Do It Already

Last night my husband texted me that he had been praying and thinking and that he knows what we should do.  He was going to talk to me last night, but he worked too late, so he wondered if he should talk to me or write.  I said write...email...but, I haven't heard.  It makes me antsy.  Today is my daughter's birthday.  I don't want to sit and talk to him.  I don't want to rehash.  I want a chance to read in private.  To digest.  To see what he wants.  But the day has gone by...and he hasn't written.  It puts me on edge.  Wondering.  I have one more day left until I go to Oregon.  I have to pack.  I want to relax and get ready.  I know that he wants to "connect".  I don't.  I want to pull apart.  I want to be able to just relax.  Just be in my home and not worry that I have to work on things for him.  For his sake.  Funny how all of the years that I begged, he had no interest whatsoever.  But now I'm supposed to hop to and think that it's important because it's important to him now that I said that I don't want it anymore.  It's always that way.  And I am pretty tired of the stress he puts on me.
Then, a friend texts me and tells me how fragile she is and how I need to be nice to her etc....and I just wanna say, get in line.  I have my own problems.  What is it about me that most people don't get how deeply wounded I can be?  It's the strength.  The desire to find joy.  To encourage.  To have hope.  Those things are so deep within me.  They are who I am.  I like that.  But...it does make it pretty hard sometimes.  My problems are way less than some people's problems.  All in all....the thing is...I am able to realize that I have choices.  I am not a victim.  I will NOT be a victim.  Nor behave as one.  WILL NOT. I refuse that life.
I will live.  Really live.  For I was created.  I am loved.  I have purpose.  So, I will continue on.  With as much joy as I can eke out of a day.  No matter how painful the day.  And I will find reason to smile.  And I absolutely will find reason to be thankful.  Because that is who I choose to be.  And I get to choose.  I am responsible for who I become.
But I do wish he'd write already....it's ridiculous to play games.
grace to you.

Better

My children make my life better.  Not by being perfect.  Just by being.  Pick them up.  Bring them home.  The world is better.  All is right in my world.  They are healthy.  Smart.  Kind.  Happy.  Fun.  Silly.  Honest.  They make me know that I can make it.  And how important it is to be me.  To share how to make it through the hard times.
So, my son was writing the names on the gift of who it was from.  And my daughter says, "does dad even know what you got?"  I kid you not.  And my son says, "should I even put his name on it?"  Wow.  How that helped me is weird.  Strange.  But true.  Because I knew that they get it.  Even if they can't put it to words yet.  They see.
I love being with them.
They helped me today.  Without even trying.
grace to you.

Hurting

Who knows how to make hurting end?  Or to stop the causes?  Who can choose to stop feeling certain feelings?I don't know how.  I don't know  who.  I know that I walk through my life doing my very best to make it as pleasant for others as possible.  Generally.  I know that I like to help them to make it through.  Ease the load.  I know that a smile can change an instant.  And I know that being forgotten can critically wound.  But sometimes I forget that people don't see this person that I am.  They get so caught up in thinking that I'm so strong.  So able.  So consistent.  That they forget that I need help.  That I need to be able to count on others.  And those are the moments when I wonder how long this hurt will last.  Because I know that others can't live in that place with me for a long time.  I know that they don't see how very hard it is to get through this day of absolute happiness regarding my daughter's birthday....not because of her birthday, because that is the GREAT part.  No, because it's the constant stress to be the one to plan.  To be sure she has what she wants.  It's all on me.  Even though I can "delegate", it ends up back on me because she's my beautiful girl.  And today, I am a wreck.  Total and complete.  And I have a lot still left to do.  At least I got the candles.  I shoulda just ordered a cake....made life simpler.  But somehow, I wanted to make things as normal as possible.  And I know that it will all get done.  The dinner will be delicious.  It will be fine.  And nobody in the whole wide world will know what it cost me to make it through today.  And that's hard.
I keep saying that I'm on my last rung. But I'm supposed to keep getting back up.  My husband simply doesn't get what he takes from me.
I will make sure that tonight is good.  I will have a great time.  I will focus on the reason to celebrate...my beautiful daughter.  But when it is over, what then?  I have to place to fall apart.  And holding it together incessantly hurts.
Perhaps I'd feel better if I ate more than licorice today.  But I just can't do it. Can't do one more thing.  But, I have more things to do, so do them I will.  Because it's who I am.  I adore my family.  They brighten my whole soul.  They are such a gift.  I am so proud of each of my children.  For all different reasons.  So, I have to be the mom.  That's what I signed on for.
Now, I'll make sure the stuff is ready.  I'll make sure she has a great day.........because I love her enough to overcome anything else.

