Thursday, February 28, 2008

Make 'Em Laugh

So I thought it was time to share some lighter stories.
You know how when you got funky things going on in your life you attract funky random energy? That keeps happening to me.
First let me share the story of being at Hugo's with the flu.
I woke up after, let's see...chest infection in December, strep throat in early January, yes then the flu (later would develop into a full blown sinus infection - yeah me! Hey when does this get FUNNY?).
So my ds and I wake up feeling wretched on day five or so of the flu and my dd is over the flu but has woke up with some kind of FLESH-EATING infection on her chin. Most of her poor pretty chin is red with the skin peeling off.
We're off to Urgent Care!
So we meet our friend JH (bronchitis) and her ds (pneumonia - what's going on? When does this get FUNNY?) there and get seen pretty quickly. I have the flu and there's nothing (NOTHING!) to be done about it. Same with ds. Dd gets an antibiotic at my insistence. Whatever this is on her chin, it's not good. Must have pretty daughter!!!
After Urgent Care, I drag my sick-sorry-sniffling butt to the drugstore to get prescription for dd filled and some antibiotic cream for me. I actually also have these sores inside my nose from blowing so much and they are killing me. I'm worried about flesh-eating bacteria spreading from dd's chin and into my aching nostrils. So I bathe my red noseholes in this antibiotic cream. Very greasy stuff by the way. Read: NOT ATTRACTIVE.
While we wait for ds's prescription I have a great idea. Let's have breakfast at Hugo's!
Yes. Let's take our sick-sorry-sniffling behinds to a RESTAURANT.
(Seriously, what is wrong with me?)
Ok. We get to restaurant.
(Wait! Wait! Who makes it their business to go from URGENT CARE to a RESTAURANT?)
Just let me tell the story!!!!!
So. Ok. We get to the restaurant and get ourselves seated. I'm already starting to think this is a bad idea as we get seated next to Ione Sky. You know, Ione Sky, the celeb actress. She's super cute and nice...her daughter Kate went to Neighborhood School when my dd was there. So we wave.
"Hi!"
She's clearly sitting with some industry/rock-n-roll types. You know but they're all like friends and family and all ensconsced and they totally do this all the time. They love to just, like, eat (not much) and drink teas and juices with exotic infusions, and talk and be rich and cute and skinny, all while Ione's kid thrives at a fabulous school!
I, on the other hand, travel everywhere with my two sick kids, one with oozing blisters on her face and me in my stretched-out, old yoga pants with a hole in the crotch and a big, stained sweatshirt and some greasy ointment all over my red, burning nostrils. Attractive? Yeah, right. Way down deep inside, SOMEWHERE. Maybe.
"Hi Ione!"
I'm so NOT happy to be here. Well OF COURSE I am. Every instinct in my body must be screaming "Leave! Leave!" But do I listen? No. I just sweat.
I sit down. Smile at the trendy, skinny, rich, happy Hugo's clientele.
I pass out paper and markers for my dd. My ds has two new trucks to play with, just purchased at the drug store. I'm no slacker. I'm a good mom.
"Hi Ione!"
Suddenly, my SEVEN-year old dd throws the markers at me. "Why'd you bring these stupid colors? Why'd we come here? I hate it here!"
And I yell back:
"Shut up!"
Yes.
I said the "s-u" word. Out loud. In Hugo's.
Heads SNAPPED. WHIPPED, even.
Cue sound of crickets.
I am a bad mother. I didn't actually choose to make eye contact with her, but I'm certain Ione was looking. And judging. As she should.
God knows I was. I wanted to crawl in a hole. A long dark wet hole with TiVo and a box of truffles.
My poor, beautiful dd will be chin-less by day's end and forced to eat through a hole in her throat, and what do I do? Yell at her to "shut up" in public.
The waittress braves the social strata and approaches us. I quietly, discreetly, ask to be moved outside.
Happily re-seated on the porch, away from staring eyes and curious ears, like good little lepers, my children proceed to continue their rebellion and leave 8.00 of scrambled eggs untouched. Good Lord.
Thankfully, my angel AL arrives to at least prove to the Studio City social elite that I do have friends. She and I drink coffee and laugh and get through breakfast.
Okay. We go outside and she walks me to my car. My car is parked straddling the white line. Reason being, as often happens at Hugo's and other places with perversely small parking lots, people squeeze in wherever they can leading to an anarchy-ruled parking lot where lines are completely ignored.
Let me just say for the record, I did not design the parking lot at Hugo's in Studio City.
So AL and I are hugging goodbye at the car. She may never see me again because I truly feel I am dying. I am so sick and I'm still facing picking up a prescription at the drugstore. It's that kind of sick and tired when you just feel like begging to see St. Peter NOW!
Suddenly this strange woman is in my face. She's tall and oddly gorgeous in this exotic, foreign way. She could be French, Persian, Spanish, who knows, but she's got lots of hair and she's all eyes and cheekbones and a big nose that only looks good on really tall, skinny women and she has some kind of rug or blanket wrapped around her that probably cost $2500 and she giving me WHAT FOR.
What for?
I'll tell you what for.
It seems I didn't park my car between the lines and this is causing her and her friend in their car some consternation as now there is no clear place for them to park. And since as my bronchitis-y friend JH would say, "the sun rises and sets on my ass" this woman is giving me an earful.
"Have you seen what you've done? Look what you've done! Look! Look!"
I am so feverish I can't look. All I can see is a nose wrapped in a blanket, wagging a finger at me. My angel AL, queen of decorum in all situations, swoops in and begins handling it for me. So I just haul my kids into my car and within seconds my friend and this sherpa are now, like, best friends.
The sherpa walks away and AL pats my back as I drag myself into the car.
"Crazy bitch," she says.
I wonder, "Is she talking to me?"
Oh, well. Doesn't matter.
I'm now asking myself in all situations: WWID?
What Would Ione Do?

