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The
first thing ~wrong~ -
is how happy I looked, and what a nice-looking
couple we made. It was July 6th, and my grand 50th
birthday. And we were taking that picture in one of
those little picture-booths at a "5 &
10" store across from Dominion Psychiatric
Hospital where I was being admitted for my third
hospitalization (in as many months) for
suicidal compulsion which was beyond my control. It
was beyond anyones' control at that point. Neither
man nor medicine seemed capable of stopping me.....
Infidelity
is in many ways, worse than death.....
In death, an end comes. Infidelity
is not at all an end for the victim. It is, instead,
the beginning of a seemingly `endless'
torture. I never have understood, and I never will,
why people have to heap the additional pain upon the
partner that they defraud.... the humiliation of
being such a fool when everyone knows and some try
to tell you and it is too unthinkable, too painful,
too unacceptable for you to entertain the idea of...
and so you turn away from the kind and loving
friends who are trying to help and protect you. You
even turn some of the pain on them in small ways....
You avoid them... You resent their pitying
looks..... How selfish it is that ~cheaters ~ hold
on to the partner while they do as they please! Why
not come right out and say, "I have come to
want someone else" or - "I don't want you
anymore." and let it all end with a fair and
legal separation preliminary to divorce? I
comprehend the insecurity, and that they are fearing
that they will be giving up something real for an
illusion which will dissolve soon enough and they
will be left with nothing... But - that IS the price
of the choice to dally and experiment - isn't it
now? The fair choice/price, that
is..... If one wants a thing enough, they should be
willing to pay whatever that fair price is.
For some - the price may not be so fair. For some
partners are more interested in the security their
mate provides than in the fidelity vows. In that
case - there will be a great war launched and
catastrophic consequences for all concerned. The
fury unleashed, the bitterness generated and
nursed..... Vengeance to be wrought.... Penalties
exacted....
It was not that way with me. I talked with him about
this before we ever married. I said that it was not
my nature to be jealous, possessive or vindictive. I
asked that if the time temptation should arrive and
he wish to indulge himself, he would tell me. I
promised the same to him. I vowed that I would not
make any attempt to hold on to him in such a case.
And I never would have. It is not in me. Why would I
want to give my life, even one hour of it, to
someone who didn't want it? It is too precious and
what is the point? What gain for anyone? Where is
honor? Where is decency. Where is respect of love?
How can there be respect for oneself, even?
***Why
am I sharing this?
Because there is so much "Mystery"
surrounding what is commonly referred to as a
"Breakdown". There is so much secrecy and
shame surrounding the things I am going to share
here..... I think that if it were not that way, and
people talked about it more freely, the support and
help would be more available when and where it is
obviously needed.... and possibly, relationships and
even lives could be saved that now become pitiful
sacrifices to the god of pride. What is wrong will
not go away simply because it is hidden and
repressed from exposure. In fact, evil thrives in
the dark night of secrecy. What is done is done. The
only shame to carry around are those wrong choices
which we continue to make and wrong actions by which
we bring suffering and pain to others whose crime is
to love unwisely, those who choose not to cherish or
honor that love.
At
first, it was all his fault, of course......(victims
believe this until they recognize that they are
jointly at fault and break the bonds that imprison
them in the circumstances. It's the age-old adage,
"Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice,
shame on me" and you could substitute Hurt -
for the word `Fool'. It was weeks before I found my
way to THAT mountain and ascended to the next stage
of recovery!)
Excerpts
from April-journal .... Up most of the
night last night! Weird coldness under my right rib
cage and that weird numbness in extremities and over
sensitized nerve endings! Too much time to think
when I can't sleep! Rogers' choice to continue along
indefinitely...not seeking help or resolutions...
means he's throwing MY life away too! Not just his
own! I'm angry enough now, with all that's wasted in
our years, to say `Enough is enough!' I want to say,
and stick to, "No more, Roger! I will not hope,
I will remain in reality...which is this
- You have neglected and abandoned me more than you
have loved and stayed with me!" Also, "You
torment me by telling me what all you need and want
me to `help' you with....involving me in your `new
ideas' and `trials' and then turning around and
telling me it's now my `place' to be doing
it!!!!" "You procrastinate and keep me
hanging on like everything else in your life that
you are finished with but never discard or let
go!" "You don't want to live with or
without me either one! You have to choose! Either
stay the way you are or do whatever it takes to
regain control (or gain control) over your life,
your appetites and your health and stamina for life
and be my husband! You can't have it both ways
Roger! You say there's something wrong! You say
you're afraid of being alone! You won't get out on
your own and try it. You won't do much of anything
except exist. If that's all you want...then why are
you stringing me along waiting years for a husband
you never intend to be? "But I want to live,
and love with you! If not you, then someone! You've
got to make a decision and stick with it! You keep
changing and I don't know what you want!"
