As the day dawns today, I realize that April is almost over. The summer heat and rains are on their way to Florida. Not much will change in my life. I’ll spend more time indoors in the day, and maybe sit on my deck in the early morning, or the evening hours.

Florida needs siesta time in the middle of the day, like they had in Cancun when we visited in 1977. I suppose they still do. That was my first experience with siesta. I remember marveling at how everything in town closed for a few hours in the middle of the day. What a nice custom, I thought. To rest in the day and stay up late, dancing under the stars, or wandering the beach. I remember coming back to my life and wanting to go take a nap in the middle of the afternoon every day for awhile. But you know, life here didn’t allow for that.

Now that I’m retired, I do quite often allow myself a short nap in the day. The nights I don’t sleep well are not so aggravating because I know I don’t have to go put in a 10 hour day. I can pretend I’m in Mexico, and sleep.

It’s odd to me that with all the stress of the past week, I am sleeping pretty well. It’s almost as if the things I was afraid would happen did, and now that they have, I don’t have to worry about them happening. I have to deal with some of them, and will on a continuous basis for awhile, but I don’t have to have that fear that they will happen. I don’t even know if that makes sense.

The friendship that was ended, was not really a friendship. There were not two balanced sides, there was not equal give and take, there was not both of us being there for each other. So, I knew it could not last, though I wanted it to. I will miss some things about it, but not the rude awakenings I’ve had a few times with that person. I hope they get some help for their issues, so they are not alone forever.  Having the end of this happen, when it did, as it did, allowed me to let go of it, and not wait in anticipation for the next round.

My ex….Lord knows I have always thought that he might end up as he is, at least for the last 20 years. It worried me to death when my son lived with him, after I moved out. I knew then that he would hurt my son to get to me. But now, 10 years later, he has deluded himself so much and so often that he lives within his delusions, makes up one after the other. Not to hurt anyone now. Just, that’s where he lives. He wants to create his own reality in a very egoic sense. And does. And his reality has nothing to do with what is actually going on in the world right outside his personal space.  Having him in the hospital allays my fears that he will hurt himself or someone else with his delusions, and allows me to also let go of that, and just deal with the present.

They had a hearing yesterday at 3 to get the order to give him his meds intravenously. I cannot even imagine the terror inside his demented mind as they come at him with a needle. It’s his worst nightmare. Maybe it will be enough for him to decide to take them orally. But I doubt it, and I imagine he will fight it, fight it hard. I so feel for him, so much sorrow that he has ended up where he is. How could I live with someone 40 years and not feel his pain, and confusion, about what has happened to his life?

I did what I did 10 years ago to save myself and my son. But it sent him into a downward spiral, to have what he believed to be a carefully crafted life that he was in control of, fall apart. He felt so entitled to treat me the way he did, and never thought for a second that I had the option of just walking away. I see that now. Of course, I’m so glad I did it 10 years ago, so glad that I finished it before he had a chance to destroy everything we’d built together, and before he had actually descended into madness. I survived, and so did my son. Now we both thrive, and isn’t that the best thing, the only thing, that matters? That we live out our lives well?

I would help him if I could, and for that matter, I’d help the friend that I had to dissassociate myself from, if I could. But the help they need has to come from professionals, not from someone who just loves them. It’s been proven to me enough, that my love for them can’t heal them. Their healing can only come from within. Maybe some day things will turn for them both, maybe some day we can be friends again. I hope for both of them. My own life moves on, I have enough of my own work to do. We are all a work in progress, all of our lives, I think.

Love and light.