Monday, February 25, 2008

I'm Not Telling - Part Two

It pains me to keep writing. It pains me to face this all. But Jesus, it's what I prayed for isn't it?
The Big Reveal.
With a side dish of betrayal.

This is crazy because it all just plays right into the very abandonment issues that have now been put on display. Like some crazy fucking someone from your past dragged into the courtroom as a character witness assassin while you're on trial for your life. Here! See? She's CRAAAAZZZZY.

So...
I freak when I get my mom's e-mail saying basically that she doesn't trust me, care about me or whatever. She's siding with my dh any way you cut it. She's made a choice. Marriage 1. Ellen 0.
I don't think I have talked to my mom for two whole hours since this thing even began.
Fickle mommy.

Mommies should not be fickle.

I write her a very calm e-mail asking for her love and loyalty and for her please not to speak to the dh.

She does not respond to this e-mail. Instead, she calls my brother??? who calls me to talk about it. It was a long, loving but difficult conversation. It's hard to hear people make assumptions about you. It's even harder when they act on them. It's hard not to be trusted by those closest to you. Not to be FIRST. God, that's a thing for me.
Yeah. Now I know why.

We get ourselves through the conversation but I've been yelling on and off, outside, in the rain (staying out of earshot of the kids) for 20 minutes so I say my goodbyes. As an afterthought, my bro says, "You know, take comfort knowing that your dh did most of the talking." "Yeah?" (Go figure, I think.) "Yeah," my bro says. "He even told Mom all this stuff about you having issues about your adoption."
Time stops. Rain freezes in place. The birds are quiet. It's cold. Color drains from my sight.
My brother's voice continues in my ear.
"I told Mom that isn't true."
I hear myself say, "It is true. I have to get off the phone now."
The world is literally tilting. I walk up and inside the house.
Place a call to my therapist's cell phone.

She and I are in the middle of negotiating a way for me to get out of the house without conversing with the dh (he has a visit with the kids that night) when I turn and he's standing right there. Listening of course.

God, I hate him.

I hate to hate. But I do. I do.

My mother's e-mail takes shape. Like words coming out of a fog. "When you were a child..." "You're depressed..." "You're the one who needs therapy..."

I leave. Get in the car.
Howl.
THAT WAS MINE! IT BELONGED TO ME!
He climbed the scaffolding of my growth, of my work, to get leverage with my parents. He crossed a sacred trust. There are things I have told my dh that I have not told any one else. That is sacred whether you are married or not.
He stole. He stole any moment I may have chosen to tell my parents in. He stole my privacy. He stole my growth. I can't think of any other more accurate way to describe it. That belonged to me. It was MINE. Not his.
You see, my adoption has two stories. One good. One not-so-good. One the story of a woman who has a great (?) family, who has been provided for and loved. The other story is of a six month old child abandoned repeatedly by her birth mother.
It's great that my family really doesn't "see" me as adopted. It's assumed I'm part of the family like anyone else. It is simply NOT AN ISSUE. That has its advantages. The disadvantage is it can lead to some insensitivity. But that's not their problem. Not until I chose to clear it up.
On the surface, one story does not negate the other. I had not yet felt the need to correct my family's version. It's not un-true. My version came after many years of therapy. It is the very definition of personal. It is a battle I have fought within myself. It has made me what I am today.
It is also not un-true. And it is certainly, CERTAINLY, not a SOMETHING to be batted about lightly. There is a hard nub there of un-worthiness. It is the dark, tainted, left-over stain of my self-loathing. A condensation of self-hate...for a BABY. But I have taught myself to look at it, and even at times, love it.

It is ironic that in the moment of this reveal...the reveal of my tissuey, pre-verbal issues of abandonment that I am actually, really, in the flesh abandoned.

There really is nothing to say more about that.

Let me just add, for the record: I would have done anything to save my marriage. It was of paramount importance to me. I loved it. I loved my husband. I trusted him. I will miss my marriage.

Remember, from the moment we're born, we climb aboard a sinking boat.

Bon voyage.

I'm Not Telling - Part One

This post is going to take many drafts I think. Or maybe I'll just let it fly. Either way, you won't know the difference and I'm not telling.

I'm an angry bitch (if this stays in then I didn't edit). And I have good reason (editing fuck out between good and reason).

We're born alone and we die alone. I know this thought can make some sad, but for me it's actually comforting. First off, it's true. And I've been praying for God to remove my blinders. Please Jesus, wash away any and all last bits of untruth that I harbor. The mis-conceptions, the prejudices, the hurtful ignorance. I pray this prayer because I don't want to go through all this growth and truth and then trip on a blind spot.

My Jesus is swift. And I am open. Read: be careful what you pray for. Because my eyes have been opened. Doesn't mean you're going to like what you see.

