Category Archives: Betrayal

When Is An Apology Real?

Posted on by learning to live like water

I just got home from a long day trying to prepare the art center for the grand opening tomorrow. Hanging more art, and cataloging all of it, organizing the spreadsheets so that the we can know which gallery each piece of art hangs in. I am just amazed at the scope of this project, how much participation they have received, the volumes of art that is on display. I felt guilty leaving tonight, but my feet and ankles were just done after 8 or 9 hours of continuously being on them. So I went home, and hopefully will be of more use to them tomorrow than I could be if I stayed later tonight.

Most of the work I did today was fairly mindless, really, though. So I had a lot of time to think. I heard from the nameless one again….I know, I know. Ridiculous. I just kept thinking about how he keeps behaving in ways for which he has to apologize.  Why he can’t change his behavior, but he can’t. An apology which says, “I agree with everything you said” doesn’t mean a whole lot when you’ve heard it so many times. The behavior stays the same….I’ve begged him to leave me alone, and maybe he will now. I also actually feel genuine compassion for B. My anger with him had nothing to do with her, because I knew what he was up to.  He just managed to piss me off royally just by his arrogance, and his narcissism, and I just am so sick of it.  I was sick of it in December.  Didn’t talk to him for a couple months, but then the damn smoke alarm thing, geezus.   However, B didn’t know, apparently (even though I’d mentioned it before in my blog)…and he was telling her something else, from what I gather. I don’t know exactly what he was telling her, and I don’t want to know=. I was told he was not with her, but I guess she believed he was trying to turn over a new leaf. While he was not, while he was continuing with the same behavior he did 18 months ago, and it’s been pretty much on-going since I moved.  The only saving grace was that I am now 1500 miles away, and none of our conversations could be acted on.

Oh, I’m running on, just trying to think my way through the tangled web of lies, that somehow caught my leg and pulled me in. I just feel for her, to be blindsided yet again. But I’m so happy to be out of that triangle, and game that he plays. I feel bad for him, to not be able to change such self destructive behavior.

And I’m so happy to be having such a cool guy as L make me dinner next week. Such a big difference.

So tomorrow will be busy, and fun. Gonna get some dinner and rest. Love and light, everyone.

A Friend Request

Posted on by learning to live like water

Scott now wants to be friends on FB. We have never been friends on FB. It has certainly been his demise. It’s how I found out who Betty was, where she worked, that he was with her too when I thought he was only with me.  (And she thought he was only with her.)

Apparently it’s over with her if he is willing for me to be seen in his friends list. Wow, lucky me.  That has always been a temporary situation anyway.

All I can say is, NO. He is offering up sloppy seconds to me, again. I don’t want them. He apparently does not realize that if he were my FB friend, my son and all my friends would see it. All the people who had to watch as he reduced me to a pile of mush, and played with me, and used me. The same people who told me over and over who he was and to leave him alone. The last time I told my son that I thought he might come to our house in CT, uninvited, my son said, “Just saying Mom, if he shows up in our driveway, I will walk over to his car and punch him in the face.” He was not kidding. I told him, “no, I’ll deal with it.” He said, “Just saying Mom. That’s what I’m gonna do.”

My son is the one who had to see me reduced to a slobbering pile of sobbing mess after he did the prison whore. He also had to watch me then again, 9 months later, when I got the text that instead of us being together for the weekend, he was going to be with “someone else” (Betty) and that he was “busy and didn’t want to talk about it.”

When I saw Scott a year ago, after Betty had found out about me, my son said, “What the FUCK is the matter with you Mom? This guy made you cry more than my dad did.”

And still I talked to Scott through the move down here, on the phone, even though he was still officially with Betty, though I haven’t seen him in over a year. Until a couple months ago, when I just got so sick of the games he plays. The disappearing act he pulls, and then comes back as if it never happened. I just got so tired of being messed with.

And now he wants to be FB friends.

He had never been a friend. He has been my lover and my adversary. He has been my teacher of hard lessons, he has been a soulful connection. But he was never a friend to me. I was one to him. Every dark day that I knew about, I tried to help him. When she found out about me, and left him, (temporarily…but that’s another story) I was there for him. I loved him so dearly, more than I ever thought possible. And he used that love to bolster his own ego. To take what he could from me. And give back nothing, nothing permanent, nothing that lasts. We could easily have stayed friends. But he chose not to.

