Today felt incredibly lonely. I had people around me. I have my
son, my parents. I have several close friends I can call... But it's not
the same as having that "someone" love you. I miss being loved ...I
miss it a lot. The last 7 years my husband dangled that carrot of this
great love to be offered any day now...if...if... If I could just
overlook the alcoholic binges. If I could be ok with him not showing up
where or when we agreed, with him not answering the phone...for
hours...for days at a time. We would have a great couple of days, then
he'd check out again, emotionally and physically. He'd come home later
and later. Or not at all.
One night, during his 3rd rehab, he
swore his deep love & renewed commitment to our relationship, so I
stayed the night. God I wanted it all to be ok so badly... I left that
morning, feeling all things were possible again. We might be
ok...just maybe..I went to pick up our son for our family day. Family
day didn't happen. We showed up. He was gone. He finally answered his
phone hours later. He'd used my ticket to the games to take his mom--so
he could drink, which he didn't do with me the night before. His last
words to me from the NCAA games, not with me, was "two hot girls just
walked into the box. Call you later." It was days before we spoke
again. Other times it was much longer. Before I moved out, he'd
threaten, "You're lucky I don't still live in Florida, then you'd NEVER
see me!" The message he delivered was smile and wave, don't speak,
don't hurt, don't cry, don't ask any questions.
Any
expression of my hurt or lonely feelings were excuses to go get drunk
and not come home. I had to pretend things were great for him to stay
home for any length of time. A lot of times even that didn't work.
I really just wanted to be with my husband. We spent quite a bit of
our time together when we dated and when we moved into our house before
we got married. There were some red flags I didn't admit were happening
for a long time. During our first boyfriend-girlfriend Christmas, he
wasn't home after "The Nutcracker" with my friends. I'd hurried over to
meet up as promised. His house was dark. His mom answered and said
simply that he wasn't home. I instinctively knew he'd gone out to meet
up with his best high school friend, Graehme, who was currently his drug
dealer. I'd met Graehme at his Halloween party, which was the first
time Scott ignored me--even though he'd brought me. I mean, it started
out great, but there was a moment's turning point when some girls showed
up and it seemed the room turned cold for me. If I came up next to him,
he'd quickly walk away. I didn't get it. I struck up conversation with
Graehme's mom. When Scott decided it was time to leave, he was very
abrupt to me. Once in the car alone, I asked what was wrong. He took the
opening to berate me about how embarrassing of me to take off my shoes
in his friend's house--what the hell was I thinking? Except it was
Graehm's mom's party, and she was the one who coaxed me to "take them off" when she did and dance with her. I was trying to have fun. I was
having fun with her. He told me I had no manners. He said I had no
class. And I, of course, apologized profusely for the offense.
I remembered the way to his friend's house, oddly enough, to find them
just getting into Scott's car. Scott looked right at me, got in his
black SUV, and without a word, started to drive away. He hadn't answered
the phone prior or returned my "where did you go?" message. I was
confused. When he started to drive off, I honked. Suddenly my phone
rang, and he said with a smile, "Hey, baby, what's up?"
"We
had plans tonight," I stammered. Right then and there, and still today,
he slipped into his routine, "We had plans? I mean we talked about
meeting up after your play, but I didn't know it was a 'plan'." I asked
if I could come with them. He acted like it would be no big deal. The
other 2 guys were nice enough, but he avoided me. Barely talked to me.
Didn't feel like having sex when we got home that night. Drunk and high
anyway. But the plans and the reality did not match. I asked if he
really wanted to be with me or not. He said yes, of course, why would I
think otherwise?
Another night, he had a good girl-friend
coming into town and they wanted to go out. I was working 3-11pm shift,
so he said to bring my fun clothes to change into and call him as soon
as I got off so he could tell me where to meet them. I got all dressed
up, heading into the city to the backdrop of "leave a message at the
tone." He never called me back. I went home alone and unwanted and
worthless. Who does that to other people, let alone their girlfriend
they say they love? He stayed the night at another one of the girl's
apt/house who he'd just met that night. They slept in the same bed!
Just friends, he snapped at me for having very uncomfortable reservation
in my voice... Then he called his friend on speaker phone to demand she
tell me aloud that nothing happened, that she and he were just friends.