I've learned/remembered how much I dislike having my life run by other people. I hate in fact not knowing the truth about my life. This is all very circular isn't it? I pray to know the truth and then find the truth being hidden from me. Infuriating. And then some.

Wednesday: Mediation. Went pretty well I thought. On the long drive there I was really nervous. Trembling. A tape ran in my head:
This is the end of my marriage.I have to sit withmydhanddiscusstheendofmymarriage.
Oh,God.Oh,God.Oh,God.
Then I stopped. Breathe. Breathe. I stroked my soul. I love you. Breathe. I told myself, It's okay lady. Don't be scared. Remember this is what you want. And grace, sweet divine grace, descended on me. No more trembling. A smile even? This is what I want. I want free. I've wanted freedom for a long time. And I'm getting it. It's basically done. Wow. Totally different attitude. Yes. I say yes.

Where do I sign?

So I was able to walk in (still) very, very nervous but my soul was intact and my heart was sure and my mind was sound. My dh says immediately, "You sure you want to do this?"
Answer: Inside: resounding yes. Outside: "Yes? Why are you asking me this right now?"
He shrugs.
He's so bizarre.

The mediator is terrific. A real pro. I feel like my heart is going to explode and my dh is sighing loudly every few minutes. But the mediator is calming and diplomatic and his eyes are on the big picture. Like hospice nurses and sanitation workers...who signs up for this job? And thank God they do. I felt confident about the process. He said stuff like "You don't want a judge making life decisions for you" and "Your children will thank you for going this route on their wedding day." Wow. My dh and I just have to be open and able to trust each other and we can get through this and provide the best life for our kids. Okay.

"Trust each other." Insert sound of throat clearing. Or maybe one of those record scratches. Or brakes screaching. Yeah. That's good. "Trust each other." RRRRRRRRRRRRRR.
Son of a bitch.

My dh called me on the way home from the mediation bitching at me about an e-mail my brother sent him. I try to be kind. "Don't worry about it," I say. "It doesn't matter. Why do you care what he thinks?" But in typical dh-fashion he keeps coming after me.
I wonder about him. I mean mediation went WELL but I'm still REELING from the experience. The last thing I want to do right now is FIGHT with someone. Does his engine run on pain or what?
I finally say, "I have to hang up now" and he says, "What am I supposed to do with all this shit?" And I think, well there it is. His modus operandi. His reason for raging. He just doesn't know what to do with his shit.

Next day, Thursday. I e-mail my mom to assure her that mediation went well although my dh is acting kind of strange. She e-mails me back that she knows why dh is upset. SHE TALKED TO HIM FOR TWO HOURS PRIOR TO MEDIATION.

That explains dh asking me if I really wanted to do this because my mom told him it was her understanding (ha!) that I didn't want a divorce. It also explains dh's threatening e-mail later that day which says that things I've said to my mother will "come back to haunt me for years to come."

Back to my mom's e-mail (we're doing this through e-mail!?!?!) - despite having told her and my Dad about the abusive nature of my relationship, despite spilling my guts which was very hard to do while feeling broken and vulnerable, despite telling them the recent truths about dh closing our financial accounts, etc., my mother, MY MOTHER, tells me that I should get back together with my dh. That I am throwing away my marriage. That I should get back in therapy with my dh (and here...she goes on about something that I can't even understand so I blow by it...kinda like how they say the Indians couldn't see the Pilgrims' ships because it was something they couldn't even comprehend. Yeah, like that.) So I skip those sentences and go on to the finale. She writes: You need to do what's best for all FOUR of you.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

That's a moan people. A MOOOOAAAANNN. Later, in Part Two, there will be a howl.

For now, a digression.

I read a book recently called "The Traveling Death and Resurrection Show." It's by Ariel Gore and in it she tells her narrative by weaving in stories of the saints. (Aside: I liked her other novel/memoir "Atlas of the Human Heart" a whole lot and she is the editor of the cool zine "Hip Mama.")
In "The Traveling Death and Resurrection Show" Gore offers invocations for individual saints, including Mary Magdalen.
(Backstory: I've always loved Mary Magdalen. My cat's name is Magdalen. Mary and I even share an astrological sign - her feast day is July 22nd.)
As I'm sure you all know Mary Magdalen was portrayed as a prostitute for most of history. But 30 plus years ago the Catholic Church said once and for all that no such thing was true and that the bible didn't support the claim. Dan Brown took it one step further in "The Da Vinci Code" to say that the whole thing was a smear campaign to keep women from challenging the patriarchal system of Catholicism. (I couldn't agree more.)
Ho or not, what is know for sure is that Mary Magdalen was the first one to meet the resurrected Jesus. She showed up at Jesus' tomb the day after His Crucifixion and burial to find the stone rolled away and His body gone. She saw a man walking in the garden and asked him if he saw the body removed from the tomb. He turned to her and said, "Do you not recognize me Mary?" She didn't. And then.
And then.
She did. She moved towards Him.
"Do not touch me Mary. I have not yet ascended." (Happy Easter!)
Mary was the first one at the tomb and Jesus chose to reveal Himself to her first. That's a special lady.
I decided a couple weeks ago to order a Mary Magdalen medal to wear during these dark days. It arrived on Thursday - HOURS before this shit hit the fan. I was glad to have it.
Now dig what the fabulous Ariel Gore had to say about how to pray to Mary Magdalen.
Pray:
"'So that I may not waver at the sight of the divine.' To honor her, learn how to express your grief as well as your joy. Watch the sunrise or sunset and say our loud: 'I am fully and radiantly myself, IMMUNE TO SLANDER. I offer my unique gift to the world.' Stay open to inner vision and refrain from judgement. That woman you're calling a whore may just be the Lord's favorite apostle, and that gardener you hope to underpay might be God himself."