The Hearty Plant

Once a man bought a house.  And at the house, there was a garden.  The garden was full of lovely things.  But, over time, the plants died off and the weeds grew up.  But there was this one flower.  It was the pride and joy of the man.  He often complimented himself on how well the plant was doing.  Every year it came back.  Every year it had abundant, beautiful blooms.  Every year, it brought the man pleasure.  He never watered.  It never even crossed his mind.  He never weeded.  It didn't seem necessary.  Until one year.  One year, as spring came, the man looked expectantly for his beloved flower.  His prized plant.  It wasn't there.  He waited a couple of weeks thinking that the weather had been very cold and perhaps the plant was delayed.  Still, no plant.  One morning, in desperation, he went out and pulled the weeds growing around the area that his plant usually grew.  Still, no plant was visible.  After awhile, he took out a watering can and watered the dirt where his flower grew.  Nothing.  He became desperate.  He hoed the ground.  Bought fertilizer.  To no avail.  The plant had not survived.  He mourned.  He moaned.  He wailed.  But the plant was gone.  It's beauty was gone.  The man spent his days scowling.  He had always thought that plants were too much trouble.  No wonder he had never liked gardening.  He was disappointed that his hearty plant had failed him.  That it hadn't come back under his care.  He sulked.  He cried.  But he never even considered that he could have had the plant for many years if he had simply figured out how to care for it.  Instead, he spent his years cursing the fact that his plant never came back again after he had watered and pulled the weeds.  

