Cherry pit

I get my hair from my dad, my freckles from God knows where, my analytical nature from nature,  my sarcasm from the Muppets. My over-burdening sense of loyalty, passive aggressiveness, smarts and lack-of-personal-boundaries come from my mother. Damn she was a piece of work....

Lately I have been feeling very negative, hostile, judgemental and defeated.  I guess it's what we do, when we feel down, we bring the world around us down in an attempt to feel like we have power over something in our lives.  So mentally this is going on and a CONSTANT redirection to something 'present' or 'peace'.  I managed to keep my patience through some very difficult times this past week, with a smile, managed to accept the fact that the money I JUST deposited the day before from working a new second job, was taken the very next day plus some, for car repairs. I am still trying to focus that positivity towards finding a place to live and in the process I am just on the verge of desperation because I just want to get back to MY life again in the worst way. I'm not using it as a reason to re-gain some sort of happiness, but because I want to put a lid on this constant reminder of failure to stand up for myself.

I've been doing some attempting to figure out why the hell I have this absurd sense of loyalty and why the hell I allow people to walk all over me and then I feel bad about it.  It's pretty disgusting.  Then I remembered who I was. 
     My mother. 
          Christ on a cracker. 
Not that I wasn't ever aware of our similarities, but to fine tune the mental processing I have is rather interesting.  In no way am I trying to say that the choices I make today or tomorrow or yesterday were in any way, shape or form 'cause' by her, I own my shit, but instead, trying to figure out the 'why' I think the way I do when in certain scenarios.
How's that for overthinking overthinking?

~The first thought you have about something is what you have been conditioned to think.  The very next thought you have is what you know is the truth. ~

So I began to think back to childhood and my role models.  My mother. She had a best friend I adored, and an aunt who was close to my mother.  There was a long term boyfriend that was ultimately a seriously dysfunctional relationship but I do remember trying to glean all the good I possibly could out if those people.  I knew they did 'bad' things and they weren't like other adults I interacted with, but I learned very early on how to ignore certain things.  How certain things weren't discussed in public. 

I had a young mother.  Her and my father knew each other briefly before getting married.  Like 6 months kind of time frame.  She had severe psoriatic arthritis and an addiction to Darvon by age 25.  History of drug abuse of the recreational kind using "uppers" and speed. She was a "functioning" drug addict.  She also had a son two years older than me with mental retardation, cerebral palsy, deafness and retinitis pigmentosa. (He would eventually be blind).  She left my father when I was about two and as far back as I can remember, there was the long term boyfriend, pseudo step-dad, until I was about 12 I think.

Because she was able to get disability, she was a stay at home mom when we were little.  The bf was a union plumber, but I swear to God, he was unemployed more than employed.  It seems weird to me looking back that in the 80's in the California Bay Area, there wasn't that much development going on to keep a plumber employed....?  Really? At any rate, it was a clean house, someone always there, three squares a day, she was an incredible baker, she had patience with us, I was allotted so much freedom with my time and range.
There was the weird guy who was always zoned out on the couch (later I found he was a heroin addict), long haired Lou, you know that guy.... super long hair, mustache, wore the cut off jeans with striped tube socks all summer, like the fun uncle that smelled funny..? Just me? ok...
A few other supporting characters were my aunt and her husband at the time who beat her, my mom's best friend who was basically a bar fly, my grandmother who, for some unknown reason to me, always showed a disgust for my brother and I.  All of these people fueled by some sort of alcohol or drug. Always.

But my mom, she's the main character this morning. 
She stumps me. 
Her whole family is mental except my one aunt. She grew up with 3 sisters and a mom jealous of them all. She was pretty, popular, smart as hell and even played a little basketball and softball in school. She was going to go to Stanford on a partial scholarship.  She wanted to be a lawyer.  She decided instead she'd rather have her babies first.  I witnessed her decline from June Cleaver to hot mess by the time I was 13. There were evictions, car repossessions, turned off utilities... always some stressful life situation that needed addressing. It was always left on the back burner until it became a fucking fire no one could put out.  She lived day to day.  Paycheck to paycheck.  The end of the month on disability is rough.  And at the same time, she was crazy in that she was addicted to thrift stores.  Jesus Christ she had to touch everything in that store, it was misery. She bought things, not because she needed them but because "it was on sale".  She stocked up on random shit because "you never know when someone might need this".  Enter hoarding mom. 
Years of having to leave everything behind because of irresponsible behavior leading to squirreling away whatever you can.  Food included.

