finding my own way (& i’m not a whore like you said i was)

  TRUST DREAMS. TRUST YOUR HEART, AND TRUST YOUR STORY. ~neil gaiman

a few weekends ago, i left with my oldest daughter. i left the little two with my husband (their dad) and took the older one because her dad couldn’t get her that weekend. i just could not stay at our house. the arrangement was supposed to be that i left on his weekends with our joint kids and when he was gone during the week for work, i’d be at our house with all of the kids. well, i left that weekend and stayed at a girl friend’s house and then we went to my mom’s for the other two nights. recently i learned that i was out ‘whoring’ that weekend and the one that followed when i was at a girl scout camp with my daughter and her troop. last i checked whoring did not include having pizza and wine with your best friend or going to the craft store with your mom and daughter to pick out paint to re-paint your big wooden doll house from your childhood. one night while i was away doing such devilish things, i had the strangest, most vivid dream.

an ex of mine (who is awesome) had called me and invited me to climb this tower. i was all for it. i hadn’t seen him in a while, but i also was wanting some kind of personal challenge. he pulls up in a car with a driver and i get in. we are like we  used to be, talking about everything and nothing and kissing and it’s amazing (like it was). so we get there and he tells me he’s going to go check us in for our climb. i’m looking around and there are all these people, mostly in pairs, some in groups. i look up and see this tower that is more like a cell phone tower than anything i had imagined. everyone was climbing in pairs. suddenly this older lady walks up to me and while looking the other way, she says cautiously, “honey. don’t climb this thing with him. i’m not sure why, but i don’t think you should.” so i’m thinking why would she tell me this? should i listen to her? i decide i should because the risk (death) is too great if something went wrong. see, there is one person harnessed in (him) and the other is hooked onto a strap but the other person has to hook your hook onto the next spot before you can re-hook yours. basically, you must trust your life with this person. in the meantime, he hasn’t come back, so i start towards the building and find the office. suddenly, my youngest two children are with me. the littlest is dancing around because she has to pee. the other one is freaking out as usual. i decide then i will not be able to do this climb no matter what and anyway, who would be my partner? low and behold, there is my husband. he is ready to climb this thing with me and i’m thinking, hell no! i am NOT climbing this tower with him! i say no because who would watch the kids? a staff person comes by and says, “ma’am, we offer child care in this room right here.” sure enough, there is a play room and t.v. in there. in my head i’m thinking, he thinks he can just pop up here and think i’m going to climb this stupid tower with HIM when i came here with someone ELSE!!! what is wrong with him?! but, i kind of agree to it and at the same time, i notice this overlook of sorts. i walk over, drawn to it. there is this bridge, but it’s very foggy and i can see the bridge twists and turns and wobbles. i ask what it is because there is no one on it. this staff person says, “we call it the stairway to heaven.” clearly it’s no stairway, but i can see a big building, like a mayan temple, on the other side. i want to do that bridge, screw the tower!! with everything i have, i want to walk that bridge. and i’m wondering, why is no one else on this bridge?! why would you put your LIFE in someone else’s hands when you could walk this bridge by yourself and get to go somewhere amazing as well as keep on living for sure?

then, i woke up.

this was clearly a dream i could not ignore. so so many messages in this dream. it was one of those dreams you don’t want to wake up from because it’s just that good and you want to see what happens next.

what i took from it is that i could keep on climbing this tower (until recently, my life with my husband) with my husband or someone else. the tower symbolized my life. as in the dream, my life was always in someone else’s hands and once i saw this bridge, knowing i could go alone and live, i wanted to do that more than anything. i would have climbed the tower alone, but it was designed to do it together. it made me angry that even in my dream, my husband could just show back up and expect to be there with me, completely disregarding that i had planned to do that activity with someone else. is this what it will look like when i am finally ready to date and try my hand at love again? he will try to control me even then? the bridge…my favorite part of my dream…twisted and turned, sometimes i couldn’t see a section of the bridge because of the fog, but i could see that it did show up later. it wasn’t super steady, as it wobbled and shook, but i was totally OKAY with this!! there was no chance at death. maybe i’d fall down, but i’d be alive and keep on going as i learned this bridge. and once i made it to the end of this bridge was the most amazing thing, my new life, represented by this pyramid. i couldn’t see it and wasn’t sure what was there, but i knew it’d be amazing.