And so we are not. Not on FB, not in life. Not in any way. When I hear from him now, I feel dread, I feel a foreboding. Feel like the darkness is knocking on my door again. Do I love him, yes….always. Can I have any semblance of him in my life? Absolutely not, at least, not the way he is.

We can all change. It is hard hard work, to change and grow. If at some point he was able to convince me, look me in the eye, and tell me what he’s done, what inner work he’s done to change from being an egocentric, selfish man to someone who actually can be a friend, I might listen. I might then open the door. If he could actually apologize to me, and to my son, for his shoddy treatment of me, I might listen. But it would have to be heartfelt, sincere. I am good with words. I am intuitive. I would know the difference. He will say he has apologized to me enough. But what good is an apology when the behavior continues, unabated?

When I went through my divorce, I didn’t date for 5 or 6 years. I went inside, I learned to go deep, I learned to look at myself and forgive myself, but that also implies that I changed. And I did. I’m not angry with Scott (or my ex for that matter). I am just saying that I can’t have in my life what he has brought to it for 2 years now. (The first year, up until he did the prison whore was good with him, even after that, it was good. Then came Betty.) I have joked that he should go to the monastery for 6 months, like he often said he was going to. It’s a journey he has to take by himself. Even if I was inclined to help him, I would not. There is never real growth without real pain. There is help…but you have to seek it out. And not seek it from me. Not look to have the gaping wounds once again soothed by me so life can go on the way it has for decades.

So, I write this knowing he will read it. I don’t want to open the doors of communication with him, because it’s not safe for me. I know that somewhere inside there, I still love him as I always did, and that I would just be hurt again. I need to heal, I need distance, emotional distance to match the now physical distance I have purposefully put between us. He needs to heal too, and see himself. And acknowledge his soul and his spirit and stop feeding his ego, which is doing a good job of killing him, and hurting everyone who loves him. When he does that, when he can realize that he too is a child of God, as deserving as all of us, he’ll be able to love himself, and forgive himself, and then he’ll have something to offer the people he wants in his life.

I wish him Godspeed on that journey should he choose to undertake it.

Love and light, everyone.

Working Out Sleeplessness

Posted on by learning to live like water

I see my old friend Pat sleeping on my couch, in deep sleep and I think how nice it would be, to be able to just sleep anywhere. She’s one of those people who can. My mom used to be able to do that. My mother-in-law fell asleep at an NHL hockey game once. You know it was not quiet there, lol.

I went right to sleep last night, and well I should have. 3 hours sleep the night before, 2 rum and cokes at the restaurant, and we had a little smoke when we got home. I slept for a couple of hours, and then woke up, and of course, couldn’t get back to sleep. It’s getting old, this not sleeping thing. I had taken a full Ambien, just to make sure I slept, but there you go. So at 1 AM I took a Benedryl. That’s ridiculous I know. I am aghast at myself for putting so much crap in my body, but I am craving sleep and it is just evading me.

Lately when I’m like this I have to get up and write. Stream of consciousness…just let out whatever it is. Last night I felt very comfortable with my friends sleeping here. I was not overstimulated. When I went to bed I was only looking forward to climbing in between my sheets in that bed I love. But there I was, awake at 1:30 AM.

I picked up my laptop, opened it up and began to write.

What came out was, all the tentative hope I had for this relationship with Tim. He sent me an email this morning. Telling me about his night, and that he can’t wait to see me. Not gushing, just loving. He included a poem, I don’t know if he wrote it. I don’t think so, it was in quotes but the author not id’d.

I also realized that I still miss things about S, which I wish I didn’t. But that is always overridden now with his ability to play games with me and others, and the way I am always the big loser with him, that there is nothing to be gained from him. I guess when you love someone you always love some parts of them. The funny, smart, sexy parts. But they aren’t worth the brokenness, the chaos, the confusion.

I know where I stand with Tim, and it is so reassuring. I also am physically attracted to him, and that too is reassuring to me that we can get to that place eventually. He’s not overbearing, but likes to stay in touch. He’s not demanding, but expresses himself. He is not afraid to put his arm around me, he is not afraid to take my hand and talk to me seriously. He is not overly demonstrative, but is demonstrative. And he’s also smart, and has an artsy side. He loved his wife, who died after a 7 year battle of cancer. He was her caregiver all that time. And happy for the job.