Riiight?

Reviewing the post I noticed that I neglected to give another reason why I take comfort in the thought that we're born alone and we die alone. So...
Secondly, it relieves me of the burden of finding a someone else to trust, to align with, to confirm my existence, to reflect my godliness. People might let me down. Even those whom I have entrusted all my love and respect, those who I have attached myself to with a taped-together umbilical cord.
Those people live their own lives. They're in their own sinking boat. They have their reasons.
And so it's a comfort to not lean, but to stand tall and firm on my own two feet. And know that no one can knock me down.

I'm getting a little ahead of myself.
More...now.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Tell Me About It

The kids and I arrived home last night to find Andre sitting on the curb. (For those who don’t know, Andre is my 15 year old foster son whom I had custody of from Dec '06 - March '07. He was returned to his original home in October...which is right next door to me...a story for another time.)
He didn’t look good. He literally limped over to me and it was clear he was sick. He was waiting for his ride to take him to therapy.
He said he was sore from basketball, but he just didn’t look well to me. I had groceries in the car and offered him some nectarines which he gratefully took. I can’t tell you how wonderful it felt to take care of him, just for a minute. To give him a hug and a kiss and tell him I love him. To see him cup two nectarines in each hand. To feel his soft cheek on mine and see him smile.
And I love that boy so much.

This morning my daughter asked me "When is Daddy coming back home to live?"
I was rushing around, doing the morning thang and the question came at me like a bullet. I knew there was no dodging it, and that “I don’t know” was no longer going to cut it. (As my therapist said, “If YOU don’t know, who does??” Good point.) So I said, “Daddy’s getting an apartment.” She was not having it. She stomped her feet. “I know that but Daddy can STILL come home. And Daddy IS coming home to live! It was just a FIGHT Mommy! I don’t care about this “ADULT” stuff!”
Oh, man.
She left the bathroom (my kids LOVE to talk to me in the bathroom, particularly when I’m GOING to the bathroom) and set to pitching a fit in the living room. I held her. Let her cry. What else can I do?
There are no words to explain.
Hell, someone explain it to me, PLEASE!
I kissed and stroked her soft hair. Squeezed her.
She said, “It’s just so hard.”
I said, “It’s one of the hardest things you’ll ever have to go through.”
And my lovely little lady looked up at me, tears pouring down her round cheeks and said:
“Tell me about it.”
And we both kind of laughed.
God, I love her.

My friend S (and my friend J!) is going through a similar experience in her marriage right now. We both can’t believe it. How did this TNT go off in both our lives at the exact same time? She has been available practically every single time I’ve called, and I call her a lot.
She makes me laugh and cry and then craugh and ly until it gets all mixed up. We both understand that this is EXACTLY what life is. The dark and the light. The tears and the giggles.
We crack each other UP and we confirm our fabulousness each time we talk.
It seems we say to each other every day: "It’s all good." And with a friend like her, that continues to be true.
(BTW, I could write twenty times twenty blogs about all my terrific friends and just might someday...so thank you EVERYONE!)

Tonight is mediation. Session 1.
Holy crap.
I find it hard to breathe when I think about it.
My dh sent me an e-mail yesterday that was quite nice. It said a lot of stuff about how great I am, and how much he loves me, and how sorry he is.
I really couldn’t read it though.
First, it just plain old hurts too much.
And two, it doesn’t make any difference if I read it or not.
I can’t/don’t put much faith in this kind of love letter anymore (I’ve gotten many through the years and I can see that is part of the pattern now too…he’s very good in print).
Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad he feels this way. It does make me feel nice inside. Temporarily. It’s better than being hated certainly. But it is not symbolic of any kind of shift in him. I can’t afford to hope that this changes anything. He could still go off at any moment.

And third, somehow, between the lines, I can still read his criticism of me and that causes such a flare up in me that I have to mentally throw ice water on myself.
He writes, for example: "I know you don't want me anymore."
AS!
IF!
I WISH that were true.
Gaaaaawd.

One other line jumped out at me:
“The greatest, most loving challenge of my life is to let you go.”
I’ve been thinking about this.
For me it initially begs the question: “You’re letting me go? As if you had me to begin with.”
But that’s no way to be.
Yet, I look at that line and think: the greatest and most loving challenge he could have attempted would have been GETTING HELP for his anger and depression.
Can I get a witness???
And I keep coming back to that "letting me go" bit. Gotta think on that some more. Something sticks in my craw about that.

Then again, on some level, I agree with the comment too, because letting my dh go has been a great expression of my love. But an expression of my self-love. My love for myself has provided me with the strength to let go of my love for this man and for my marriage.

And here's how you let go of your marriage:
I had to fill out an intake form for our mediation tonight.
Damn. I mean, really.
A FORM.
A form that asks questions like: "Who was the initiator of the separation?"
"Was the other party initially opposed to the idea?"
"Is there any interest in reconciliation?"
"Do you anticipate a dispute concerning your children's welfare?"
DAMN. Damn. damn.