I didn't suspect something had happened with his friend. It was his friend's friend who's bed he slept in. She was audibly uncomfortable, "Am I on speaker phone?" He instructed her to let his "girlfriend (me)
who is standing right here with me" know that they were just friends.
She did that, but nothing else. She did not validate that nothing had
happened. She said instead, "I don't want to be on speaker. We can talk
another time." Gone. He humiliated me before his friend and mom. I knew
it deep down. But he corrected me that I was "just being insecure," and come sit next to me on the couch. Everything's fine. Sit.
Sit pretty. Up. Down. Come. Stay. After we were married and had our
baby, he threw me into a wall to keep me from destroying his bong. When I
dropped the restraining order --much too soon--hoping beyond hope that
he had "changed-- let me show you I've changed..." we went right back
into the same pretense. I wanted his love so badly. We were married, we
had our son together. I just wanted to make everything ok for us all. I
missed his love, when it was there. When he loves you, it's like
sunshine. I'd do a lot to get that smile, that warmth, that love again.
The love in his eyes...
He literally made me earn back the key to my own home.
Smile and wave. Ignore red flags. Pretend I believed he wasn't drinking
anymore. When I found a girl's blouse, and then underwear, he said
they were a girl of Paul's who stayed there often. When I found a condom
in my husband's pant pocket on the floor, he said, "It's not mine. I
was holding it for Paul." A lie, but I wanted to believe him. I was
charitably doing his laundry because he had to be depressed with all that filth on the floor, trash, clothes... I was doing his laundry from nights out with another girl!!!
How mentally enslaved. I found another condom in a different pair of
his pants. That, too, of course, was "Paul's." His lies were quite
verbose and always degrading. He always made a great show of defending
his lies. Following my discovery of 2 different condoms, my husband
took my son and me to eat specifically at the restaurant where his
beer-buddy Paul worked-- to publicly humiliate me for doubting his
fidelity, making a huge loud scene with other customers, raising his
voice indignantly and with great accusation and shame, "My wife thinks I
slept with another woman because she found condoms in my pocket! Tell
her they're yours Paul. Tell her how insecure she is acting."
Paul, as much as a jerk as he was, said, "Come on, man...this is where I
work, I'm not getting involved in all this."
I knew. Then I
knew again. And again. He admitted to it, to "just one girl," the day he
thought he was going to jail for stealing $15,000 from his employer. He
thought he'd just be honest so I'd stay with him through jail time,
wait for him to get out. But his employer didn't put him in jail; they
decided to let him work it off at $200 a paycheck. When he didn't go to
jail, he immediately demanded that I " get over it. I'm not going to answer your questions, I'm not going to tell you who she is." This was ALWAYS followed by his repeatedly false remorse
statements, as if I were badgering him. If I asked one single question
about the cheating, he'd glare at me and snarl, "Fuck! How long do you
want me to be sorry for it?! I said I was sorry yesterday!" But he
wasn't sorry.
I know he continued to lie, and cheat, and
attack me for it, calling me insecure, telling me I should work on my
insecurities; rather, than he should work on keeping his penis in his
pants. But I was to blame. That's how he could feel no remorse. It was
all my fault somehow.
I thought he was just so drunk-- that things like those happened because he was drunk. Not sober. So, I resolved myself to help him get rid of the real
problem: his drinking. He said he loved me after all, he said he
wanted everything to work out. Just get rid of the alcohol, right? Yep.
That's what I told myself, how I was raised to believe, and so I put a
horrendous amount of time and energy into: finding the solution to his
drinking and residual abusiveness.
The cheating, lies, verbal and physical abuse continued, all insanely justified in his mind. It wasn't just the drinking. His mind is warped to treat someone that way. I just loved him so much that I loved myself into blindness, into the false belief that my love could make it all okay. Love can move mountains.
Real love, I suppose now.
I wish I had REAL love. The
consistent-you-can-count-on-understanding-supportive-faithful-enduring
love I thought I was getting. I bought into the sunshine. I made a huge
mistake every single day I stayed in this relationship. Certainly, any
day now, he'd have that epiphany.
It never happened.
Today felt incredibly lonely... But my husband is not the solution.
God, I was crazy to let him tear me apart. But crazy was slow in
happening, little by little, with one word, then another, then another,
then an action...And before I ever realized what hit me, I was in too
deep in finding salvation for him, not me. That kept me too preoccupied
to find my own.
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