There was a stint of her being a severe alcoholic.  Literal jugs of wine, that Carols Rossi shit? Yeah, I still remember the smell, makes me ill.  Mom crawling into bed with you at night and pissing the bed isn't the kind of memory every kid gets to have.  The boyfriend was a Michelob man, Doral cigarettes and all the pot in the world.  I was exposed to marijuana my whole life like it was no big deal and the god's honest truth?
Those were the only normal people in my life.

She quit.  She could do that.  If she wanted to do something, she did it.  She was stubborn as hell.  Just like a good lawyer but with out the dramatics and yelling.  Always seeming cool, calm and collected. She never got emotional.  We were NOT affectionate as a family.  I literally remember one hug in my life from her, when I was about 24 and the very last time I spoke to her, she said 'I love you' which really, really, really scarred me.

She didn't care to what expense it cost her, she just wanted to be liked.  She would do anything for anyone and even so on a level of annoyance.  I think she felt if she couldn't do anything about her own shitty situations she could at least try to make everyone else's easier.  She set NO boundaries for herself.  I was scolded for anything considered to be selfish.  Hell, I grew up helping to raise a mentally retarded brother, my whole life was just sacrificing what I wanted for the greater good.  I got my first summer job at age 14.  My checks went to help pay bills because at this time, my mom's best friend of over 20 years ran off with her then fiance.  Enter nervous breakdown mom.

I'm 16, work full time, I am on Independent Study because I can't deal with regular high school of which I will be graduating soon so I can go into "the real world", I break up with my first boyfriend of over two years and lose everything in an eviction I was unaware of. I had a backpack I stuffed with clothes I grabbed on my way of being ushered out, and my dog.

The next few years are where I eventually get married two months before I turn 19 to someone I knew for 9 months, lose out on thousands of dollars trying to help my mom establish a place to live and eventually move to St. Louis briefly.  Enter meth addict mom.

The thing with watching really smart people ruin their lives and you are doing all you can to try to make them see where they can do better, is eventually you have to detach from them emotionally or they ruin you too.  I full well understand the struggle with the whole truth to 'you can't help those who don't want to help themselves.' It's amazing the stupid things bright people will do. 

She would try to rent rooms out to make ends meet when I was moved out and these people would rip her off.  Literally one woman started beating her up.  She was such a doormat.  She NEVER stood up for herself.  Made excuses for everything.  If she did own a mistake, it was to play the victim.  Holy hell, the sap stories you can be witness to hearing from a mom on disability with a disabled son.... Interestingly, she never lied.  She was just a master bull shitter.

I was victim to males trying to say they could 'collect' with me and I was stolen from so I had to make a name for myself to NOT FUCK WITH ME.
I was woken up at 3 am to bear witness to the freaky thing that was the Bronco supposedly, very slowly, rolling down the driveway backwards. On the flat, gravel driveway.  That there was a man hiding in the bushes outside, she called the cops a couple times on this one...  Going through every box in the house at 2 am to try to find the title to the car so "I can get it smogged!" (??) Cleaning the carpets with the steam cleaner BLEACH ADDED in the middle of the night was always a fun one too...
She stopped having eye contact with people.  She started hoarding more, she moved away, I guess thinking she could try escaping again.  She didn't. 

I remember very vividly one afternoon when I was very young.  Like under 8. I was riding in the back of the bf's light blue Cougar he had.  Everything blue. interior, carpet dash... lol He lit up a cigarette and there is that certain smell that comes from the first smoke of a cigarette that is more burnt paper than tobacco and that is one of those smells that takes me back to happy feelings. Interestingly, on that particular afternoon I was just thinking about whatever kids think about when passing through a town and your too small to see out the window, and I very clearly had this knowing that I was going to lose my mom sooner than I should think.  Like I knew I was going to be younger and it just broke my heart.  I started crying and I wanted to sob but I remember keeping it in as hard as I could because I didn't want anyone to ask me what was wrong.  That's a solid memory.  It's one of my first.

So when I got the call Christmas morning, 2005, and I heard my grandmother's awful voice, saying "Melissa, it's Grandma." In exactly the same nasally, shitty way she said it every time, and I knew instantly she committed suicide.
Damn.
Christmas? Really?
Fuck.

"Unintentional overdose"
Oxycodone.

Being that I have been aware of becoming her age now, I have always been accepting of things that happened.  I have remained un-accepting of things that I don't understand, like her being beaten, raped? (details were kept private but I saw pictures of the aftermath of her face) to near death. No one deserves that.
 She did what she thought she had to do at the time.  I get that.  I realized not too long ago I was living for the day and not preparing my future and I was going to have the same headaches to face if I didn't get out of that mentality. Now at this point I am trying to piece together the parts of me that are passive aggressive and this insanely debilitating sense of loyalty to those that aren't' me. This clearly is a learned behavior and it's a damn shame it had to take me half my life to realize it but it was a matter of realizing value and worth.  Something she could never do.  Something I always tried to establish in a weird mimicry way because that's all I knew.