Perhaps I should just forward them to my blog?
I mean, REALLY!

Love,
Ellen

P.S. OF COURSE, I'll let you know how it goes!

Sunday, February 10, 2008

Mirror, Mirror - Part Three

It’s the first week of December. Crunch time. I just had, in one week, four, count ‘em, FOUR major birthdays, THREE of which required presents and cakes and special dinners and of course, PLANNING. And my parents were visiting and there was that holiday, Thanksgiving. All the while I’m barely holding my marriage together. And now the slipperly slide to Christmas.

AND my dh announces: he’s taking time off from work. Three weeks. Vacation.
“VACATION.”
What the hell is that?
Shit.
We barely keep our asses together while he’s at work. Now he’s going to be home???
So a few days into dh’s “vacation” a friend of his offers to take him to Europe for three weeks right after Christmas. Dh says to me. “Of course I told him I can’t go. You’d divorce me.”
His. Exact. Words.
Are you k-k-k-k-kidding me????
“Go! Please! And not just so you can get out of my house but so you can come back a new man. Find yourself. Find your calling. Release your depression. Fuck a Roman. I don’t care. Just come back different!”

But he said he wanted to spend time with his family. With his children. With me.
With me.
With me???

So far on this vacation he had not spent a minute with me.
He spent his days on his own, doing God knows what.
About this time I got a wicked chest infection – shocking I know! While I did the kids and did Christmas with the worst illness I had in years, my dh did what? Went to the movies? Went for hikes? I really don’t know where he was or what he was doing. He would take off in the morning and come home for dinner without nary a word to me.
He wasn’t helping me.
He was disassociating I know that.
Cause the crazy thing is, if he was off watching movies and taking hikes, and not helping me, I could almost deal with that. What I couldn’t deal with was his doing all this while claiming the whole time that he wanted to be with me, connect with me...and again the whole time he’s keeping his whereabouts a secret. One day he told me he had to get the cars smogged and what not and he’d be gone all day. A few days later he let it slip that the cars only took about 30 minutes and he had actually gone to see Golden Compass?? He had been gone ALL DAY! And who doesn't MENTION to their wife that they went to the movies? I mean just for the simple fact that it makes interesting conversation?
That was the first two weeks of December.
Then the kid got off school too. Oh Joy to the World. Everyone home for Christmas.
I’m laughing to myself right now just remembering it. What sweet holy Christmas hell!
So I make myself some mommy time. Make a dinner date with a mama friend. Shout out M.M.! (and sorry, again…)
The night of the dinner, the dh gets mad that I made the date without ASKING HIM FIRST. Say what Mr. Vacation? And you guessed it.
He rages. So bad I can’t leave him with the kids.
I have to cancel on my friend and I’m furious. I say it again. We have to divorce. Dh says ok. We’re on the floor. Crying. But it’s done. It seems it’s almost an everyday occurrence this breakdown.
I spend literally the entire night crying on the bathroom floor. (Paging Elizabeth Gilbert!) I stumble through every repercussion. Every depressing future moment of my broken family. This is forever. It is tragic. It is real.
I wake up with boxer’s eyes. Have I damaged them forever? Will a plastic surgeon be able to put them back? I wonder, as I gently tug my lids out of my line of vision.

But…but…but…the next day, I can’t do it. We can’t do it. Molly makes us a beautiful drawing of our family. The word “FAMILY” written across the top. My dh and I look at each other. Tears pour down our faces. Molly says, I want you to stop crying. So we do. We spend the day as a family. For real. And yes, we re-commit ourselves…God it sound like a joke now but in the moment it was true. And it was possible. And I knew I would continue to breathe life into the moment until all possible avenues were completely blocked. My dh brought home an expensive bottle of champagne to toast our new marriage at a special dinner I was going to make the next day.