~
I need to face the
here and now of the way things are, because they
have BEEN this way for 17 years and may possibly be
that way forever if not dealt with. He can't deal
with what he doesn't see! So that leaves me with no
recourse but to begin to step forward into a
LIFE....get out from `backstage' and live! I can't
keep looking over my shoulder to see if he's coming
along!
I don't know
what's the matter with me... it seemed like such a
big impossible thing for me to deal with.... but I
don't understand, why? I was fighting not to let my
voice reveal the tears which began (why the tears?)
it was like my mind just couldn't fit anything about
the subject <taxes> IN up there in my brain!
It kind of scares me how overwhelmed I'm getting
these days. I think it's the loneliness and
insecurity and the stress and even the workload and
responsibilities.... it's just too much! I think I
just can't handle any more responsibility! I keep
saying that - but nobody is listening - not even ME
<to myself>!
To make matters worse...he came here too. He was
acting so odd(!)..... adding even more stress to the
impossible amount which I was so desperately trying
to hold up under. He wanted to `show me what to do'
- BUT I CAN'T DO ANY MORE..... - I just CANNOT! I
could see that he didn't believe what I was trying
to say. He acts like I'm crazy... I think he's
right. It was like one of those `Twilight Zone'
experiences where I feel I've been sucked into the
TV and Rod Serling is announcing the show while that
`music' introduction begins. I keep telling them
around me that I'm on `overload'...but they keep
pressing me to fill their responsibility needs and I
feel sometimes that no one listens or believes that
I'm a finite human! Why won't/don't they hear me????
It began to seem like I was fading away and nothing
made any sense. My whole life is turned inside out.
I feel on the edge of a real Breakdown! <whatever
that means or will mean.....>
I'm feeling
drained and listless and stay near to tears. I would
be okay if Roger would come and hold me and comfort
me or lend me some strength for all the
responsibility that has fallen to me from his share
of the household and our life! Or.... if he would
just leave me alone altogether and let me adjust to
his absence permanently. Instead - he is always
pushing and pulling me back and forth and I don't
feel I have any power to do anything about any of
it. I love him. It seems that is a sick thing to
continue to do in light of all the
circumstances.....
Called Roger this
evening to ask him if he wants to get the rest of
his stuff out of the closet in the bedroom. He talks
about getting his `act together' - loving and
missing me - wanting to come home - and then the
last few times he's come, he gets a few more things
out of the closet as though he's still moving out. I
hate the confusion he keeps going! If he's still
moving out - then he should DO it and he should STOP
talking as though he's coming home, since obviously,
he isn't really working at doing that. In fact, he
says he's lazy and thinks he likes not having to
answer to anyone or do anything more than come home
to that room and `flop down and do nothing if I want
to.' So, why is he hanging on to me? Why doesn't he
make some decision? If this relationship isn't what
he wants, he needs to take up the responsibility of
ending it fairly. He's already leaving everything
but the house-payment and my medical bills (some of
them) up to me to fend for myself. (He's stopped
paying the
utilities now too)
The thing is, I can't adjust to anything, one way or
the other, because he comes and says one time that
he wants to come home, doesn't like who or what he
is, knows he needs help and needs to change but
doesn't know how - and all that sort of thing - and
then at another time, he acts perfectly content with
the status-quo. I need direction and stability. I
can make it if he just makes up HIS mind! We both
know that I want us to make it, to get help or
whatever it will take, and be together for the rest
of our lives. We've invested so many years together!
I don't even know if I can deal with the idea of a
divorce. It feels wrong when I pray about it. But
when I read the right books and articles, it seems
so right. Especially if he IS having an affair. Oh,
I stay so confused and torn one way and another.