Now that I am in a position where I have no choice but to love and respect myself because I won't find that in anyone else for what it should be worth to me, I am aware of what my first thought is on something and what my second thought NEEDS to be.

Mentally I'm playing the blame game and I'm trying to make others seem smaller so my ego can be bigger.  It's the self conditioning to change for the better that is important though.  I spent the past 6 years playing the role of partner to someone who didn't deserve me nor gave me half as much in return.  Repeating the pattern my mother did with others, the thing that always made me so angry at her. 
It's true. 
What we hate about others, we really hate about ourselves. 
We just have to recognize where it is within ourselves first.

and cherry pit that mother fucker out of our lives.

GJB-E 1954-2005

I'm not ready to forgive and I'm ok with that

The topic of forgiveness has been heavy in my head for a few weeks now.  This means it's solid, not letting go.  This "action" needs resolution as it is literally making me feel increasingly hostile.  It's not the forgiveness that is making me feel hostile, it's the anger I feel.  I keep retaliating against myself on the subject.  Making reason after reason after reason after reason as to why he doesn't deserve to be forgiven.  Building up this incredible wall of garbage and filth and stink and rot just begging for it to topple over and dissolve.  Every week there is at least one thing that is brought to my attention with a memory of some fit he threw over nothing or some critique of me.  How so many red flags I just completely missed. So then my anger transfers to me.  And I bury myself in the same pile of hate and revenge and fury.  I stew and melt and conspire against myself.  Taking the blame. If only... Then if... 

Reminded that it's not my fault, because normal people don't go around telling their partners they are horrible people for not bending to their vision of potential.

I don't exactly know where in this cycle there is going to be a solution.  Obviously it will come between shared blame but at what thought?  It's almost like I am asking myself, like a lawyer cross examining, "On what grounds will my arguments be based on?" Which cliche am I supposed to be paying attention to here for my epiphany?

I'm not a fan of forgiveness.  I never really believed in it.  I called it a bullshit cop out.  I've had some pretty shitty things happen to me at the hands of other people I came across in my life and I have no real recollection of sitting down, thinking about, releasing or making an effort towards forgiving the person for whatever heinous behavior I was subjected to. It's just a matter of no contact.  That's it.  Done, over, walk away, be mad but feel lesson learned. I suppose I have forgiven my mother for certain things but all together? No.  I think some of the things I went through growing up is most definitely NOT a part of your every day average American teenager. 

So it's in the past and clearly there is nothing that can be done to ever change the past, and I should feel like I learned a lesson and the whole drinking poison waiting for it to affect the other person, not to forget I should do it for me.  It's a pointless argument and it's based on petty, immature thoughts.  It is what it is.
Right?
I think a huge part of this is him still being around.  I can't stand it.  I feel like I could jump out of my skin for all of the awful sensations he is. How even though there is no contact and no communication, he still manages to find ways to be a bully.  Granted he's gone again more now, (even heard his child complaining about having to be involved in all the various relationships he is having.), which gives me that sense of relaxation can be had but then it will come to the day he is likely expected back and I get stomach cramps, I have nausea.  And it's not because I am so angry or moody, it's because of the vibration he brings with him.  I constantly feel on defense because I absolutely refuse to be treated as I was ever again and obviously he is enemy number 1.I will never feel invalidated or less than or inadequate around him, ever again. No matter how, I have to present myself.  I feel like I have to be angry to protect myself.... I was thinking this morning...

After reading an article from a Buddhist perspective on letting go of resentment, it spoke of how it can be traced to not being able to ever communicate your feelings.  To have them acknowledged or to just deal with them.  I was ignored a lot when I was younger.  I had to live through some pretty sordid situations with drug abuse, prescription abuse, heroin users, meth addicts, crack heads, alcoholics, witness to physical abuse.... The only time I was able to get out how I was was feeling about my  frustrating situations, was to not.  To confront if I had to and walk away forever. No one told me I had a right to feel angry or sad or really to have any emotion at all.  I didn't have an opinion or a voice in any matter.  I was used, taken advantage of and neglected at times.  Self-harm sets in at a young age in these situations and while I had no knowledge of self-harm at the time, it was something I did. 
Instinctively.
I was horrified and confused but it meant no additional drama and I could be left alone with my "feelings" and "emotions" as they presented with deep, etched and at times bloody, fingernail scratches up the thighs.
So insert me into a marriage where I just want to be out of my current surroundings to a man who was brought up with a representation of a father and mother family, a dominating father at that, where also emotion and affection are not factors.  I was well into my 30's before fully understanding anything that had to do with my feelings or emotions, what I was doing with them, why etc...

