of sleep. Then I either work and drive feeling like garbage (and maybe not even being safe--I really don't think I could put H in the car with me under those circumstances), or I stay home and miss one of the last rehearsals before a concert PLUS recording the hours and hours of the 130 finals I have to record because my kids' final is singing a NYSSMA level 4 or 5 song individually.

My OB wants me to go have a sleep study, which would be TOTALLY pointless, because I would not sleep. At all. And I KNOW it's all in my head, all anxiety. I guess he thinks they'd be better at treating the underlying anxiety. Maybe they could refer me to a decent psychiatrist, I don't know. But all I do is go to doctors appointments, and I'm sick of it. I feel, not so much like a hypochondriac, because it's doctors pushing me to go, but like someone who leaves her kids all the time to go shopping at The Miracle Mile and getting her nails done. I feel like there's a certain amount of entitlement in going to all these appointments.

If I'm trying to show Sean how good I can be sexually, I'm definitely failing. I mean, part of that is conscious--I'm not pushing myself to do anything I don't want to do or be the perfect partner. I tried that for years, and it messed me up. I'm trying to be how I am and hope that's good enough. But, right now, I can't be how I am because I'm such a mess. I don't know if it's end of the year, the circumstances at home, or just a cycle of bad anxiety (my coworker actually called me "manic" the other day, but manic would be better, because then I wouldn't CARE about sleep, and the desire for sex would totally override the need for sleep).

I'm watching myself fail, and then I'm hearing myself talk to him about my anxiety, and the last time we talked about it, he was annoyed with me. I think he was annoyed that I could have anxiety all those years when he was there for me.

But at least I got a heavily-drug-induced sleep last night. I wish I could be drugged all the time, I really do. Some kind of upper at work (I've been really really perky and energetic at work the last couple days, maybe because I'm having 2 cups of coffee instead of one, but it's been AWESOME), and then a drip of Xanax from about 6:00 on. It would really be magnificent. I fantasize about it all the time.

Another session out of pocket, another telling of the story, another therapist. I still hold that a therapist should just listen, and possibly validate, during the early sessions. This one challenged Sean a lot. I think the problem is that Sean told the whole story, and I just agreed with it (because it was accurate from my perspective, too) and admitted to everything. I think it probably came across like I'm super submissive or whatever, which of course isn't true, but I felt like she needed someone to take my side. I don't know. I don't know if we'll try another session, call her to make the appointment and talk to her about our needs, or just move on. I'll leave it up to Sean, because he's the one who didn't have such a good appointment. (And for good reason--maybe I should just say upfront in appointments that we both need that in the beginning, because we're both generally reasonable people who love each other, and right now no one's being mean to the other).

She had a 14 year old dog and a beautiful cat that hung in throughout the session--that's one thing stopping me, and maybe Sean too, from just dropping her. We know that she "gets" us in at least one way.

Things have been better around here. No big blow ups. Despite the circumstances, it's really been incredible being close again.

He did say last night that he has serious concerns that the frequency of sex will not be satisfactory to him--and also the quality. The former I guess I get, but I thought that was just something that all couples had to negotiate. The latter...I felt like I was going to vomit when he said so. Like, we're having sex, and he doesn't know if it's good enough. That basically means it's not.

Ugh I had almost forgotten about that. I had, actually, because I had planned to fool around last night (foiled by H staying up until 10:30) and then again tonight...maybe foiled by my own insecurity.

God I wish I had forgotten that he said that.

Jesus.