Sometimes I wonder, `What is it that the
relationship holds for me? Has there been enough
good in it to keep it?' But the answers are, #1) I
took those vows `for better or worse' and regardless
of what he does... it was my vow!' and #2) I see a
spiritual man and another man (not really a man at
all, but more a teenager who is selfish and mean.) I
see a potential that I believe will one day be
actuated and reached. So tonight he started in on me
- "Do you want to end our relationship?" I
didn't even want to answer that question, I've been
trying to discern that for myself for a year now and
haven't yet - so how could I answer him? Besides -
it's a trick question/situation.... if I say `yes' -
then he will immediately set about changing my
mind/decision.... and if I say `no', he is content
to officially be `off finding himself' (which he has
spent a LOT of time doing throughout this entire
marriage) while using the separation as
justification for abandonment of his responsibility
for his family. He says he's `lazy' - and I guess
that covers it all pretty well... He wants to
validate his irresponsible and procrastinating
lifestyle by using me - pushing me into the position
of not being able to live with him.. and his
behaviors. Since it's entirely my fault, I think he
believes that `anything goes' for him to do. It also
, in his mind, warrants my having to struggle to
survive on my own, depending on others to provide
for and meet his responsibility for me!!!
I can't write very
well with this pain...but I am trying to deal with
the conversation by setting it all down like this to
look at it now and later and maybe find out what the
truth or answer in me is! I'm so desperate for this
to change! Sometimes I
don't think that I can get through another night of
the loneliness and need! In fact, I believe
that I already know the answer - but I just don't
want to get on that roller-coaster ride that will
begin as soon as he identifies one or the other
choice in me. It's a `no win situation' for me. A
trap that he's wanting to snap shut on me as he has
so many times in the past! I also feel so vulnerable
about my physical health. It just seems that I'm
falling apart. If Dr. Taylor is right, then I must
do something about my life or `die'! He says that
the situation is as deadly as cancer!
I keep asking God to show me what to do, but I know
that He isn't going to make the decision FOR me. He
certainly isn't going to change Roger when Roger
doesn't want to do so and won't let Him! So what can
I expect of Him? I just try to find the comfort and
instruction in His Word. Even that is growing remote
for me at times now. I think all of life is growing
pretty remote for me now! In fact, I hate it!
With the mail came
a late notice for the mortgage. I was stunned! Is he
going to allow the house to be `lost' too? Just how
insecure are the circumstances I'm about to find
myself thrust into? I was so undone that I began to
tremble and cry. Waiting for the nausea to pass, I
called the bank. They said the payment had arrived
two days ago! I was almost too weak to stand. Last
week there had been a double electric bill in the
mail when he told me I have to start paying it! I
felt overwhelmed with insecurity! I realize that I
don't really know much about the state of things in
my own home! I could be out on the street so easily
and just as mercilessly as anything else he's done.
Why not that? I guess, in one way, it would be
merciful because I would leave and return to
Maryland then! The decision would be made for me! So
- let it happen, I thought. Or, wanted
to think. But I was having a weird day after that! I
kept getting sleepy-like.
I don't know if a person can `doze off' while
walking around and doing things, but I seemed to be
doing that today. Time slipped away and I didn't
know where it went. I'd find myself in an activity I
didn't remember starting - and not remembering
ending the one before it! It almost scared me.
Perhaps it's a new kind of flu bug that effects your
brain with encephalitis or something? I began to
feel like I was having Panic attacks and with the
odd sleepiness & fogginess, I felt like either
the world or I was becoming unreal. Everything
seemed to be moving in slow motion and there was a
peculiar numbness about me....like I was turning to
cotton or something insubstantial like that. I even
went to bed and lay down 3 or 4 times today and fell
asleep immediately with Buffy on one side of me and
Brandi on the other side. They were so sweet and
good while I tried to negotiate/navigate my way
through what seems like a fog coming and going in
and around me. Am I sick? Yes, yes, I believe I
really am and it's getting serious now!
Roger came after work and when I asked him about
last night he said he'd been upset over us and had
been out riding around for hours - had even come
past the house a few times but couldn't bring
himself to come in! He blasted me about the house
payment, about my `feelings' about the house payment
"You KNOW I wouldn't let anything happen to the
house!" But I don't know that. I don't know
anything. He seemed to be very put out with me,
super-irritated and all I could feel or think was a
blurry confusion and unnamed fear. Even as he went
on talking I found my own thoughts superimposed over
his - `I have to sell the store, find a job and get
medical insurance.... I don't think I've ever felt
more insecure in my life! I remember him asking me
what was wrong with me and I realized that the weird
feelings I was having must be showing. I don't know
why or how. But I just said I hadn't been feeling
good today.