So I think I am coming to realize the source of my anger might just be tied in with giving one person in my life, my complete trust, love and devotion and being abruptly rejected after years of easing into being able to be open with someone.
A big chunk of it anyway.

Forgiveness in Buddhism is a big thing.  You literally have to embrace it to achieve enlightenment. I can't say I forgive if I don't. I can't tell myself to "just fucking let it go", and have it be over with.  I feel like once I can be in an environment I can call home; once I am in a place I feel safe and out of judgement or sense of servitude or racked with anxiety, I can forgive.  When I don't have to look around and see a strangers stuff all over my house.  When the end of my weekend puts me in a medical position of having hives because of how stressed I am? It's just not going to happen while I am still being reminded of pain lived. 

In the meantime I keep flopping the word over in my mind.  Like some kind of blob, I just can't figure out what to do with.  I can't file this and categorize away.  I need to make a place for it.  Clear out some space, and try to empty at least this one piece of heavy baggage. Pretty sure it's a smelly old steamer trunk...

I'm getting a second job.  I don't have the obligation of cleaning and cooking and playing worship to a man so I have the time.  I need the money and with school and the lack of a social life, there really isn't a reason why not. Physically, I'm upset.  My elbows have severe pain and numbness in my fingers with arm usage. Fun.
I certainly don't feel the need to fake a relationship just to have a place to live.  I have a history of living on my own and taking care of myself.  The fact that he EVER thought that I was with him because I needed to be? Coming from the man who slips from one relationship to the next almost seamlessly. Jesus Christ.....
I'm still getting over trying not to second guess myself.  To not feel inadequate.  To try to feel attractive.  To feel like I might be good for someone and vice versa. To reassure myself I AM a decent person.  That I need to have patience with myself and I need to take care of myself for once. 

I really wish I was taught how to set boundaries.

Sound familiar?

"This is love bombing and it is why things are moving so fast.
You've never met anyone before who is so much like you! It must be fate?

Here are the common line sociopaths use in the first few weeks or month of meeting you:

"No one has ever made me this happy before".
"I can see myself spending the rest of my life with you".
 "We are so much alike, you are my soul mate".
 "It didn't work out with anyone else because I haven't found the right person".
"You are the kind of person I have been searching for my whole life".
 "You're more wonderful, more giving, more (insert blank) than all my exes/family/friends".
"You are my future. I would be honored to call you my future wife/husband".
"I've never before felt such a connection with someone, we compliment each other perfectly."

They will try to move into your life and talk about living together within a matter of weeks. Some talk marriage almost immediately to lock in the deal."

Too good to be a good kind of love.

Not lonely, just bored

For quite some time the concept of loneliness has been floating around my head space.  Kind of one of those thoughts that just encompasses everything without being totally recognized? Getting to know the term, what it means to me, how it is affecting me, what the reality is...
(I never said I wasn't an over thinker)

In the beginning of this journey I had gone from the whole focus of my life being 5 other people.  I felt surrounded constantly and I ALWAYS had someone to turn to for any kind of conversation or company I needed.  Just that flow of energy that comes from a house of people or a family.  There is a vibration to feed off of and to focus on.  My time alone came in groupings of hours.
So then it went overnight into nothing.  I mean absolute nothing.  To the point of purposely going out to the middle of nowhere with no one around to sit and focus on nothing for a week.  Talking total immersion.  I guess my mind figured if I was going to be subjected to such a shock to the system, may as well be the controller of it all. 

I spent some time thinking I needed to seek out a  partner or a friend.  Someone to replace the someone's I had so recently been inundated with.  I justified it with saying I need a friend with benefits or some such bull shit.  I kept coming across these boys (for lack of a better term) that I was attracted to but they didn't find me so convenient.  Which led me to start wondering, what was the common factor to these people that I was drawn to? There had to be a reason I was pursuing the impossible.  I think ultimately it was a matter of keeping myself alone and at the same time, I could totally say it wasn't my fault.  That I deserved blah blah blah and needed such and such and wanted this and that. 
So, I stopped complaining and owned my shit. 
If I feel I deserve something, it's absolutely not anyone else's  duty to provide that to me. ( I know this is remedial stuff but when your in the middle of a selfish life breakdown, focus gets transferred to the weirdest places...) I needed to focus not on what I DIDN'T deserve but what I DO.  And Not settle like the door mat I tend to be.  If I NEED something in my life, it will find it's way in and I need to trust that.  Not just on my accord but the universe's as well cause I'm spiritual n shit like that.
If I want something, it's a process to figure out the worth to me and how to go about planning to achieve the goal.  To figure out if the journey is worth it isn't the question, it's the how.
In realizing the distractions I was creating for myself, aka needless relationships, I can more easily recognize the behavior to stop it and bring myself back to reality. 