What do I not like about him? Well, he has a drawl, lol, and my mind always clicks to a redneck when I hear a drawl. But he’s so not. He is so much an aging hippie like me, even though he’s an ex-firefighter, and ex-cop.

So, I have hope that this will go somewhere. He’s a really good man. I am cautious, too cautious with him. Like I should have been with S, and wasn’t, jumping in with both feet. I resolved not to do that again. To let things grow, to fill the marble jar, before giving myself over completely. S would always put 5 marbles in the jar, and then dump it over and just watch the marbles roll out. It’s just too hard to retrieve yourself, when someone breaks your heart. Jumping in set me up for heartbreak over and over again. I can’t imagine Tim willfully breaking my heart. Nor me his. I’ve broken a man’s heart before, but not willfully. It was just that I could not match his emotions for me. That man was needy, and I am so not. I love to be in love, but not with just anyone.

So that dichotomy, between the two men, that chaotic jumble of emotions, is what was keeping me up. Tomorrow Tim and I will go manatee watching, sunset watching and really see if we connect. I’m looking forward to the growth of the seed that’s been planted.

Love and light to all.

Flashback

Posted on by learning to live like water

A blast from the past. I don’t watch much TV. I turn it on in the evening, and often pay no attention to it. It’s just for the noise.

Tonight I’m watching the news, which is something even more rare than watching at all. I hate the news. At least, network news. But tonight there was a story about the CT Supreme Court reversing the decision on Michael Skakel and sending him back to prison for the murder of Martha Moxley. They showed the Supreme Court Room, and boy, did that bring me back to some difficult, yet triumphant memories.

December 2, 2010, exactly 2 years after the first day of our trial in Superior Court. More than 3 1/2 years since I had left my ex.  2 years since my son had come to live with me.  I remember sitting as a spectator, because that’s where the actual parties to the cases sit, in that auspicious room. The pomp and circumstance was palpable. Classrooms of students from local colleges filed in to watch the proceedings. The officer in charge of the courtroom gives all of us instructions. There was not an empty seat. Classrooms have to book it way ahead of time. The Supreme Court hears 2 cases a day. I had been waiting for 2 years to be heard. Two years from the 3 day trial my ex and I had, as he attempted to make sure I got less than 10% of the estate from a 32 year marriage. He lost that first Superior Court decision. He appealed, and then requested to have the appeal raised from the Appellate Court to the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, every asset from our 32 year marriage, every dime, was in his possession.  I had a paycheck.  That was it.  (And just for added stress, my son was in a bad car accident 4 days before, broke his ankle, totaled 2 cars.  Of course the man with all the money did not contribute one cent to the deductible for his health insurance, or on a replacement car.)

7 chairs at the bench in the front. Like 7 thrones. The people who sat there would decide my future. I hoped they were just, I hoped they could see the truth about what had been done to me. Each atty gets a certain amount of time to make their case. My son’s GAL (guardian ad litum) sat with my attorney, to help her if needed. Because, he got it. It took him awhile, but he finally got it, and for the last year, and during our initial trial sat on my side. When my atty made her case, she didn’t even need all the time allotted. The judge in our Superior Court decision could see my ex coming 100 miles away, and did a ton of research for us, since there was no law regarding our issue. He wrote 7 pages, citing cases in other states. It was all in our brief, not much needed to be said. The point was that for him to prevail would have done a grave injustice, I think is what it said.

The justices argued with my ex’s atty. Not mine at all. They had some questions, but not many. They had a lot of questions of my ex’s and some actually argued with him, telling him that what the judge did, he was supposed to do.

In the end, I won. The decision was released April 18, 1 day before my 60th birthday. I had been secretly asking the Universe to give me the decision for a birthday present. Really.

They called my ex “unconscionable” 9 times in their lengthy decision. Unanimously.

And, my case made case law in CT. No one will ever be able to do to their spouse what he tried to do to me again. That makes me proud, really. And really, eases some of the pain of waiting 4 years to finally be free of that man.

A couple of years later, a Yale 1st year law student contacted my atty. His first assignment of the year in contract law had been to write a brief on my case, and could he come and see her for about an hour, and see some of the files. Imagine that. My case, my 4 year struggle ended up being a case which Yale University used to teach contract law.

