Be Me

It occurs to me that I am asking a lot when we fight. It feels like him or me, and more often than not, I feel unheard. I feel like I have to close down everything in order to get through this. I feel like he has no idea what it is like to be, though I spent a tremendous amount of energy seeing things from his point of view, making his point of view my own.

It occurs to me that I am being unfair...but then it would, wouldn't it? I thought I would try for once to put some boundaries around who I am. It would be the healthiest thing for both of us. Maybe then, he could see me. Maybe then, I would stop resenting and blaming him for all of this. And maybe then, I could see myself. Maybe then, I could be active and give this all that it needs to thrive.


This is so very obvious, it's pitiful. The reason we're having so much shit right now is because I feel unheard and disempowered. And it makes me angry, though not overtly. It's not fair to blame him for this. He is trying to force activity. And yes, he's risking the entire relationship for it, but I can see it is from a place of preservation. He truly believes that without that, this won't exist.


This is why every fight we have is epic. This is why my decisions or indescisions come out of left field. This is why he thinks I am not trying, that I don't want to save it. In actuality, the turmoil in my head is gigantic. It's huge, but conflict is worse. So I think, and think, and think. I tell every aspect of the story. I see all sides and I am stuck. Even a question as simple as, "Do you like your boss?" takes twenty-five minutes of back story and ultimately, an ambivalent answer. Now, talk about something relevant: "Do you want to be in this relationship?"


I'm just thinking and thinking. I know what I don't want. I know that I don't want to be taken for granted, that I don't want to be invalidated, that I don't want to be alone, that I don't want to be without him, that I don't want to fight, that I don't want to worry all the time about what mood he is going to be in, that I don't want to feel guilty for having my own shit to do, that I don't want my loyalty questioned, that I don't want to be told that my way of loving someone is inferior, that I don't want to know that the quantity and quality of his love is entirely dependent on his mood and what he thinks I have done for him recently. Now, decide. DECIDE.

But, I can't. Could you?


I know what he's doing. And in a way, it's the right thing. It's the right thing to make me choose, make me active. But there are still two flaws with his method. First, there is no support. If I am choosing, I am choosing him or not him. It is a test. So if he helps me, if he is encouraging and patient, I don't really love him. He said it himself: "It's crunchtime."

I have to choose him and immediately, without thought. I'm not him though. I cannot always see what I want. I can see what I don't want and so it is a process of elimination, and it takes time, and unfortunately for him, it takes energy. Energy is a hard thing for me. If you come at me full throttle and filled with rage and disappointment, I shut down so fast. There is no chance I can spend any energy on choice if everything is going to keeping me numb. Numb looks like resistance. It looks like passivity and ambivalence. This is infuriating for him; I am rejecting him. So, the second flaw is that his punishing emotion has gotten priority over my method of achieveing choice, and as a result, nothing happens.


So, I'm stuck. Left alone, I will numb out any feelings I have and make everything, at least superficially, okay. I will come to terms with the next direction because I will convince myself that my happiness should not take precedant over another's, and moreover, that someone's happiness is better than no one's happiness. But I won't be there as much. Moments. But mostly, just go empty. If I have hopes, I have disappointments. If I have to take a stand, I have to engage conflict. It's not worth it. Better to let it happen to me.


Here we are now. In this place. He was angry, and for two days, said everything he needed to; and I waited it out. I defended myself some. I even mirrored back his anger, but oddly enough, I felt nothing from it. I know that sounds like bullshit, because you can't say horrible things to someone you love without wanting to hurt them. But really, I wasn't angry when it was happening. It felt like a game. He needs catharsis; I need this to end. If I let him yell, call me names, tell me that my efforts are worthless, if I defend myself to provoke it -- then he will feel better. And you know what? He did.

He felt much better. He dismissed it all as "getting things off our chests." But the issue is that nothing was off my chest. In fact, I was angrier afterward than I was while I hurled insults at him, while I belittled him. I was livid that he put me through that. That in the end, it was supposed to be okay, that I was supposed to accept some responsibility for that trauma. I hated every second of it. I felt out of control, in every sense. My teeth dreams came back that night. First I was just wiggling them, but they fell like sand, filled my mouth like pebbles until I was spitting them out. In a bag, little and big. I felt that it would be more appropriate should that dream have come last night, but in all actuality, knowing what I do about myself, I feel the most out of control when I am angry.

Anger is not comfortable; it is not cathartic or releasing. It's terrible and frightening, and paralyzing. I could do nothing in the moment, could think nothing, follow not one train of thought to completion. It was so big and so chaotic. I hated it. I hated it. And I wondered if I hated him for doing that to me, for putting me through that. Why couldn't he see that? Why couldn't he see me? He says, "We won't fight anymore. I like it like this." But he doesn't. Fighting makes things crystal clear to him. And he won. We fought. I lost. I lost because I was so fucking hollow.


And then, it was supposed to be okay?

You're supposed to know me. You're supposed to take care of me. You're supposed to protect me from that trauma, but instead, you inflict it on me? And not once, but for days, in cycles. Deep depression that I fucking feel as much as you do. Then spikes of intense anger that lashes out at me, expected or not. I am there, not just with you, but as part of you.

And then I am broken, because there are things I can't survive like you can. You have weathered yourself for so long, but I am there for the ride, like it or not. I am being buried by this. Buried, and you have the audacity to question how much I care about you? How much you are a priority in my life? You say that you have to watch your back, but look at me. If I don't go numb, run away, hide, who's going to be looking out for me?


In the end, I am numb. I am trying very hard not to be swallowed by the weight of how much this depresses me. I am trying at once to both go numb and continue to work through it. I know that if I go numb, it will happen like this: My feelings about the conflict will subside. I will no longer be angry that it happened, happens. I will accept it as part of who I am with, but I will not allow myself to be open anymore. I will have to shut down. I will have to feel nothing, across the board. I will have to be half-here.

And I know that will mean the end, because he cannot live with me being half-here. I know that he will know there is a difference and he will continue to be angry at me, tell me that I am not making an effort, that I am letting it die. But I am far too used to subjugating my own needs for that of someone else -- I am far too aware that I can only pretend I am not here; I cannot maintain that level of enthusiam, of engagement. I am not that intense. I will go to sleep in this. And if I ever wake up, I will be so angry and so sad, because I will have done it all half-way. And he will have allowed that.

I don't trust him right now. I can't be sure that I will ever trust him. And not about bullshit facts here and there, but he is so broken, too. He doesn't trust anyone, not even me. And so, I mimick the same; I feel the same paranoia. And for this to work, for me to endure through that seperation, I have to be dead to those feelings. Then, everything is a charade.

Or, I could try my damndest not to do that. I could wake myself up and go through this. I could force the pain and anger and hurt out into the open and deal with it. But there has to be some promises. I can't do that forever. I can't even do that frequently. I have to know that he will hear me, that there will be change from him, that there is a chance that he will stop being capricious and subject to his emotions. I cannot be the only one to sacrifice. I cannot be expected to alter my ways only to watch him excuse his outbursts and attacks as "in the moment" or "because I was angry." I still have to go through it just the same.

And I can stand there with my arms spread wide and trust that the waves will not knock me down, or I can go below deck and listen to the storm outside. The reality is, though, that time won't tell. I have to decide.