So I thought I was lonely, and I just wanted attention.
I'm not going to say it's ok.  I'm not going to beat myself up for it.  It was just one of those epiphany things where the obvious dawned on me at once and I was/am humbled.  I think going from one extreme to another was such a jolt of reality for me.  I do crave attention.  I do want it.  I don't try to present myself in a way to NOT attract attention of a positive nature. I never really realized how much I do.  How much I relied on it.  Being submersed into a world where you have practically none makes you realize how these dynamics worked. My job now is to focus on asking myself if the attention I am garnering is worth it and if not, having the ability to walk away. 

So I pretty much started detaching myself from most sources and in the beginning it was rough.  Looking back it kind of feels like detox.  The cravings, the worry, the anxiety, the fear..... crazy.
I feel like I am coming out the other end of another tunnel into picturesque scenery of sunshine, green grass and bunnies in the flowers kind of crap. 
I'm learning to not rely on the distractions I was creating for myself as a replacement. 
Just this morning in the wee hours of insomnia, I was reading this article, the six kinds of loneliness and it was everything and more compiled neatly into this package already figured out and given a 'solution' for.

" Not wandering in the world of desire is about relating directly with how things are. Loneliness is not a problem. Loneliness is nothing to be solved. The same is true for any other experience we might have."

Holy Hell did this hit me hard. 
Every time I read it, it feels like I am reading it for the first time.
Duh. Right?  How could I be so dense? So selfish? Why didn't I apply the basic knowledge I had already been trying to use in other areas in my life to this emotion as well?
This isn't a punishment.  It's not something that is broken in my life.  This is not an issue to be solved.  I just don't need that companionship in my life right now while I focus on more important things.  And I need to be ok with that because it is the truth. 
It kind of takes a weight off of me so to speak.  I don't feel obligated to fulfill something that feels like an empty space when all I had to do was shift some priorities to fill that space.
I have to learn to diminish the need to feed my ego.  Just because you feel like something that no one wants, doesn't mean you are that.

I've been thinking about my baggage and how much I'm carrying around.  Like a ridiculous amount. I had been running from it and trying to ignore things and it catches up every time so I guess it's just time to deal with this one.  I'm evolving every day more and more into the woman I used to be before I have been reduced down to a self-doubting-anxiety-ridden shell. Evolving and improving on it.  Improving by recognizing and letting go.
Just exactly as Bhante said it is in meditation. You recognize your thought. You allow it to be there but then you ignore it.  You just give it no attention.
I feel my anger and I give way to at least a smile.  I feel my frustration and I make patience.  I feel fear and I determine my goal. 


Also,
I CANNOT wait to be out of this house.

Terrible Taste

Sometimes I have to keep reminding myself that standing still is still a form of progress so I don't get frustrated and impatient with how I want to control situations I don't have any control over. 
I've had to do a lot of reminding to myself lately about such things.
Taking time to do things properly, to take pride in what I do.  Aiming for more of that mindfulness of staying in the moment. Staying in the moment and being at peace with it. Racing thoughts tend to make ones mind drift to the craziest places so a lot of my mental time is spent redirecting to the now.  Mental time is all I have and I have no idea how to shut it down, except with meditation, so its all been a sort of running background in my already chaotic, adventurous imagination. 

I find work to be a challenge at times now, physical pain is a HUGE turn off for me but because I have been keeping so mindful and REALLY putting effort in, my dogs are coming out pretty awesome.  This makes my customers super happy which makes me super happy.  Because they are finding they can't get in with me as easily as before, my appointments are booked about a week out now which enables me to add another day in every other week. Physically my back is already protesting but I don't have a choice.  I have got to build up more income.

Part of that mind-drift is thinking about all the things I need to be getting done in the future.  Stressing about what if's and how's.  I've been doing a fairly good job of pushing down what doesn't need addressing right now and taking care of what I can.  I have been reminding myself on a constant basis, that the universe is going to do what it does and I should be open to that.  Not to say I shouldn't do shit but I want to say "it will be provided" but I don't meant it like that.  That sounds selfish and greedy when said like that. More, "it just is what it is".

Which totally contradicts my other line of mental support that is the law of attraction.  I have been redefining what it means to me and how I "use" it.  Incorporating more sensory input into my lists of goals I want to achieve. When I think about going on a trip, I am mentally going through visually things like the act of packing.  Driving, checking into a hotel.  I am smelling that smell of the airport or hearing that pull of the train.  Keeping it realistic yet ideal. Inserting the emotions I want to feel at certain times.  Happiness, joy, peace.  Where I will move to. Making more money at work. The kind of car I need now. All being stewn over at times, but in a productive way.