I could go on, about how my life changed that 60th birthday. How I went house hunting, and bought my dream house, and later segued that house into this lovely life I now have in Florida. How I didn’t even consider having a date until I was moved into my new house. I hadn’t wanted to embroil anyone else in that mess. I learned that avoidance of something doesn’t mean you’re ready for it. I fell in love with someone who devastated me emotionally as badly, if not worse, than my ex did as he tried to separate my son from me, and hurt me financially. What my ex never did to me, my first love after divorce did. No need to expound on that. It’s all in the pages of this blog. I’m pretty cautious now.

Funny what just a flash of one picture can bring back.

Love and light everyone.

Just Wondering, WTF Was I Thinking?

Posted on by learning to live like water

wtf

I guess that phantom phone call got me thinking, about WTF I was thinking for so long….

It seems long ago now, suddenly. How much I loved a man, and how much I was betrayed. What strikes me this morning is I am trying to fathom what I was thinking, then. To love someone so much who will never love anyone but themselves. And that, only superficially.

I say superficially because this man doesn’t love himself enough to behave in ways that make him proud. He doesn’t love himself enough to take care of himself. He doesn’t do the things in a relationship that take care of it. He only makes sure he is getting his needs met, which translates to getting his ego fed. If he meets the needs of the other person, it is as part of trying to get his needs met, it’s not out of genuine care and concern. And I think that’s true across the board for him. I think he may use different ploys for different people, but it remains the truth. I’ve watched him.  I’ve also watched him pursue behaviors that result in reinforcing his low self esteem, setting himself up so he can say, “see, it’s all I deserve.  I’m a bad person.”

So anyway, I’m just wondering now, with all this time passed, WTF I was thinking? I’m not angry, I don’t dislike him. I have said over and over I will always love him, and, well, I guess I will. But I love everyone, or try to. Him no more or less than anyone else at the moment. But what I was thinking? IDK, do you think when you’re in love? He had lots of lovable qualities, I guess. The first being that he could make me laugh. He was funny, creative, smart. We had a wonderful physical connection. But he was completely self absorbed. When push came to shove it was always him first. He treated me so badly at times, and I just kept coming back for more, believing that he just needed experience unconditional love.

I guess the distance between us now, the physical distance has given me some perspective. I guess that move has enabled me to meet men who are funny, creative, smart, AND kind, gentle, loving, and generous. Men who try to take care of themselves and their loved ones. Men who squeeze your hand when they’re happy, sitting at a table with you. Men who behave in ways that will keep drama out of their lives, and people in.

Since I believe that our purpose in this life is to learn lessons and evolve our souls, I guess he was another life lesson for me. Now, far enough away from it, the complete lesson is coming into focus. At least part of it is, I think, to know that I can love that passionately, that fiercely, that deeply. That’s a good thing to know. He was practice. I’m sure there’s a man here who can match my ability to love, and celebrate it.

I suppose, based on the phantom phone call dream, that the connection we have had will remain, but will probably remain dormant. It originates on a level I can’t really comprehend, and will most likely always be there, but will not take over my life anymore. Life is for living in the present moment. His journey is his now, and mine is mine, and the paths have diverged far apart. That’s the present moment.

Glad to be moved on from all that. Stomach bug and car accident not withstanding, I’m very happy with the move I’ve made. It was 85 yesterday and I was at the beach. Not dressed in multiple layers and still shivering, lamenting the fact that I was burning up a ton of fuel oil. Yep, life is good, and exactly what I’ve dreamed of.

Love and light, all.

On Breaking Like a Little Girl

Posted on by learning to live like water

breakingi like a little girl

So, look….I don’t break like a little girl. Usually. And not now, not today. In fact I’m a long ways away from breaking.

I am tired, I am slightly stressed. I know I need to be doing things like putting my furniture up for sale that I’m not taking with me. I’ve heard to just sell it on ebay, with a pick-up only, not to use Craig’s list. Don’t want to be letting the craigslist killer in my front door. Maybe I could advertise it in the local little paper. IDK. I need to find someone to give my old washer and dryer to, although, I have been told that Big Brother/Big Sisters will take that stuff off your hands and put it for sale in their stores, Savers. Which seems like a good cause, and I could take a tax deduction.

I need to finish getting the utilities in the Florida house in my name. I need to have the mail forwarded up here from there, til I move there.