i need more dreams. i need more symbols. i like knowing that i could choose to continue to climb this incredibly difficult tower with someone, risking death (of myself while with him) OR i can choose my own way, leading to LIFE, with the result in my hands. i believe god has a greater plan for me than i can ever imagine. god is going to be walking next to me sometimes, holding my hand as i stumble, helping me to get up when i fall. sometimes god will lead me and i will follow, trusting that the outcome will be good, even though i am not in control. this is truly the only way i think i will make it through this time of my life. i was divorced before, but i had one child. i was a lot younger. the marriage didn’t even last a year. i never even cried. this divorce, it’s going to take a lot more for me to come out on top. every day steps will be taken to be sure we will be okay.

i am not a whore. i am not a life sucking bitch. i am life giving. i am a mother, a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a god-mother and a friend. i am standing up to the man who controlled me and emotionally abused me for way too long. i’m making decisions that do not include him or that do not require his opinion. as far as i’m concerned, my dream showed me that i have god on my side and in the end, my beautiful kids and i are going to live a beautiful, beautiful life. and i cannot wait to show them what that will look and feel like.

worried & more

today i felt so numb. numb but angry. we were home and the kids are remarkable, really. they feel the stress. it’s truly amazing how they are like little barometers of mama’s stress. they were fighting, crying, whining. the hardest thing, RIGHT NOW, is that i have no money. my husband would not allow me to have access to the money he made. no bank card. no emergency card. nothing. he would hand me cash every so often and it was however much he determined to be enough. once i had $100 last me over two weeks. that was $100 for everything i might need to do for two weeks while he was gone. he thought i was so frivolous, yet i stretched that $100 as long as i could.

anyway, back to today. we finally went to the store for milk and eggs. a small distraction to get us through the last part of the afternoon. my four year old has autism and has been regressing terribly. we were leaving the store and i felt like i was going to lose my mind, cry, scream and pull my hair out all at the same time. my patience had worn down. i thought for sure i was going to do any or all of those things, but i didn’t. then my little guy started demanding wendy’s because he saw the stupid sign. so as i’m going through the drive-thru to get him his cheeseburger & fries (not what i feed him but i just couldn’t handle the repeating for wendy’s). as we are going through to the window and i’m gathering my change to buy his food, i started crying. all four kids in the van. me crying. trying not to, but not succeeding. pissed because i don’t even have three full dollars to give to the lady. i have to give them change. and i’m thinking to myself that my husband is off doing who know’s what and spending money like it’s nothing. that i have to count my change just to buy milk and eggs. that really pisses me off! later my daughter asked me why i was crying. my oldest asked me if i ate dinner. i am so glad they see me in my vulnerability. i want my son to see and hear how painful it is for me so that he thinks twice about doing anything similar, or maybe he will refuse to do anything but the opposite. i want my daughters to know that this is NOT what a healthy relationship is and it’s not worth it. that i’m sorry for putting her through this crap. that we deserve better and that this is why i am doing this. i want them all to know relationships don’t have to hurt. they don’t have to hurt anyone that is a part of it; not the two adults, definitely not the kids. i certainly won’t be able to keep it together 100% of the time when i have them the majority of the time.

so…i am a stay at home mom. i have kids. i have two with autism. one functions mostly okay except in certain situations. the other struggles most of the time. we have appointments that we are supposed to be going to yet can’t because of insurance. he is in school a few afternoons, which is nice, but it’s almost impossible to get him to go. i’ve had him in a number of daycare settings, and none have worked out. so it’s either I hire a PCA or i don’t work. i figure a PCA plus child care for the youngest would probably eat up my whole pay check. i bust my ass for my family!! i bring them to their appointments. i make home cooked healthy food. i do projects with them. teach them how to garden. read with them. color with them. play with them. teach how to play games. make it to parent teacher conferences alone. i go to lessons, games, tournaments, girl scouts, etc. i do the shopping, the cooking, the cleaning, the laundry. I.am.not.complaining. IT IS JUST WHAT I DO. so now i do ALL these things and have even less money. it is making me mad, anxious. it ALMOST makes me want to have him come back. BUT, i cannot. this crap cannot continue. i figure i will only struggle for about a year. WHATEVER. if we are all happier, then it is all worth it. the kids miss him because he was gone for work and hasn’t yet returned. i dread morning because they will ask if he’s coming home ‘today.’ my questions today…HOW AM I GONNA DO THIS!? AHHHHHHH!!!!