This is in no way being utilized to find a mate.  I had an epiphany a few weeks ago that I wasn't lonely.  I was more bored.  I wanted attention.  I kept running into walls where I wasn't getting attention I wanted from those I wanted it from and I kept getting attention from those I didn't want attention from. Kind of a red flag in life saying, "what the hell do you think you're doing?"
So then I just felt cheap and dumb.  I felt like I had been less of a person.  It started me thinking on the past, as a learning example, what is it that men I have been attracted to, have, that is the common denominator? I feel like there has to be something to that.  Some quality or personality trait that I am drawn to.  Then I realized, it's never ME picking the partner it feels.  It feels more like I am doing the auditioning.  Like I am the one who has to sell myself and create 'value for the buyer'.
And again, I just felt cheap and dumb.  Not to say that I don't think I have any value to sell but that I felt like I had to advertise it.  It's not like any man in my past has been worthy of groveling over.  When that's what you offer, that's what you get.  You don't get a man who wants to pay attention to you, you get a man who wants you to pay attention to them.  I may be a little sensitive to this being what I have been through but it really took me long enough to figure out the obvious.

So I dabbled in trying to find a friend.  I didn't find anything that made me think they were interested and after coming to the realization, I don't want to deal with anyone right now, I just dropped it.  I felt ridiculous for attempting to even date anyone. For making it known to people I was interested in, that I was interested, to have them only be emotionally unavailable anyway.  I was trying to put my energy into fulfilling boredom time I had that I, ironically, spent alone and bored regardless.  So I'm not even touching that right now.  I will work through my lonely spells and hormonal perversions as they pass but if I can't figure out that I deserve someone who treats me like they actually like me, then I have no business trying to put any effort into those people.  Captain Obvious strikes again....

I am happy.  I am in a good place mentally and I am working on changing bad habits I have acquired through the years.  Like when I hear HE is entering the house, I immediately go into anxiety mode.  That is something that I just can't seem to control.  I can talk myself out of it but the reflex is there.  When I see he is gone for an extended period of time, my whole everything relaxes and I feel like I can breathe, even when I am not at the house. When he is around, I completely ignore him.  Otherwise I feel a combination of anger and anxiousness that give me tunnel vision.  Every now and then something will pop up that makes me remember some detail or piece puzzle pieces together.  Like it doesn't make any sense to tell me you don't like me because I don't like the same things as you do and in the same breath say you don't like me because I don't completely submerse myself into anything and you won't join me for anything I do want to do.  Ultimately I am disgusted.  I feel shame and embarrassment when I look at who he really is as a person to me now. I feel like I really let myself down.  They say you only accept the love you think you deserve and I am beginning to think I need to really believe I deserve better.

 I thought dealing with local memories was going to be more difficult but it's proven to not be a bother.  When I recall places or things from the past or around me that involved him, I can totally recall without recoil the memory.  My brain blocks him out.  Like whatever or wherever it was, he wasn't there.  There is this faceless, nameless man there, but it's not HIM.  A nice little emotional protection I guess from being surrounded by the living past.   I am so very excited for the day to come when I will never have to feel that anxiety come over me just from his presence, again.  It is a very strong motivator.  That and seeing him stomp around like a child needing attention or whining like a drama queen let me know I have had terrible, terrible, terrible taste in men.

Progress

Every day that I get further away from him mentally, I grow more.  I am becoming aware of so many things around me, I didn't see before.  Good and bad.  With the good, it elevates me naturally.  I forgot what it was like to feel on the up for longer than like a few days or hours with out the tension of is he or isn't he.  I have had a lot of time in the past few weeks that I have kept to myself in order to get back in tune with who I am, what I want and how I have been changed.  If I am not aware of these things within myself, I can not successfully go on and assume I will have a better future for myself.

I still have shades of bitterness.  I still have anger.  I am frustrated and I am sad but not in any way that encompasses my whole life as I was before.  I can take these feelings and keep them within me so I can try not to release it out onto everyone around me.  In so many situations, things are different because I am different.  I am changing and recognizing that I am not who I was.  I am making a plan to better myself in thought and process. I never had a plan or goals before with him as I realized that at the time, it didn't feel like my life was mine to live.  Everything revolved around him.  EVERYTHING.