Suspicions vs. Reality

I always have suspected that I don't really count in my husband's view.  That he doesn't really see me or hear me.  But, many things don't "really" matter.  They aren't that important.  And I guess that I've always hoped that the nagging feeling that he thinks of himself before anyone else was.....false.  But, in this time of high stress.  In these days where I have laid it all on the line.  Where I have said exactly what I need......I find it sadly true that he really does not care.  He cares how it affects him.  He cares how it looks.  He cares about saving a marriage.....but not about saving me.  I am only part of an equation in his view.  In his vision, I exist as an extension of himself.  And in this time when I am hurting so much, it would go so far if he would hear me and honor what I am asking.  But, again, as it has been time after time after time after time.........he chooses him.  HIs alternatives.  His ideas.
No, I don't want talk about it with him anymore.  Yes, I realize that seems cruel. I hear how unrelenting it sounds.  But, I've been saying the same things for years.  In all different ways.  Using words.  Using analogies.  And all it ever comes down to is how he feels, what he wants, what he perceives, how I need to forgive.  And I'm just done.  I need him to leave.  I really need him to do it without me figuring it out for him.  I wish he'd man up  and take the heat and do it.  I don't care if he gets a second job or does whatever it takes.  It would speak more kindly than the constant putting it back on me.
I shake when I approach my house.  Hold my breath.  Driving around the corner, looking, seeing if he is there.  I shouldn't have to keep living like this.  But the thing is......this exact behavior is part of the root problem.  I can't just say what I need and get it.  I get worn down.  He just keeps asking the same questions. Asking for the same reasons to be reviewed.  Until I am rubbed raw and just want it to end.  I have learned to comply not because he meets my need nor because my need changed....but because I just can't keep up the battle.  How many times must I say that I need this space in order to function?  Why does he refuse to honor it?  To honor me?
He has good qualities.  I have spent so long trying to focus on those.  But it came at the cost of me having to be the one in the wrong.  Of me being to "blame".  It came at the cost of my self respect.  Self love.  Self care.  I don't mean that my SELF should be at the center either.  Really, I don't need to be the focus.  I just don't get why I can never say.  Oh, I DO things...but without blessing or support.  I make choices.  But, I pay a high price.  And it is simply wearing me down.
But what he thinks will happen is what has happened all of the times before.  I just go back to living.  To raising the kids.  To making things fine.  I hunker down and make it work.  This time, there needs to be a change.  This time I won't go back.  I've said this.  I've said what I need.  Heck, I practice in the car saying my words aloud.  Being blunt.  Being clear.  Being kind but not protecting.  It still has no impact.  He cries.  He argues.  He admits there's a problem........BUT........there's always a but.  And he won't allow me to choose what I need.  I wish he'd go live with someone even.  Just go for a time.
This is affecting my ability to work.  My ability to parent.  I am having a harder time than ever.  And yet...in some ways, it is better.  But not because he is doing anything about it....because I am getting stronger.  Even in the midst of all of the pain.  I am not simply a depressed lump.  I have options and I know it.  But it doesn't keep this from being incredibly, undeniably wearing.  His viewpoint is that the marriage must be saved at all costs.  The cost will be me.  And I'm not willing to do it.  And I hear that makes me hard hearted.  But what about all of the years that  I have done it?
And, it bothers me.  WILL I destroy our children?  Will they be the sacrifice?  I could even live with him around and doing parties together and being nice if he could just release the grip.  The barrage of expectations for me to make it all right.  To make him feel better.  To give him what he needs.  Deserves.  Before God.  As a Christian woman.
He is oppositional when it comes to me.  What I want, he feels a need to fight against.  Always.  I was feeding the sparrows a waffle today.  He wanted me to get out a bowl and give it to him to feed to his chickens.  I didn't.  I fed the sparrows.  I like to feed them in the winter.  It brings me pleasure.  But....he wouldn't know that.  Isn't that........sad?......pathetic?  He doesn't know me.  He doesn't know how many things that bring me pleasure that he stomps on and takes away the pleasure.  Gardening.  Writing.  Traveling.  Reading.  Cooking.  He has a way of making every single thing about him.  Or an argument.
I'm just tired of struggling for the simple freedom to be myself.  I am tired of him knowing me well enough to use what he knows to hurt me but not to help me.  Like always waiting until I'm getting ready to fall asleep to give me hard news or to share his worries.  Every single time.  Though I've said for years that I don't function well that way.  That upping the stress right before I go to bed is harmful to me.  To my ability to rest.  But...bottom line?  He doesn't care.  He doesn't care because what it does for him is provide a release which HELPS him to relax.
I've had suspicions for years.  Doubts.  Questions.  Painful, nagging wonderings.  Asking why.  Troubled.  But, in this time of everything being as bad as it can be......I KNOW.  I don't matter to him.  Well, I do.  And I can hear his argument in my head, " I love you.  I need you.  I fell in love with you.  I meant it.  I am committed. You can't just not forgive me.  You shouldn't be hard hearted.  You should give more chances.  You should forget the past."  But he won't ever change what he wants to accommodate who I am.  There is no room for me in this relationship.  He loves something.  The way I fit into life to make it easier and more comfortable for him.  The way I encourage him.  The way I make it possible for him to look good.  But he doesn't love me in any way that actually addresses me.  That means him putting him aside to allow me to come to the front.   To actually have my needs met.  Without being told how I shouldn't feel that way.  And I've lived that way for 20+ years.  Making the world work for him.  For the kids.  And I can't anymore.  I have to allow me a chance to live.  To grow.  To be who I am supposed to be.
And I don't want him here right now.  I have to figure out how to do that while NOT in his shadow.  Without him telling me how I'm thinking wrong.  Doing it wrong.
I'm so weary of living to make him happy.  To keep the peace.  To try to keep him happy so that the home life is better.  I'm not responsible for all of that.  But he always puts me in that position.  And when I try to wiggle out of that space, he acts out.  That's why right now is so very hard.  And that's why I need him to be away so that I can heal.  I can't heal "us" without first working on me.  In his view, "us" matters most.  But....it doesn't really, because his view of "us" is warped.  His view of us is self serving.  There's very little me in "us" and mostly him.
Yes, I drove up to my house today, coming slowly around the curve and I could barely take a breath, my heart was racing, my head hurt, I was shaking.......until I saw that he was gone.  I can't live like that.  It's too stressful.
grace to you.

The Trials

I am having a hard night.  A friend that wishes she was dead...or not exactly....wishes that she had a terminal illness.  She is   depressed and barely functioning.  Hurts my heart.  She feels like she has no choices.  Like she is stuck.  I know where she is.  I remember wanting to die.  I remember also how it feels to feel stuck.  All I can do is pray and hold the flashlight.
And I'm stressed.  Highly stressed.  My kids are hiding away in some ways.  Hard to get them to do the things that they need to do and to do it well.  And I'm stressed because I single parent.  Yet, I get to be criticized when I don't do it right because there is another adult in the house.  I just can't take much more.
I need him to get away.  He needs to give me time to get through.  To heal.  To figure out life again.  And I can't do it with the end result being "so I can have a relationship with you again."
And I can only hope that he doesn't get me a Valentine.  Because if he does, I will be certain that he has no respect for what I hope for or what I need.
Can I say again that I am really weary of this?  I am.  But the saddest part?  More and more I realize that he doesn't care.  Only cares how it affects him.
How do I get to take care of myself if my voice isn't respected when it is used??? Stressed.
grace to you.