one truth i know RIGHT NOW is this FUCKING SUCKS. i hate it all. i hate that i put myself here. i hate that i put my kids in something so yucky (in all fairness, it wasn’t like this before). i hate that we brought two kids INTO this family when this is where we are ending up. i hate that now i have to figure EVERYTHING out. at least before i didn’t have to worry if there would be money because he has a great job, however, i still worried about everything else because stuff still did not get paid. i am anxious. i am stressed. i am hurt. i am worried. i am tired, exhausted, drained. my head feels like it could explode and my heart feels deflated. i hate that i am questioning God how he could give me so much. literally way too much for one person. the only peace i find in this is that God knows i CAN handle it, which is why i have all of this. i need peace. i need calm. i need to breathe and be me and find comfort in all that i know deep deep down to be true. i must face my fears and do the thing i fear. i must move on.

on how important it is to open your eyes to the truth

just as soon as i turned back to hope for my marriage, i was blindsided by news that no one ever EVER wants to hear. but i tried. i tried and tried and tried with that man. while i was trying, he tried when he felt like it. he’d help me when he ‘got around to it.’ but never with the big stuff. i needed help processing, to be strong and make it with him, but i was dismissed. put aside. i did not matter. or, at least i didn’t matter enough for him to make me a priority.

three more months. that is all i gained and also all i lost in the time i had with him as my husband. this time, i’m not even sad. i’m angry. not raging lunatic angry, but angry just the same. angry that he put us through all the crap he has. that he strung me along, or that i let him string me along. the way he spoke to and treated my oldest two children. the way he ignored me. the way he withheld his heart and his feelings and overall, withheld himself from me, the one he chose to marry. the inattentiveness. the unappreciative comments and general attitude that i did nothing for our family as a stay at home mom. the insults. the lack of empathy for hard days with children while he was on the road. the bitter heart he carries around. the constant criticism. the nice fat paychecks, but unpaid bills. the lies. the deceit. the never-standing-up-for-me to anyone. my constant attempts to meet his expectations, yet always seemed to fall short. i’m angry that he has always been jealous of my friends and family. that i let friends go because i didn’t want the conflict or he convinced me somehow that he was right. the vulgarity of his language and thoughts. his put-downs of people. his excuses. always a damn excuse for why he wasn’t successful or able to succeed sooner. the double standards. the way he used shame and humiliation to move me into submission. the coming and going every few months. the lies…did i mention the lies? the mixed messages on any and all things. the blame. ooooh the blame! my own naiveness. the sadness he caused my children as he left us over and over. the hope he created by coming back, only to leave again. the dog shit he put in my bed because he was convinced i had been sleeping with someone else…only it was him, not me that was doing that. the spraying of the water hose in my face because i stood up to him for once and he didn’t like it. the use of fear to control…not just me, but all of us. that i felt it as personal humiliation, but he really was he one who it reflected on. the name-calling. the porn. the tension he created by just being here. the feeling of walking on egg shells constantly. the 32 oz mason jars, filled with ice and then half way filled up with rum, the other half with diet coke or 7-up. the person he became after drinking. the gambling. the flowers that he bought me that made me wonder why he was buying me flowers. the fucking cell phone! the doubt. foreboding joy. not letting the kids help each other. the way he changed over the years. being just as ‘gone’ while home as he was while away.

not all of our time was bad. i just have a really hard time thinking of anything good about him these days. seriously though, what good is a really good job if you don’t use your money wisely? no amount of money would ever be enough. and no amount of money is worth it if you end up sacrificing your family and relationship in order to succeed. one person is never to blame in a situation. i really feel in my heart i have done a decent amount of self-reflection, listening to him and his needs, responding how i felt capable to respond. the things he wanted from me caused me to become someone else and that pulled me away from who i really was. here i was, feeling so disconnected from myself and wondering what the hell had happened, when really i had just changed to fit his requests without even really knowing what i was doing. we were disconnected. he was gone for months and i finally recognized the person looking back at me in the mirror. he came back a couple weeks later and within a very short amount of time, i felt destroyed. i’m back to not recognizing myself.

with all those things i listed that make me so angry for putting up with, finding the good in him is so far beyond where i am right now. he did this to himself. no one made him stop believing in God. no one. no one made him say the things he said or do the things he did. no one made him distance himself from us. no one made him into the person he is but himself.

i’m glad i’m already past the sadness. i had months of that the last times he left. this time, i’m already in the next stage of grief and i’m okay with that. i’m sure the sadness will come now and then, but i’d rather not sacrifice myself for one more minute for it to be in vain. when all of this has become your reality, there is no looking back, only looking ahead and being glad to be able to breath and be yourself once more.