There wasn't a day that went by that I did my best to cater to him and did what I assumed he wanted by how he told me what he wanted.  I was thinking the other day, trying to recall anytime when things revolved around me.  When I made a suggestion that was followed.  When I was shown I was cared about and thought of.  I'm really stuck.  In the beginning he made me a bookshelf that was amazing but lets put into context that he had been out of work for a long time as well and that was what he did for a living.  Every single occasion after that dissipated in level of caring on his part while his demand for attention and service went up.  I just can't imagine making demands of someone I love that I wouldn't be willing to do myself.  Every time I was asked for a suggestion on anything, it was shot down.  I was told "Come on, why don't you pick." and I would and he would tell me any number of excuses for each of my suggestions to the point where I just didn't care.  I gave up.  It was pointless. Making suggestions of larger things like a small weekend getaway that WASN'T camping, I was never even heard on.  Never acknowledged. I just assumed his reasons were valid.  I mean really, why would I want to waste money on a weekend in New Orleans that I have never experienced and always wanted to, when it would be so much cheaper to just go camping every other weekend. Make a suggestion for a local outing? Get whining and complaining the whole time as if I was dragging an insolent child around.  I guess because I was....

I'm not angry that I followed so blindly, these were things and activities I genuinely enjoyed doing.  I like having new experiences and when I am not feeling suppressed, I do enjoy socializing and being around people. I don't like being told I am not enough then told I don't do enough in such situations.  My confidence in myself was at an all time low and I genuinely thought it was because I was deficient as a person. If I stood up for myself, I created a rift where he would be angry.  If I kept it to myself but was obviously hurt, he would become angry.  I often would convince myself, before he could have a chance to tell me, that it was all my fault just to save from having to be lectured.

All of these things are accumulating into a base for me to stand on.  A position where I can look at myself and determine for myself what I did do wrong and what I actually didn't do wrong.

The tally columns have drastically changed with my opinion. 

I'm letting go of my intense hatred and replacing it with indifference.  It's like I have to pretend, at least the last 5 years, nothing happened.  Like it never was.  I have to start over so I need to start over with myself too.  If I continue to hold onto trying to blame and garner revenge, I will not be able to move on.  I will be tied to him as if I were on a leash.  What I have been doing in the meantime, is pretending he doesn't exist.  Literally.  Everything about him, all around me, is just some roommate I never see.  Which works perfectly except for the fact I don't get as much use of my big tv.  It's worth the sacrifice to not have to be in the same room with him.  It has made me more aware of how I have double standards and how not to.  To show even more patience and to stand back and assess how I can approach a situation as gently and kindly as possible.  Some of this is a reflection of what I have been through and some is a reflection of what I have learned in the Buddhist community.  

I am excited about my future but I am nervous as well too because I know all to well the things that go along with being a single mother that doesn't make enough money.  I have some challenges ahead of me but if I try to plan ahead and become more prepared, they will be easier to navigate.  I have more of a positive outlook than I do a negative one and that fuels me. 

Starting school I initially though I was only going to do a small portion and go on from there but I have added to my plan.  Instead of starting with an associates degree, I won't accept that as the minimum, I will be going for my bachelors AND I should be getting to work on a masters degree in less than 5 years.  I have a good idea of exactly what I want to do at each stage job wise and I am open to expanding my possibilities to something that fits me perfectly.

Everyday I work, I have clients tell me I look great.  That I seem happier.  When I tell my closer ones what has occurred in my life, they always resort to pity.  I just smile and say "No.  It was a seriously painful experience and I was literally torn in half and felt extremely low but for as low as I was feeling from being rejected, I have catapulted beyond that in the opposite direction.  I feel like even my physical vision of things is changed.  As when I had my experience at Dhamma Sukah and felt the power of the universe in a tiny moment.  I am forever changed and will be changing. 

I am doing some focusing on companionship as well even though I really shouldn't be. I'm not exactly in a position to be exclusive with anyone but should the right one come along, I'm not saying no to dating.  I have definitely re-written my expectations into a higher standard and struggle at times to remain commited to those standards but I have an ability now to tell myself I am worth what I want.  If this person can't provide for me what I need in a partner, I am not going to waste time with persuing them.  I've been trying to not take things personally and I am also incredibly confused by men.  Never in my whole life have I had so many experiences with men saying things they don't mean.  Or leading me on for no reason.  Just up and gone from conversation when you thought things were going great.  Telling me how fantastic I am and how much they want to spend time with me yet, I have been the most alone I have ever been. 

I despise lip service.