The truth is, I haven't felt good for a long, long
time now. I'm terrified of everything in general, no
one particular thing specifically. I just don't seem
to be able to think or feel `right'- whatever that
is. Like a drowning person, I kept repeating to
myself `One day at a time, just one day at a time.
Don't think about anything else. I'm still doing it
now. Roger seemed angry with me for whatever he
thought I'm feeling or thinking. I couldn't respond
very well, and I think he thinks it was for some
reason. I'm sure this all is. But I don't know what
it is exactly. My whole system seems to be speaking
urgently in languages I don't understand.
Roger is objecting
loudly to the `cleaning up' of the yard we were
doing <at last> - even though he admits that
it's looking really good around here. I wondered
what he was here for today, really, I honestly don't
know! He seemed to get angrier by the hour, yet he
wouldn't go home. I invited him to do that and he
snapped at me, "This is
my
home!" I have no problem with that idea - I
feel that way myself. But that made it all the more
frustrating that he was willing to just stand around
observing the whole family cleaning up after him!
Criticizing and complaining while the rest of us
were all gathering up years of his old trash and
accumulation of a dozen vehicle batteries - odd
parts - empty containers, rags and trash. Three
separate times today and evening, he announced that
he was going to leave his `keys'....once even began
to take them off his key ring, then stopped as
though unable to reconcile himself to either
decision - keep or forfeit them as symbol of how
offended he is that I'm doing things without his
permission. Though I seem brave about it, actually
I'm really afraid of his anger, but I'm doing it
anyway! I just hate living this way!
The cook-out was nice in spite of all circumstances
contributing the opposite influence. Everyone ate
heartily! Even Roger himself! We even sent a plate
home for Bobby too. Roger kept saying he was
leaving. Then he'd stay! He even left in his car
twice but then returned. His face was so tormented
and contorted that I could barely look upon it! It
was a man at war with himself so powerfully that it
seemed he would self destruct! He was actually
talking to himself on several occasions when I
walked up to him without his knowing. I didn't
understand one word, but it was as though two men
were heatedly arguing with each other! He often,
throughout day and evening, turned that animosity or
whatever it was between himself and himself - ON ME!
He was supposed to do that tax filing but I found
this morning (It's the next day that I'm writing
this) that he never even did that - and Friday
is the deadline!
The evening, with the others gone and Brandi in bed,
exhausted from her day of helping and playing so
hard with her cousins and all the excitement of
company.... was even worse! I tried
to get him to share what was going on, but he didn't
want to talk, didn't want to leave, didn't want to
stay, wasn't interested in playing cards or
any other game, (is he ever - really?) or a movie or
anything I could think of to suggest or offer. He
said, "I don't know what's wrong with me. I
feel screwy. I almost feel drunk!" and such
things in a ranting, raving, pacing (not unfamiliar)
kind of way. My nervous system became so `wired'
that I thought I too would soon begin to act like
that myself if he didn't stop! He said he had to go.
I thought he DID leave, without saying goodbye - but
when I went downstairs, there he was sitting in the
dark in his recliner glaring like a gargoyle at
nothing at all! I apologized for turning on the
light, explaining that I hadn't realized he was
still here. He so often just up and leaves without a
word, that I'm accustomed to the behavior. This time
he'd said he was going to leave. I
was going into the bathroom to take my shower at the
time and had no idea he didn't!
"Do you want me to leave the light on or
off?" I asked, as I turned to come back
upstairs. He jumped up out of the chair, "I've
got to go."
he said, following me. He took me in his arms and
kissed me in the dining-room, a hard, odd kiss,
almost like he hated me for wanting to kiss me or
want me or whatever he was doing... I didn't like
the kiss, but I sure wanted it to change into one of
our usual ones and then lead to more! Then he
abruptly let go of me and left! I stood there and
cried. It had been such a strange day of that
pushing-pulling, scary roller coaster kind of day
with him that I felt as strange as he was acting!
I hated, but was also relieved at, his departure. He
started the car. I ran to the bedroom and threw
myself across the bed sobbing. It always feels like
he's leaving me for the first and last time every
time he does it! We've spent so much of our life
together in `partings' of all kinds.... angry, sad,
mean, gentle, reluctant, eager...you name
it....we've done it that way - lots of times! I
don't know if he left or not.... but he returned to
the house, came toward the bedroom and my heart
leaped at the sound - "He's coming back"
my soul spoke happily.....(it always hopes his
`coming backs' will be forever).