The next morning, December 23rd. It was time to visit Santa Claus at the mall. Oh, how many marriages I wonder have ended on the way to this mecca of stress? Anyway, that morning was bad. Having a hard time with my daughter and more realistically with myself. I just couldn’t get myself together. WHY WHY WHY I wonder? Maybe because I was resisting a little thingy called reality? Oh, retrospect. But I know I was just living moment to moment (not unlike what I’m doing now, gentle reader…)
So I was really struggling. Feeling frustrated and depressed and spent and not wanting to take it out on my little girl but somehow needing to get us dressed and presentable for St. Nick. She pouted in her room. I sat at the table drinking tea trying to find my center. How could I use more reflective language? Be a more patient parent? How could I be a better mom I wondered and I cried in my chamomile a little.
Enter dh stage left.
He sat next to me, ignored my tears…such an expert at that he is…and he launched into a diatribe on how we need to punish our daughter more. We (read I) never follow through, I never discipline. Our daughter needs more consequences to curb this behavior of hers.
Well, I just couldn’t hear this right now and I said as much.
The dh does not like not being heard.
So a big fight ensues on top of EVERYTHING ELSE. I lose it. Crawl in the closet (my big dark womb) and fall into the abyss. But a few minutes later I crawled out. Must go on. Must fight inertia and the need to smoke cigarettes and listen to Pink Floyd for next four hours.
Kids must see Santa.
The kids’ clothes are found and put on. Tears dried. Hugs shared. We had just re-committed the day before, right?
On the way out the door, sniffling back my last tears and self-respect, I lean in to give my handsome if troubled dh a kiss and he pulls away.
He PULLS AWAY.
Like, no, don’t kiss me. Like, recoils. Like, don’t touch me.
Oh, no.
I lose it AGAIN. It’s all knee-jerk stuff now.
I have to retreat back into the house and fucking tear it down AGAIN.
Cry AGAIN.
Make the kids wait AGAIN.
It is not lost on me that this is bad. Not the life I want for me. For the kids. I’m a wreck.
But with love, sweat and tears and prayer I pull it together and actually get them in the car and to the mall. But my dh won’t be so easily dissuaded. He can’t speak to me or the kids at the mall. Won’t get in the Santa photo with us…oh, to have that picture now in Kodachrome…to be enjoyed for many a nostalgic Christmas. I’m laughing. I hope you are too! Stay with me!
At the mall, we get some mall food and the dh is GONE. At one point I ask him “What is wrong?”and he yells at me in front of the kids, God, the carousel worker, in front of everyone: “What the fuck do you think is wrong? We’re finished!”
A few minutes later, after my daughter doesn’t get the carousel horse she wanted to ride, she is running down the length of the mall yelling “FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK!”
Is Christmas over yet?
So we get home and dh has one of his WORST RAGES EVER. In front of our children he calls me a “fucking liar who never loved him.”
Okay.
I know.
It’s over.
I see you God.
I see Jesus.
He’s nodding. We’re nodding together. I understand. And what’s so confusing is that I made pot roast.
There’s pot roast in the crock pot.
It’s one of Dh’s favorite meals and I had put it in the crock pot that morning for us, for our special evening. Our special dinner.
Our marriage ended with pot roast in the crock pot. How can anything bad happen with pot roast in the crock pot?

I called my friends. Implored them to bear witness to my pain. They assured me, assuaged me. And I made my peace. I would cry no more. I would damage myself no more. I would put my kids at risk no more. I would put myself in harm’s way no more. I would lie to myself no more. No more. I hear you Jesus. No more.

Not even for that great bottle of champagne.
Not even for pot roast.

My dh disappeared till 2am the next morning.
The kids and I went to the bookstore and got hot chocolate. Drove around looking at Christmas lights. Came home and ate pot roast together. It was Christmas Eve Eve.
I love my kids.

I love you.

Saturday, February 9, 2008

Mirror, Mirror - Part Two

I was with my friend M.E., an acupuncturist and healer, and we were working on my feelings of shame about my divorce. We had worked my shame to a point where I felt pretty okay, but when we made a final pass at it, shame came on strong.
A new shame.
And by a new shame I mean an old shame.
A very old shame.
The shame of my birth. The shame of being a bastard child. The shame my mother must have felt.
First being pregnant with me, and then, the shame of having to give me up, of not being able to take care of me.
The shame enveloped me. The failure.
Don’t tell me those pre-verbal feelings aren’t real.
They are. They hurt. Even now.
Especially now.
The new shame attaches to the old shame. The non-verbal attaches to the verbal. And breathes life.

My husband is depressed. And maybe it’s even bigger than depression. I’ve tried to help him but the very nature of depression can keep someone from getting, or receiving, help.

In the eleven years I’ve known my dh, he has never seen a medical doctor. Not a single check-up. Every appointment I’ve made for him, he has cancelled.
In the past couple years, he hasn’t always taken care of himself. He was always my sweet love, but he didn’t always look good or even smell good. One evening at dinner a few months ago, my daughter said to him, “Dad, you don’t look right.” His answer was this: “I don’t look in the mirror anymore, sweetie. That’s not me anyway.”
I was so disturbed by this, but I didn’t know where to begin. We’d been down this road already. So. Many. Times.

Jump ahead. We tried a new therapist. I said right off as the session began that, as much as I loved my dh, this was my last try at couples’ therapy. I honestly felt the problem wasn’t within our couple-dom, but within my dh. And I dug deep, very deep, to be able to say in front of my dh, in front of the therapist and in front of God, who sat across from me, encouraging me, that I believed my dh was depressed, maybe even in need of medication. And to stay living under the same roof, I said, my bottom line was that he go to anger management classes.

It’s hard to understand how an effort so keen and so arduous can fall on completely deaf ears. But he didn’t hear me. It was frustrating as hell. Disheartening. And sad.

For three years prior, my dh and I had been coming apart, badly. During his rages I would try to communicate to him how he was destroying our marriage and that if things continued this way it would end in divorce. He’d yell for me to “Go ahead and call the lawyers.” He didn’t care.
Later when he’d “sobered” up, he’d say “Well, I guess we both say things we don’t mean.” I couldn’t get him to take me seriously.
About a year ago, I told him in the midst of a bitter argument (one I knew I could never crawl out of) that I, for sure, officially, wanted a divorce.
I’m not sure what happened next except that after a long conversation, where pain hung in the air like smoke, we committed to try harder and for awhile things were better.
But then, five months ago, I started to accept that things were not getting better, the rages were increasing and that I couldn’t fix them anymore.