I worry that my boss will find all this stuff out, about both houses, and it will ruin my relationship with him, which is good at the moment. Work life could get very unpleasant if that happens. But if I tell him, without an exit date, he might give me one, and I might not be ready to move, and I don’t want to have to pay this mortgage if I don’t have a job. So every day I feel like I’m taking a chance.

I want to find out what a POD will cost to get my son’s stuff to CO. I need to get costs on moving my stuff to FL.

Yesterday I was sat on my deck and fell asleep in the sun. It was lovely. But while I was there, I thought about how I ran into a good friend at the store yesterday, in the organic produce section, and we talked for 15 or 20 minutes. She wants to try her hand at jewelry making, for a hobby, because her youngest child is about to go off to college. So we made tentative plans for me to go with her to get some basic tools etc, and I told her to come over some Sunday (her husband works weekends) and we’ll sit on the deck and make jewelry…drink wine…

Anyway, sitting out there yesterday, thinking about that, I thought, God, I wonder how long it will take me to have friends like that in Florida? Friends I can make spur of the moment plans with, like going to Costco Saturday with my bff, like going to my cousins to do reiki, like having this friend over to make jewelry on the deck. I will miss my peeps so much. They are my family here. I’ll have to create a whole new family and that’s a little scary.

Altho, my bff said Saturday, “we want to come see you as soon as you get settled.” And I know she means it. I said, “October, you will love it there in October. You will be getting pissed because it’s getting cold here…Florida is lovely then.”

But still I had this dark vision of me sitting alone every weekend there, nothing to do and no one to do it with. It was momentary, because I know I will make friends, and I know that before I’d sit all alone, I’d probably head to the beach or my sisters, or something….But, you know, the fear kind of showed up momentarily.

But, I guess the point is, it doesn’t break me. I think a broken heart can break me, but even that only momentarily. And who knows, maybe I know enough now to work through it, without feeling broken at all, if it happens again. Plus, I think I learned enough lessons from the last two men, to choose better, and not fall in love with someone who will treat my heart so callously. I’m sure there are men who actually appreciate a loving heart, and will treat it lovingly in return. I’m hoping I find one in Florida.

Maybe at the yacht club, lol. Or maybe I’ll get a fishing pole and go down to the fishing pier and find a fisherman, one that doesn’t get a thrill out of being helicopter lifted off a sinking ship. One that just likes to catch fish, and be near the ocean. Calmer…..more content. More appreciative of the joys life offers every minute. One who doesn’t need to be walking on the edge to feel alive. One who feels alive every moment he takes a breath, and finds wonder in that gift.

So, the opinion once given me by the man who broke my heart, that I break like a little girl, well, I am gonna guess that he has probably discarded that opinion of me anyway. I broke like a grown up, and I did my work, and I once again found a new path that will work for me. I’ll get through the hard parts of it, probably by writing, by being near the sea every day, by finding joy somewhere every moment.

I won’t walk the edge, I won’t risk falling off. And if I slip, I won’t break. If I crack, well…I’ll let the light in, let it weld the pieces back together, and glow a little brighter when it’s over.

Love and light.

The Best is Yet to Come

Posted on by learning to live like water

The sun poured into my bedroom window like spun gold this morning. It was filtered only by the sheer white curtain that hangs like a flouncy skirt onto the floor. It was 6:15. I woke earlier, at 5:30 and thought, no, I don’t want to get up this early, and the next time I looked it was 6:15.

When the sun is like that, pouring through the windows on the south side of the house, I am excited to get up, and watch the day unfold. I am only sorry it isn’t warm enough to sit outside, and listen to the birds, and feel the gentle spring breeze on my cheek.

I did a meditation this morning by Tara Brach on Open Awareness. She does wonderful guided meditations. https://www.tarabrach.com/guided-meditations/

At the beginning, as she guides you into physical body relaxation, she asks you “What is it your heart really wants?”

My answer was swift, required no thought. “To love and be loved.” That’s all.

The meditation sought to bring us to a place of only awareness, not thought. Using words from the Buddhist monk Tilopa from 1000 or so years ago:

Let go of what has passed.
Let go of what may come.
Let go of what is happening now.
Don’t try to figure anything out.
Don’t try to make anything happen.
Relax, right now, and rest.