He came inside the
room and said nothing for a few minutes. There was
no light on. Finally, he asked, "Are
you crying?"
... I hesitated in replying, not knowing what the
answer would do or bring about - would he attack me
with the usual accusations ? ~ "You're
just doing this to make me feel bad."
or "You
know I hate it when you cry."
or the `why?'
questions which seem so ridiculous since we both
know what's hurting! I decided to avoid the answer,
knowing that we both already knew I was crying (and
the why? of it too) even as he left, "What is
it you want Roger?" I asked. "May
I turn on the light?"
he asked. "Sure" I sat up and reached for
a hanky to blow my nose and he said,
"I
need to get a few things",
indicating his closet there in the corner. So this
was why he had come back? I felt that resentment and
anger rise too suddenly to bite back a comment
"Why do you keep taking a `few things'? There's
nothing much left in there except junk!" He
removed his summer shirts that hung there - "The
weather's changing and I don't have many shirts to
wear." he
said.
"Well, why don't you take everything else
out of there too? It's been a year now, and now
you're taking the last of what clothes you want. Why
leave that stuff you haven't worn in years and
probably never will wear again?" He snapped
"I'll take what I want, when I want!" as
he shut the door and began to make his way back out
of the room. It was like something snapped inside of
me! He has left me for years with that closet as his
only presence left of him in our bedroom. Why leave
it with stuff he didn't want? It seemed so symbolic
of ME in his/our life. "If you take those
shirts - take everything else out of there
too!"
"Why are
you saying that now?"
he wanted to know. "Why
do you want me to clean out the closet at this time
of night?
"Because I can't take all this it anymore,
" I said, "if you're going, go and take all
of it with you - Don't leave your trash and
unwanted stuff here with the wife you've abandoned
over and over and obviously don't want either!"
"IT
ISN'T TRASH'
he snarled, "It's
just trash to you because it isn't YOURS! You want
the closet for yourself."
My heart was breaking, "No, Roger! It isn't the
CLOSET I want, it's my husband! You keep leaving me!
Piece by piece, you come and go and I have to wait
and wait to see which and when you're going to do
it! I don't even understand the why!" .......
"Well,
then, why are you throwing me out?"
"What?" I asked, incredulous. "You
want me to take everything."
he replied... "I said, stay or go, Roger,
....either one, only you can make that decision. But
I don't want you doing it a little piece at a time
like this. I can't stand the back and forth
moving!" Glaring at me intently, he said, "This
relationship isn't going anywhere. We both know
it!"
I always get sick when he starts this. He was
baiting me and I knew it. When I get the courage to
be in agreement with such a statement from him, he
turns right around in a few hours or days and talks
me back around in the other direction! I'm dizzy
from it! "If that's how you feel -" I
began to say. He interrupted me, lashing right out
in the midst of my words,
"IT ISN'T ME! IT'S YOU! IT'S HOW YOU
FEEL!"
he was shouting at me as though the loudness would
make it sound true... "Roger, I have never
wanted you to leave. I get to where I can't stand
the pain and treatment you give me and then we
separate-...." once again he interrupted
me...... "OR
YOU CALL THE POLICE AND HAVE ME LOCKED UP!"
he angrily, accusingly interjected, referring to the
night I'd gotten a temporary restraining order from
the magistrate - when he'd spoken of killing himself
and left and I didn't know where he was.
First, he'd
threatened me and went to the cupboard in the
kitchen to take down a shotgun (or whatever kind of
gun that was) which he threw down on the floor in
the kitchen when he evidently changed his mind about
what he'd wanted/intended to do to me after
threatening my life (because I was going to leave
him) in the bedroom moments before. (Later, Roger
told me that he was standing on a chair - the
cupboard is up at the ceiling, and our little Brandi
, he said, toddled into the kitchen and looked up at
him and he looked down at her and it wrenched his
heart/mind into awareness of what he was doing...
how out of control he'd gone, and it was then that
he threw down the gun as he did....) Funny, it was
always okay for him to leave me - but any mention of
my leaving him or moving out of our home made him
violently angry.