I read an article this morning regarding women who view themselves as never *the one*.  Which, is my position at this time.  It said exactly how I was was why men are not interested into falling into more of a commitment.  Finding men who are constantly unavailable means I am making myself unavailable.  And I do.  I do so under the idea that I think I am being strong and independent. Which I am, I have had to fight my whole life on my own without a family structure, no financing from mommy and daddy and no clear set of values and things to achieve to be personally successful.  I'm like that rescue at the pound, the scrappy one that is scrappy because she doesn't know how to ask for love.  In the article it was stated that I should be open to being more vulnerable.  That it is natural for women to be flirty and sexual towards men. That I should not be hiding my feminine side because I am fearful it will be a turn off.  That I should never be afraid or ashamed to ask for what I need emotionally or physically and it made me cry.
It made me upset to realize that I didn't know how to do any of these.  That I do put up defenses.  I don't allow people in all the way.  I continually am feeling hurt by how I am treated because I allow it to continue.  I feel embarrassed to let anyone know my feelings and wishes because for the recent past, I was told over and over again with invalidation and being told I was the one in the wrong.  That MY thought process is flawed.  That I should or shouldn't feel a certain way.

I'm not necessarily seeking out a partner for the rest of my life, I feel that sort of thing can't really be planned. I would however love to find one or two that I can hang out with. Talk to. Do things with.  I am not in it for just getting attention, but because I am genuinely alone.

I still have health issues that need addressing but my mental state is becoming more and more clear.  I have lost 31 of the 60 pounds I have put on over the past 6 years from depression and my goal for the last 19, I am positive will be achieved sooner than later. Trying to become comfortable with feeling I could be attractive and feeling sexually comfortable in intimate settings.  Things are becoming so different for me, because of me.  I am a late bloomer but I am embracing myself and finding my worth to be more than even I originally thought. 
And him?
Literally,
I. Do. Not. Care.
He is only in my way and soon enough he will be permanently gone as everything in life is temporary.
Happy New Year to us all.

When the clock strikes midnight....

I haven't been here as there really isn't anything to say that hasn't been said or felt already.  Things are ever evolving as much as I feel things are static.
School keeps me busy and I like it but it seems that is being threatened now.  I am not going to concern myself with it at this point but as a natural worrier (aka "woman"), I can't help but create all sorts of fantastical scenarios regarding the outcome. So clearly not being kept busy enough...

It seems my current life phrase is "disappointment".  I have been having the patience of a saint.  I have been so tolerant of other people and been doing so well at staying in the present, focusing my positivity out, not trying to have expectations but apparently I still do.  I get to the end of the day and I feel so let down.  I feel insignificant and walked over. 
So I shrug and accept it and continue on because it is what it is,
right?

A few weeks/month? ago, I was contacted by more of his family members.  I was expecting it but taken by surprise at the same time.  So that makes all but one contacting me to tell me even though they aren't here, they know exactly what I have dealt with because they have dealt with his anger issues his whole life.  That it certainly wasn't all my fault and it was more than wrong of him to treat me as he had. Is.  Apparently narcissism is a trait that runs in the family that is the source of the abuse they were subjected to growing up and never wanted to expose their kids to.....
ironic.

Love isn't perfection and it isn't relying on someone else to make sure YOU are happy.  It certainly isn't using control over people you supposedly love to make them bend to your shape. Expecting everyone to gather 'round and admire the saintly man god has gifted to us.

So my process of grief is winding down I feel.  It was a hell of a ride.  Looking back I can see exactly why I reacted to things the way I did.  And I don't think I was in the wrong.  Maybe two times.  But I admitted my failings and own up to being the asshole on those.
 I loved.  I loved with all of my heart someone who didn't care nor deserve it and that is pretty deep stuff. If it doesn't impact you, you're not human.  You're shallow and vain.  Have no empathy and a skewed view of the world.  Love is everything.

I'm moving past anger.  I'm totally accepting of love gone.  I am ok with that part dying.  Its the shitty way the deed was thrust upon me and then I was told to take the blame for it all.  Even then, as I look back, gaslighting me.  Telling me I was the one at fault.  I am the one who doesn't deserve love.  Ever since the evening of him holding me hostage in the driveway with his car, I can never see him the same.  He is a monster.  Whatever iota of respect I had for him as a human being, left me and I have to pretend he isn't here.  He talks down to my kids for no reason even after at least I remembered to include his children in Christmas.... and walks around like some self righteous deity.   He makes me literally sick.  It's not anger I feel anymore, it's disgust.

I have been spending a super amount of time by myself and while I don't mind it, it is starting to get to me.  I was alone for my birthday.  Thanksgiving. Christmas.  Stands to reason I should bring in the new year alone as well too I suppose. 
It hurts.
I'm worn out from feeling so alone.  Friends can only fulfill so much and kids expect you to be there for them.
I would imagine it would feel amazing to have someone around you that appreciates you for who you are and what you bring to their life. That you adore and makes you smile inside.

Happy New Year to us all.