It was a nice way to begin the day. Peaceful, no angst today. Or at least, not right now. (she smiles, lol)

My son and I are going out for BBQ today. It’s a delayed birthday dinner. Then we’re stopping at Sam’s club, for a few things. It is a lovely spring day.

I have not buried the St. Joseph statue that my friends Peter and Linda gave me in my front yard yet. I think I’ll do it this morning. I’ve not had a nibble all weekend on the house. Even though I’m not really worried about it, I still think I will give it whatever added boost the statue can give it.

And believe. Just believe it will happen. Just trust that the universe will bring the right buyers to my house at the right time.

Feeling peaceful and calm this morning. Trusting my intuition to guide the path of my life to follow my heart’s desire, to find my heart’s desire. I am beginning to trust myself again. It’s a good feeling. I’m not sure if that isn’t the greatest trauma of being betrayed on such a grand scale, the loss of our ability to trust ourselves. A good lesson was learned about love and trust.

I still believe love never dies. I think I’ll always love the people I loved. It’s just that I see them through unfiltered glasses now, in all their imperfection. What’s done is done, what’s over is over. In the words of Van Morrison in Someone Like You:

But just lately I have realized
The best is yet to come.

I hope that’s true until my last breath.

A Little Obsessing as I Put the Chaos Away

Posted on by learning to live like water

I felt a little guilty over the vitriolic email I sent Scott, lacing into him for sharing our personal stuff with someone else, and for trying to tell me what I should or shouldn’t write about.  I was so furious.  He can engender such anger in me, it frightens me that I can still get that mad at him.  It’s not who I want to be.  The truth was in there, but there was so much anger that it was difficult to decipher the actual message.

I’m not sure why he thinks if he takes from me, or now demeans and /or denies the  relationship that gave him much pleasure for 18 months, will somehow in her mind, undo the fact that he betrayed her.  He betrayed us both on a grand scale.  When he was with me in January, he blamed her.  And when she became so jealous that I was with him, he blamed me.

He did, to his credit, blame himself mostly.  But he tried to spread it around, so that we too were culpable in his mind, so that he didn’t have to bear the whole burden.  We were not.  My ex used to do that.  Every problem he had, he had to pretend I had it too.  I was conditioned for a long time to accept blame for something I didn’t do, just to keep the peace.  Taking years after my divorce to search my soul, I don’t and won’t do that anymore.  What Scott did to us, is all on Scott.  The fact that he ran to my bed when she left him….he can own that too.  I still loved  him, missed him, wanted him, but he ran to my bed, when he had the opportunity.  Not me to his.  I ended up there, but I didn’t initiate our reunion.  When he came to see me 12 hours after my mother died, I looked at him and said, “Do you want to sit on the couch and talk?  Or lay down and talk.”  He thought for a moment…And said, “lay down….”  Everything was easier for us there.  Talking, connecting, being.  I wasn’t going to undress, but he asked me to….I was distraught, over my mother, I just trusted him to do what would help me get through the day.  He had come, he said, to keep me company, to keep me from being alone.   I did as he requested, and soon, we were into our old rhythm, our old patterns.  It was all still there, after having been buried for 3 months.  The connection, the attraction, was just as strong as ever.

When she found out, to satisfy her jealous nature, he had to take from me, from us, from what we had.  She couldn’t allow it to just be over, and see if she and he had anything left.  She demands that he recreate himself in her image, the one that satisfies her huge ego, her possessiveness.  The one that wants him to have had no one ever but her in his life.

Well….he did.  He had me, and try as she might, and as much as she can get him to deny me, she can’t take from me what was real.  Nor can he.  It is over, but it was what it was, and it was something lovely, caring, passionate…..  No matter how the two of them try to re-write the story for their own selfish motives, it remains in the universe as it was.

I suppose a lot of her insecurity comes from the fact that he was still married to his second wife when he started seeing her, 15 or 16 years ago.  He told me that went on for about 5 years.  Eventually, his wife knew, and he and his wife stayed together still for a time, a couple years I think he said, for convenience sake, for their kids.   But for Betty, knowing he was willing to cheat on his wife, and then wanted to still live with his wife while he was supposedly with her?  She has or had to be very insecure, knowing what he was capable of.  And obviously, he is still capable of it. All that time, and he was living with his now ex-wife.  That is so f’d up, I can’t even begin to fathom it, nor do I want to.

