I get confused sometimes

[Hell_On_Heels]

Some days it all seems very clear to me, and other days (like today) I get so confused. Was it him? Was it me? Am I as crazy as he accuses me of being?

 

I read an email from him this morning. It was sent mid-June. He went to his first therapy session, and was reconsidering his decision to divorce. After his first therapy session, he sent this:

 

***I'm feeling better about things. I find it hard to put my feelings in an email, but I will try. I still feel horrible, but safe at this time with our separation and I think it's still for the best that we divorce. I still love you dearly, but have lost all trust that we could ever make our marriage work again. It's just too painful for me to think about getting back and then splitting again. It really shouldn't be this difficult. It's like we have to be trained to like each other? * * * ? If it was meant to be it really wouldn't be this difficult, seriously. I'm so sorry I said or did things to hurt or offend you in the past, but it's just me being me and I shouldn't have to be "trained" to be someone else, and neither should you. It's ok to be "coached" to maybe say things a little differently, but really, we shouldn't be having this hard of a time with it. I hope you understand.***

 

No, I don't understand. Any of it.

 

Maybe he's right. Maybe if it really were meant to be, it wouldn't have been that difficult. Why it was so difficult for him to be nice or to date me once a month or to have something that we shared together, I don't know. I couldn't possibly have been asking for too much...I don't think?

 

The man would sit there on the couch with me and talk about old girlfriends. He would say things that made me feel so small, ugly, unwanted, as if I didn't measure up. I'd call him on it, and he'd get upset. Meanwhile he gave me one compliment since we got married - that I drive a stick shift better than he does.

 

He would say such hurtful horrible things when I'd cry or complain about our lack of closeness. I'd say I want us to be a family, and he'd yell at me that we will never be a family, and I just want what I had with my first (dead) husband. Then he'd say I'm menopausel or too emotional, too sensitive, no sense of humor...always it was my fault that I felt hurt by the things he said, and the things he wouldn't do.

 

I would close off, not knowing what else to do...

 

I don't know. It's so crazy-making. Some days I feel that he was abusive. Other days I feel like it was all my fault. I don't know why this still hurts - he wouldn't give me what I wanted, and I should be happy that he set me free.

 

Ugh, just sick of it all. And feeling so confused.

[BriarRose]

Sounds like the things you want are things any healthy woman would want. And he does sound emotionally abusive, talking about old gf's when he knows it upsets you and telling you how you'll never be a family?? I'm sure he does love you, but if he can't show it, you won't be happy with him and he will drag you down.

 

Today was only his first "session". See how things go....maybe it will get better.

[annbuckley]

He has made the decision to leave, and he is showing an apology as well. He says he still loves you, and from his letter i believe him.

 

What I think is that you are both trapped in the mesh of awful that you can't get out of. Sometimes when that mesh is too thick - it is like a heavy bucket on the grass that stumps the new growth from coming up. The roots are still under the bucket but on top it is a wasteland.

 

You are lucky in some ways because his email is very black and white. On one hand, he shows appreciation, and on the other an honest request for freedom. I think he hurts badly too, but he can't share it with you - if he does - his point of leaving will be lost.

 

I don't know - but I do know that making the decision to move on is so difficult.

 

I send you a big hug. I am sorry if it sounds like I am on his side. I am not. I am just reading the email compassionately. If he was verbally abusive, it makes it worse. You need a deeper sense of closure and a "why" answered. It is so hard to move on from a long time relationship when really what we want is the pain to go away, and closure that we can wrap our heads around.

[Hell_On_Heels]

I think he hurts badly too, but he can't share it with you - if he does - his point of leaving will be lost.

 

I don't understand that. How would his point of leaving be lost?

 

He wrote this emaill a month ago. A few hours after he wrote it, we talked on the phone and he wanted to reconcile, wanted to go to therapy, etc. I drove 2,300 miles back accross the country to do that, and once there he had changed his mind. He was enraged, attacking me, making wild accusations. He was scary, quite honestly.

 

We haven't spoken since.

 

He's very cruel. Push pull in extreme ways.

[BriarRose]

I don't understand that. How would his point of leaving be lost?

 

He wrote this emaill a month ago. A few hours after he wrote it, we talked on the phone and he wanted to reconcile, wanted to go to therapy, etc. I drove 2,300 miles back accross the country to do that, and once there he had changed his mind. He was enraged, attacking me, making wild accusations. He was scary, quite honestly.

 

We haven't spoken since.

 

He's very cruel. Push pull in extreme ways.

 

He does sound very unstable. Does sound scary, I agree. Is he on any meds?

[Hell_On_Heels]

Not that I know of. He wasn't taking anything when we were together. A friend of mine is convinced he's on drugs. (wry grin)

 

He started going to tattoo school in Feb, and he has a whole new set of people he talks to now. I don't mean to stereotype but he could be taking something with his new tattoo friends and his old rocker musician friends that he's been hooking up with lately.

 

When I see his pictures now versus back when we were together, I see 2 totally different people. He doesn't look the same or act the same. He projects, a LOT. One of the things he tells people about why he wants a divorce is that I'm bipolar.

 

Honestly, I don't know...and I get exhausted trying to understand it. I just want clarity in my own head that I'm not crazy, that he was cruel to me. It's so weird...I'm the logical one, the unemotional one. Not that I don't feel emotions or even act on them...just that I usually let them sit there for a few days and think about it first. THEN I act. (excluding the breakup period where I was so hurt, angry, scared, and seemed to have little control over myself.)

[BriarRose]

No, it's not in your head. He sounds frighteningly volatile. Could be drugs, I don't know. Guess you would have to compare his current behavior with how he has been in the past? But drugs or not, it's unacceptable behavior.

[Hell_On_Heels]

Thank you for the "unacceptable behavior".

 

I think his pattern is to get angry and demonize whoever he is breaking up with. He stays angry for years. He has talked about his last girlfriend with me several times, and each time he'd get mad about it. I don't think she did half the things he accused her of. I'd take up for her sometimes, and he'd stop being mad and listen intently to what I was saying...it was weird, creepy.

 

The only girlfriends he talks nicely about either ended it with him, or he had valid reasons for leaving them (one cheated on him and one passed her twins off as his kids when they weren't).

 

So, it makes me think that he has to demonize me to leave me...and he knows he will never give me what I wanted. That isn't even an option in his head. Some couple time? Respect? He just wasn't ever going to be that kind of husband to me.