The all-too-familiar physical manifestations of the
stress of what was happening between us were
beginning, the severe cramping, the panic, the
inability to breathe...the diarrhea - I got up from
the bed to go to the bathroom, "Do whatever you
want Roger, you always do that. Take what you want.
Leave what you want. It's ME, actually, that I
really object to your leaving behind the
most..." and I closed the bathroom door behind
me. When I came out, I thought he was gone, but he'd
only taken his shirts to the car. I was trembling
and weak. When he came back again, FEAR ran hotly
through me...what now? Sometimes I still remember
that day.... the day I first learned to fear his
temper and capacity for violence.... the day of the
only physical beating he ever inflicted upon me. But
his hands were empty and it didn't seem that he was
threatening me...... I pulled back the covers and
got into the bed. I felt such freezing cold inside
and outside of me.
He went to the closet and opened
the door. He stood there looking in. Took out a suit
and turned to me and said, "Do
you know anyone to give these things to? You're
right, I probably never will wear this stuff again.
You can get rid of it if you want to. Throw it away
or give it to the clothes-closet....
Something
like rage came up in me.....[`Me?' I
shouted within myself.....`Now
he wants me to carry away his discards and remains
for him too?] To Roger I then spoke quietly, no sign of the inner
rage that had come, "Why don't you take the
stuff with you and do whatever YOU want or decide to
do with it? It's yours!".......
"Oh,
SURE" he
growled....."It
has to be done RIGHT NOW! It's got to be done when
Nina says to do it!"
he said, belligerent and challengingly, which was a
bit absurd since he had been gone now for a year
already. "You
wouldn't care if it took me all night or I didn't
get any sleep at all tonight" The
fury or rage or whatever the terrible thing or
feelings (so unfamiliar to me!) were in me began to
`boil' and I'm not sure exactly what I said or did.
There is a very hazy picture of
myself throwing or taking things out of the closet.
I remember saying or shouting, I don't know which,
words like.... "I don't want your trash in my
life anymore. I want a life! I'm not going to take
this anymore. I'm not going to let you be mean to me
like this anymore!" I clearly remember a moment
when he came into the room with the outside trashcan
and began to put the things all into it together and
I know that we were both saying stuff - but as weird
as it seems to me this morning, I can't recall
anything more specific. I have no idea of the time
we spent or anything.
The next thing I remember, was him standing over me
in the closet doorway and I was inside the `now
empty space', sitting on the floor in the corner,
face wet with tears, and he was telling me to get up
and get out of there. I felt confused about being in
there. I didn't remember going in there. I felt
afraid of the anger and impatience in his voice. It
was like when you first wake up from a dream and
aren't sure whether it was a dream, or, reality. I
felt trapped there in the corner of the closet with
him filling the doorway and no way past him.....
Then he was pulling me, out of the closet and I
didn't want to go out. I felt safe or less pain or
something in there. - It was as though I had found
an escape from the world and all of its' harsh
realities . I think I had shut the door and crouched
into a corner...maybe crying - for some unknown
time?
It felt as though
it had been more than a few minutes, but I had no
sense of time, so I'm not sure. I felt like a really
little girl! Funny, I can remember that feeling
clearly... it almost felt as though I'd `visited' a
familiar place where I'd been before...but it was an
odd feeling - sort of unreal, or, a twilight-zone.
As the scene took place, I felt like a removed
observer of him and of myself and of what was taking
place. It was like seeing someone else - but it was
me! I was seeing me as though I was two different
people. I remember feeling numb (paradoxical
statement! Oxymoron?) and `slow' - like everything
was in slow motion (that happens to me a lot
lately). I remember him saying he wanted to make
love to me... but he didn't say it in a way I ever
heard before. I CLEARLY remember him looking at me
in that strange way he does on those rare occasions
when I finally do `lose it' and get angry. It's like
he too, is seeing me as another woman - one he finds
stimulating and arousing.
He announced that it was too late to leave and he
was too tired, and that he was going to spend the
night and asked, did I want him to sleep in bed or
on the couch. I could barely speak or respond. I
felt entirely passive, lifeless perhaps. Slowly I
heard myself say "I don't care" as I
curled up under the covers which he was tenderly
pulling over me. It was like a father tucking in his
child. He reached down and ever so gently brushed my
hair back and then bent down and kissed my swollen
eyes and he said, "I'm
sorry Nina. I know that I put you through
hell."
and he was crying as he spoke.