I’m ok with it all.  Every minute it is all part of my past, and I am evolving into a new, wiser, smarter woman.  I don’t think he can anger me like that again, because I see it for what it is.  I see that the past week was a just more of the same dysfunction that has become his norm since she reappeared in his life, something that her extreme jealousy and possessiveness require of him.  I don’t have any idea if they are together, my intuition says not, but who knows, I’ve been wrong before. I think if they are not, he is still trying to do what she requires to accept him.  He mistakes her jealousy and possessiveness for love, they are the opposite of love, they are fear.  She mistakes his denial of me as more for her.  She thinks that the less he cares for me, the more he cares for her.

I used to say to him, I don’t want what you had with her.  I want my own account with you, filled with our specialness, our memories, our intimacies.  What you had with her has nothing to do with what we have together. Keep what you had with her, lets see what we can build that’s ours.

To me, that’s love.  And we had it…the fact that he now denies it, doesn’t make it less so.

So, here I am, winding it up again, and hoping I don’t have to do this again.  Trying to take the chaos of last week, the negativity and the raw emotion,  and put it back in order, find the places where it fits, put it away, and move on.

I would have liked to remain friends with him…and at first that’s what we did.  But then, it wasn’t enough for her, and soon he was denying me and us again, and he devastated us on even the level of friendship.  It’s too bad….that he can’t have even a friend who loves him.

I’ll be closing on my Florida house soon, I’ll be putting the one here on Zillow soon.  I’ll be spending pretty much 100% of my time on that.  I don’t have time to deal with this childish, adolescent dysfunction any longer.  Soon I’ll be 1500 miles away, in a new life, making new friends, living my dream, and I have no doubt that all the dreams I have had are going to manifest.

I wish no ill on either of them.  They are good enough, without my help, at dragging themselves down. My energy is on my future life, on ending this one correctly.

I’ll always love the man he was when I fell in love with him.  And will always think of that man fondly.

But now….the past is past, and the future is looking bright.  Onward….forward motion.

Love and light.

 

 

Tuesday Updates

Posted on by learning to live like water

desert sunrise

The house.

My sis has been making calls about the mold. There is a test that can be done for $375 to see if there’s a mold problem. So we’re going to order it, and try to get an extension on the contract until that test is in. All these inspections are gonna run about $1000. But at least I’ll know what I’m buying. My sis is building lots of good karma, I’ll tell you. I could never do this without being there without her. So much to organize. My sis is good at that stuff, lol, but I will be forever grateful.

Addie

I texted with Addie again today, 3 days in a row. After only intermittent convos over the last 2 or 3 months. He sent me the picture he took of the desert sunrise this morning (above). He used to do that every morning. And send a selfie of him waking up. He would always ask for one of me. I would protest. I had bed hair, no make up, you know….. He would always say, “But that’s when you are the most beautiful.” Sigh………

He is such a good guy. I hope everything is ok with the gf, and I hope he’s not falling for me again. Much as I love him, and love having him in my life, I can’t go there with him. It’s just never worked, and I’ve tried. I keep breaking his heart, as he rather succintly reminded me back in December.

The first time was because S was doing his thing, to get me back from Addie. I’d been seeing Addie for about a month, after the prison whore. But I still loved S, and S was really working it. He said everything I’d ever dreamed of hearing from him, and did everything I’d ever wanted, and I left Addie in a heart beat. (I guess that’s when he cared for me, as B said, “not in the way I wanted or dreamed of” except it was everything I’d ever wanted from him.) I was unbelievably happy for about 6 weeks, till B decided she wanted him back. Then began the S torture. Not letting me go, not seeing me much, pushing, pulling. Having a great time watching me cry over him. Getting his huge ego boost from all the tortured poems I wrote last summer. Playing the game, the great player. See how long he could get away with it. No wonder he thought I was weak, that I “broke like a little girl”. Well, I bet he doesn’t think that now.

The second time I broke Addie’s heart big time was last November, when we were talking about him coming to visit. I suggested New Year’s Eve, for a few days. He wanted to come for 2 ½ weeks. “I’ll rent a car when you go back to work, I’ll make you dinner every night….” I know he meant it to show how he loved me.  He was so excited about it. But I didn’t want it. I was not, am not, ready to have someone here every night. It’s like a commitment, and I didn’t want it. I called it off, the whole thing. I told him I wasn’t ready, that I hadn’t gotten over S yet, and I hadn’t, that was true. I had just found out a couple weeks before, the full extent of S’s deception, and I was still trying to assimilate all that bad news. I was still rebounding from all the push pull, which continued right up to the moment I found out the whole truth.