Little Things

First....I napped.  Then....I tried to do some normal things.  Picking up.  Laundry.  Dying hair.  But I am not ok.  I mean, I am somewhat functioning.  Nobody else would probably notice.  It is the fact that I can't say it enough times to get through to him what I need.  And it is killing me.  I suspected that this would be true.  And I'm not wanting an all out battle.  But, being me, it's hard to have to say the same thing that I need over and over and over and keep on proving it in some way.  It hurts.  A lot.  It weighs on me.  Wears on me.  I am not walking around wanting to be unkind.  But, he doesn't get that this reality is EXACTLY what is wrong at the base.  He refuses to actually hear me.  To actually let who I am or what I need or want or hope for to actually filter through his own wants and needs.
I get that he needs me.  But he doesn't really want me.  No, he wants what I give him.  Not what he can give me.  It's so complex.  It has taken me years to figure out...I'm not the woman he wants, but  he wants to make me the woman he wants.  But he doesn't want me to be the woman that I am....which I NEED to be.
It makes me absolutely crazy.
Wish he would be able to have that kind of grace towards me.  He can talk "nice" or mean.  Neither way really matters.  The bottom line is always the same.  He is always focused on what he wants.
Wow.  I suspected that he was self centered.  But, now, after it's all laid out and all.....and he won't help me...it makes me know how deep it is.  And......it hurts.
How sad.
grace to you.

Coming Home

Had to come home from the weekend away with my daughter and friends.  It's so hard.  I wish that it wasn't.  But wishing doesn't make it so.  Back to my couch.  Back to the horrible discomfort.  Not of the place I sleep...but of the emotional aspects of his always being here.  I turned off my computer last night when I really wanted to watch a show.  Laid and tried to go to sleep.....because I knew he'd be home in a few minutes from basketball.  I know that he wants to talk more.  Said he hoped that we would on Sunday.  K just want to be done talking for now.  I want for him to do what I'm asking.
I don't look forward to having him served with papers.  The thought traumatizes me.  I am not cruel.  And though I am hurting, I in no way relish harming him.  I just wish that he was the same for me.  I wish that he could see me.  And that it mattered.  That he would choose to help me instead of simply him.
He can't bear failure.  It grates against him like nothing else.  Always performing to win.  But I am not a trophy nor a prize.  I am a person.
And I am so very tired.
Going to be gone for four nights soon.  Yippee!!!! Can't wait for that.  And yet...there's the dread already.  Knowing that it will be hard to face the coming home.  It has been for years.  To love being home with my kids but to be so very uncomfortable.  It's painful.
Today I'm going to take care of me.  Rest.  Do what I need to do.  But just not worry....or at least as little as possible.
grace to you.

When Day Comes

I am so relieved when day comes.  When night has passed.  When the sun comes up again.  It comforts me.  Though I am tired.  A new day.  Hope.  Again.  The darkness did end.  The night did not last.  Just as in life.
Doubt fades as the light grows.  And I am thankful.  Unbelievably so.
Today is a joy......but I'm also looking forward to some moments of  quiet.  Fun being with the girls for the birthday.  Yet it overwhelms me.
And I remain........silent.  Not speaking of that which crushes me.  Listening about how lucky I am.
You know, living with the person while going through all of this process is......grueling.
gotta go see what the girls are doing.
grace to you.

Silence

I can't use my words with just anyone.  I am silent about those things that are huge.  I have had a lot of practice. I have it perfected.  Talk about what is not as important.  What doesn't crush my heart.
A little sad.  Yet.................more comfortable.
People talk well of my husband.  They enjoy him.  That's good.  Hard for me.  But, I'm not willing to say anthing.
But.......I've survived this overnight for my daughter's bday so far.  With a friend.  At a hotel.  Quiet.  Laughing about stuff. On our computers.  It's best this way.
gnight.