From
somewhere inside of me, an alert, responsive me
asked indignantly, why then, he continues to do it,
but my lips were too tired to speak her words out
loud and I remained silent.
I tried to focus on him because it felt like I or my
vision was blurring or getting foggy and my sight
and hearing grew dim...
He still stood a moment,
looking down at me, then he went around the bed,
took off all his clothes and got into the bed with
me. I remember hearing coins clink as they rolled
together and fell from the covers when he got in. I
vaguely noted that it was the money that had fallen
onto the bed from a cigar box of coins from his
closet. That brings a vision of lots of pennies
everywhere. At first he lay on his back on his(?)
side of the bed and my senses got a little sharper
-like a small bit of fear in me, of not knowing what
might happen next. The silence was so loud it felt
like a pressure against my eardrums. After a few
minutes, he rolled over and slipped one arm under
and one arm over me and held me in that way that I
always CRAVE (and I think I will crave it FOREVER!
The little girl in me, who had no father to hold and
cuddle her?). He brushed his lips against my earlobe
and neck, and whispered there so softly, "Oh,
Nina, I love you. I hate what I 'm doing... what I
always do to you. And I love you."
Another
woman in me, one from our ~yesterday days~ spread
her feelings through the numbness with a liquid
warmth and I turned to kiss him. Without a word we
began to make love there in a silence that made it
seem magical. I think we both were afraid that words
could break the spell that was making it possible to
make love. It felt like we really were one body. It
was a physical communication as well as a
`communion' of each other. A thing that I think only
husband and wife, within that mystery of oneness,
ever really know or share... In the midst of the
near end, and right afterward, we both cried. I
don't think either of us had a particular reason,
unless it was the sadness of the separations and
pain that we both seem victim to at the merciless
behavior of a whole other `Roger'. But the strange
thing about it was the `mutualness' of timing and
feelings that we never spoke a word of, except in
holding each other, and in the mingling of our tears.
The `spell ' that we still didn't want to break, by
speaking or moving apart, allowed us to sleep so
closely all night - never moving or separating!
As
though there were demons who had fallen asleep and
while we were unguarded by them, we were able to
slip from the chains which bound us from each other
and be together and we didn't dare disturb them and
lose that contact!!! <I
had no idea, at that time, that he had plans and
would be with another woman in a few hours.... But -
Roger did know........ and even to this day - I
cannot comprehend the terrible reality of that
fact..... >
next days'
entry
~ We
didn't speak this morning of anything. He said he
might be back this evening or would call as usual. I
had no idea what to say or hope to hear! I chose
instead to just cherish the good that had happened.
It renewed the memory of what I'd almost forgotten
we are (can be) together at times!
Eric
arrived home early! He looks great, his
beard and all that! I so hope he'll decide to keep
it! So good to have him home again, I've missed him.
Whenever my son is at home, I just feel so safe,
secure and contented. The kids had a wonderful time
together outside. It was actually WARM! I took
pictures. Jeanne and I enjoyed visiting.
When I
cleared the table to set it for dinner, I found that
Roger hadn't taken those tax papers with him - OR
filled them out either! See? That's why I try so
hard to get him to do stuff like that ahead of time!
They're due in the mail tomorrow! I tried, but
couldn't reach him by phone. I can't afford calling
him anyway, I'll just wait till he calls, I'm sure
he'll REMEMBER anyway, he usually does at the last
minute when a thing is due - remembers it on
the very date it's due! That will be
tomorrow! I looked to see if I could do them...but
you know me and instructions! Better that I leave it
alone! Why didn't he just do it early? Oh well....
nothing I can do now. We all actually fit and ate
around the big table like the Waltons or something!
I love it when we do that! Well, I'm tired. Long
day. Besides, I wrote so much this morning that my
hand is still tender from it! Enough!
Later - Roger never did call or
return my call. He knows that worries me! I'll have
to try to reach him at work so I can get them in the
mail. He'll have to help me by phone, or I'll have
to pay the $35.00 late fee! Hope not!
The above is the
type of madness that is so difficult to explain or
even comprehend when you are caught up in the
patterns that repeat and repeat until something
breaks it.... Had I not kept such a faithful and
complete journal most of my life, which served as a life raft in the
midst of the storm and then a lifeline to shore
after the marriage ship-wrecked, split apart and
sank into the sea of adultery...... I would have
been lost in the sea of it all!
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