That’s my biggest problem with Addie, is that he won’t allow time for a relationship to just grow. But also, because I don’t want to be in love with someone who lives 2000 miles away. And in the desert…I could visit, but I need the water. I have to be by the ocean. There were some physical issues too, which I never mentioned to him, because he couldn’t do anything about them, and I didn’t want to make him ashamed or even feel bad because of them.

For whatever the reason, it’s nice to have Addie in my life again. No games, just a good, intimate friend. Someone you can count on. Someone who constantly fills up my marble jar. It is so nice to be reminded, reassured that there are men in the world capable of selfless loving. Who take pleasure in pleasing their woman. I hope all is well with his gf, and he’s not talking to me every day because there’s something wrong, or worse, because he’s still in love with me. I don’t want to break his heart again. But I love having a man in my life who wants nothing from me, except a little of my time, and a little of my affection, and is never anything but loving and kind. I want nothing from him but his friendship. We are more than friends, we are very close. There was a tenuous time, when I broke his heart, the last time, that I didn’t know if we would make it through as friends. But we have, and I couldn’t be happier about it.  I’m so grateful the Universe has brought him back to my life right now.  Just so glad.

All is well, as I watch the Universe self-correct, and self-organize, and help me along the way to the fulfillment of my dreams. Love and light.

Reminiscing

Posted on by learning to live like water

memories

I’ve been talking to a friend, who is on a path exactly like the one I was on with Scott in January.  Together not as long, but long enough to be crazy in love, and then having it ended cruelly, by him.  Then after months of no contact, seeing him again, and having him start up as if it never stopped, and then, once again walking away with no notice.

I’m just so glad my experience can help her.  She knows that I made it through, that it triggered in me at the time, all the same emotions triggered in her.  My story went on for a few weeks.  Those weeks gave me clarity on who S was when he chose to deny me because our relationship hurt B.  And because I had gone into it with no expectation, no desire for a long term relationship, it was easy to let go, and be done.  If he hadn’t then denied me to B, and if B hadn’t made it clear to me that he was lying to her about me, yet again, I wouldn’t have even gotten involved again.  Add to that her arrogance in thinking that she knew what I was wanting, or that she knew what he felt.  Assuming that our relationship deteriorated into something ugly.  Our relationship was fine, it’s just that there was a third person involved and I didn’t know it, HER. That’s why it deteriorated, because he was a liar and a cheat, to both she and I. Does she think he told her the truth?  Or that he does now?  That’s a laugh, really.  He can’t discern the truth from the crap he makes up, he never has been able to.  He fails the trust test, every single time.  Maybe it’s a game they play together, who knows?  Who cares?  It’s not one I want to play though, that’s for sure.

Anyway, talking to my friend, trying to help her clear her head, kind of made me remember how it felt.  I am so grateful not to have any of those emotions now.  I am so glad to be past that, to leave that relationship behind me.  It entices me not at all any more.

I have been thinking I don’t even know if I ever want another relationship.  Men have been the bane of my existence.  One was a control freak extraordinaire, unbelievably abusive.  The other was deceptive, a liar and a cheat extraordinaire.  The ex, the first one, inspired more anger and frustration, than I can even express.  The second, more pain than I can express.

Not sure I want to risk round 3.  But maybe there’s someone special out there, someone who just wants to love, like I do.  Who just wants to enjoy life, and enjoy me, and let me enjoy him.  I will be careful, before I give anyone that much trust, that’s for sure.  These narcissists, and sociopaths are so good at the game, at fooling us who have no ill intent, who don’t need it for an ego boost, but just want the pleasure of someone’s company and attention.  Who just want a relationship that evolves us into a better person, and adds to our life, instead of filling it with darkness.

I guess that’s why Florida looks so good to me. It is full of light, and happy people, really.  I didn’t run into anyone who didn’t have a smile, and a positive attitude. Maybe it’s the negative ions from the ocean, lol.

I’m going to the light, that’s for sure.  Away from the darkness that drives people down, and consumes them with false promises and false projections of who they are.  It’s easy to even fool yourself in the darkness.  Give me light any day.

Love and light, everyone.