A pivotal moment: Money was tight and my dh was obsessed about it. It was all he talked about and it was all doomsday scenarios…and, most importantly, it was all my fault. He proclaimed often that I wouldn’t do anything to help our financial situation when in fact I had cut everywhere I could think of. So one night I had been doing some serious brainstorming and I had an idea to save some money (small change but still) by changing how we rent videos.
As I began to talk to my dh about my idea, things began to move in slow motion. Something was wrong. It was wrong that I was filled with fear. It was wrong that I had rehearsed this conversation over and over again in my head before talking to him. It was wrong that I was trying to back-pedal and please and placate, when suddenly my dh flew off the couch, yelling and calling me names. “You are such a child! When are you going to grow up? When are you going to listen? When are you going to wake up?”
He followed me around the house, outside, inside, raging at me. Finally I locked myself in our office and fell to my knees. FELL TO MY KNEES. Hard. Hands clasped, I prayed a real prayer. The realest I’ve ever known. I emptied myself completely and I knew God would answer.
“Please God. Please Jesus. Just show me the way. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it. I’m lost. Show me the way. Tell me what to do and whatever it is, I’ll do it.”
And it was Jesus that came to me. And he said – wait, I don’t mean to be blasphemous so I’ll acknowledge this was filtered through ME, ok? So, Jesus said, “Throw the fucker out.”
And that’s what I did. The next day I told him I was done. I wanted a divorce. And he said, let’s go to couples therapy. And since I told Jesus I would walk whatever path he asked me to, I agreed to go.

And that's when we went to the new therapist. But my dh said the therapist was biased against him. He blew up at her during our second session and called her “unprofessional.” He didn’t want to go back and I didn’t argue. Walking the path.

Later that week I went to see HIS therapist with him at his request. Oh God, I’m walking the path. Whatever you put in front of me.
This was more difficult than I can describe. I was terrified. I was certain I was digging my own grave. It’s really painful and draining to continue to speak your truth in front of people who don’t want to hear it. And I had a good feeling that my dh’s therapist was one of those people. But I was willing to give everything and anything a shot.

Somehow in that excruciating session, my seriousness was broadcast and received. I was done with the status quo. I wouldn't do this dance anymore. We came home and decided to divorce. It was devastating. The reality was a crushing rock on my chest. I wanted to throw myself in traffic to end the suffocating pain. But in that moment my dh at least understood. And something happened in him. He changed. Right in front of me. He admitted his wrongs. He took responsibility. He promised to be a better man even if it meant losing me. And it wasn’t just words. There was a vibrational change. A deep revelation and I couldn’t help but believe in it.

So after a few days, we decided to give it another chance. For weeks it was all-new. Special. We took our first overnight trip together without kids. Magical. Renewing. Weeks turned in to months. We made US a priority and it felt different.
But, then—

One evening, my daughter wanted me to watch a TV show with her. I explained it was a school night and when she started whining I said, ”We’ll watch it over the weekend. I promise.” My dh stiffened and left the room. I could feel it. That old electrical charge was back. Present in the room. I quickly got my daughter to sleep and found my dh in the kitchen, upset.

“I wish you wouldn’t promise her things.”
“I don’t want you even using that word. Promise.”
“I don’t ever want her to know that word.”
“Because promises aren’t kept! Promises aren’t real!”
“You don’t keep promises! You made promises! Vows! And you didn’t keep them!”
And then, the love of my life, the man I had re-committed myself to over and over and over again, he punched himself. The most shameful of all acts between us. He hurts himself. He puts bruises on himself while I watch horrified. The sound is un-bearable. His fist makes contact with his lovely face. Nausea rises up in me. It’s repudiating.
My love is sick. He’s ill.
And despite all my vows, I can’t put him back together again.
And that’s failure.
And that’s shame.
And that’s my truth right now.

Thank you thank you thank you for reading me.
And I thank God for my well-lit path.
I love you.

(Mirror, Mirror - Part Three soon to come.)

Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Mirror, Mirror - Part One

Let me start off by complaining. I'm sick. Again. I have been sick for most of December and January and now, February.
Moving on...
My sweet Catholic parents are having a hard time with this divorce thing. My parents met in high school and beyond a thrilling three-day break-up in Junior year when my mom went picnicing with my Dad's best friend, Ed (who I have called Uncle Ed my entire life), my parents have always been together. They have rarely fought in front of me. They have provided a very stable home environment for me. I'm sure it rocks them to the core that their "perfect" daughter turned out to be such a home-wrecker.
But there you are.
And they're trying to help, but they just can't ACCEPT it.

Mom and Dad say: "Don't give up hope."
Me: "Sometimes you have to give up hope."
Mom and Dad: "We hope you and your dh get over your personal problems."
Me: "Sometimes problems aren't personal."

Dostoevsky: “Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared with love in dreams.”
Me: "So I'm finding."

You know you can only admit to others what you are willing to admit to yourself. There is more hidden than I knew...more events rationalized, more memories buried. But they are finding the light.
And their voice.

After a bitter and tiring weekend punctuated by equal measures of grace and anger, I found myself on Sunday night, after the kids were in bed, talking to the bathroom mirror.
Telling all.
Confessing.
I imagined myself talking to my family. Specifically, the women folk, standing and sitting in my aunt's kitchen. Their sincere faces pained, listening. Sympathetic arms around my shoulders and waist. Tears in their eyes. They helped comfort my mom too. Helped her understand.

I realize I'm ashamed. It's humiliating to be in an abusive relationship. I certainly thought I could and would fix it, eventually.
I also wanted to protect my dh...still do. I care about him. I'm worried about him. But I see that hiding the truth helps no one. And hiding the truth is so fucking symbiotic of an abusive relationship. And man, that's what cuts. I thought I was doing what was best for everyone and yet, I find, I was just following some cookie cutter abusive wife pattern. Ick. Big ick.
So...I'm working on that.
And I wanted to protect my family from the information. I've never been comfortable bearing my pain in front of them (read "information" in the last sentence)...and this is a doozy.

So I stood in front of the mirror, crying the shame away.
I have a story to tell. Like all art, it's a story I need to hear first and most importantly. Everyone else benefits by proxy. In the end, all our stories are the same.

I did most of the changing in our relationship, even though on the outside, it would seem my dh would have the most to change. In fact, that became the pattern. He'd rage. I'd cry and admit failure. He would hug me, build me back up by brainstorming ways I could change...for the better of our relationship. Everything from me getting more therapy to me watching less TV. He'd stroke my head, put me to bed and I'd promise to try harder.
My dh had lots of opinions about me. He liked to involve himself in the details of my life. I should practice food combining. I should meditate more. I should drink less coffee. I should use less toliet paper. I shouldn't have my own credit card. I couldn't be trusted with it.

The credit card thing was a big, big moment for me. And so typical in its abusive-wife pattern it makes me sick. Sick because I just couldn't see it at the time and that's frustrating. It's humiliating. Yes it is. But it's true.
He did not want me to have any credit cards. If I needed one, I could borrow his, he said. I won this fight after years of needling (and after our daughter was born...what if there was an emergency?) and so he finally added me to one of his cards after three years of marriage. A couple years after that, it dawned on me that this was not going to build MY credit. I needed to have a card in my own name, period.
So I applied for an American Express card. And got one.
Well...
You'd thought I'd stolen state secrets so deep was the betrayal.
Some of our biggest fights were over this American Express card. Not that I ran up non-essential purchases on it or didn't pay it off as soon as it came in. No. It was because I got the card, WITHOUT PERMISSION. But despite his hot breath, literally screaming in my face, I had an epiphany that would watershed over the years.
No matter how he yells, I can still, practically, do what I want. He can't yell me into cancelling my card. When I stood up to him, withstood the raging, and kept my card, it was a major victory to my spirit.
However, to maintain control, he would open my American Express bill when it came in the mail if I didn't hide it first. This was the case still, years later, up until the day he moved out.

Control was an issue.

His rage controlled me. It frightened me. Froze me. Having a chair smashed to smithereens in front of me is no different than a fist in my face. It's a warning. It says: don't push me any farther. Being spit on during a fight informed me that what I had to say didn't matter. Having a glass of water thrown in my face said: I am nothing. Being called names, having the truth of WHO I AM constantly perverted...well, it did something to me.

Until I said, "No more."

I knew it was going to be scary. But I assured myself, that it was just the territory that was new. I was the same old Ellen.

Me: "I can do this. I can change it all. I can tear it all apart and build it back up again."
Joseph Campbell: "You know the rule. If you're falling, DIVE."

XO
(Stay tuned for Part Two...it's a doozy.)

Thank you Oprah

I was watching Oprah today and a therapist on her show said that "feelings are time travelers." I loved that phrase. It doesn't matter if what you experienced happened last week, last year or during your first week of life -- the feelings can still FEEL the same. And sometimes, when you don't deal with those experiences, you continue to re-experience those feelings from the past; so you can hit that nerve over and over again to provide your consciousness the opportunity to work it out.
I lived with feelings of abandonment, sadness and victimization. Unfortunately, my marriage offered many opportunities to experience those feelings.
After years of suffering and seeing no change or end in sight, I decided the only person I could change was myself.
Slowly I learned to experience those feelings OUTSIDE of my marriage. As the pain washed over me, I would say to myself, okay, this is MY feeling. I'm feeling un-loveable. My dh is not MAKING me feel this way. There is a situation here that is providing a lot of opportuntiy to feel this way, but it is not MAKING me feel this way.
But still I did have these feelings.
A lot.
Where did they come from? Why are they so real? As I began to just let the feelings come over me, un-attached and un-judged, I was able to find their true origins. And so I gave them a VALID place to live.
A place to live inside me that was big and roomy.
And compassionate.
I'd view them for what they were: a part of me. Not the whole me.
I learned to observe.
And eventually, I gave them the space they needed to heal. Those feelings now have a context and when they come up I recognize them for what they are. They are not the result of my relationship with my dh. And I don't need that relationship to validate my pain or to fix this damage in me anymore.
I can do that. And I have done that.
And he can no longer plug in to that outlet. It's just not there anymore.
I had hoped and prayed and hoped that there was more to our relationship than this painful dance. And there was at times. But not enough.
I had hoped too that we could grow together. But the past is hard to let go of.
Kind of like hope.

An acquaintance heard about my situation and I was shocked when she said to me, "God, I wish I could divorce my abusive husband. How did you do that?"
I told her, "Work on yourself. Improve yourself. Grow as much as you can on your own. And eventually, anything that is not growing with you or that does not make room for your growth, will become intolerable to you. And I think that's the first step."

My goal was never to end my marriage.
But growth was an inevitable part of my journey and I'm grateful beyond belief for that.