My Verbally Abusive Marriage

My sister, Erin, supports me consistantly and constantly. She loves me regardless of my decisions, actions, and quirks. She knows my dark side and thinks it’s valuable. I couldn’t love her more, yet every day, I do love her more.

Before I recognized the abuse in my life, she was largely quiet about it for fear of her words pushing me away from her. She knew, instinctively, that Will (probably subconsciously) wanted everyone who loved me far, far away – or at least that’s how it appeared. Still, she would cry with me when I hurt in large part because there were things she wanted to say but held them inside. Or at least, this is the way I think it played out.

One time, after realizing the abuse for myself,  I asked her why she didn’t just TELL me I was being abused, and she said, “Would you have believed me if I had?” Of course, the answer was “No.” I’ll never ask that question again of her or anyone else who loves me. It’s not up to them to tell us what is going on, is it? It’s something we have to realize inside of ourselves.

Erin is a very wise woman. She’s decided to put her skills to work helping other people who need fresh ideas and perspectives so they can move away from the things, people and ideas that hurt them. She wants us all to live in our own light, within our own power augmented by Spirit (God, Goddess, Angels, The Powers that Be…).

Here is an email she sent me on facebook two days ago. She said I could share it, and Iwant to because you need to know that there are people in the world like her. People who support you, who love you, who are just itching to help you. You may not see them until you take off the blinders abuse is causing you to wear.

Here is her email:

“I think you are overlooking something you don’t want to look at again… yet.

“You are a survivor. You pushed your way through a horrid time in your life when you was married, and then again pushed your way through the time of uncertainty after you left.

“Other women need to know this can be done. They need to know that after they leave their abusive marriages, they will come out better on the other end.

“I think you are just not ready for it yet. You are not ready to re-visit the pain of it; or to be faced with the women who are still enduring it because you NEED to keep pushing through this segment in your life for right now.

“So, don’t question what you should be doing to earn an income. You are loving your life where you are right now; and I think that is exactly where you need to be. The time will reveal itself to you when it is time to step back into the world that brought you to where you are now…

“The only difference is that you will already be on the other side. Completely.

“Keep doing what you are doing. You haven’t been this happy, or this authentic in a long time. Own it. Live it.

“You will know when the time is right.

“I love you, and I am so proud of you Kellie!!!”

The good news is that even if you don’t know a soul like Erin right now, you can contact her now at her website, Dear Erin. The link takes you to her “What Dear Erin Does” page. I encourage you to contact her because her first two clients are free if you agree to give her a testimonial in return.

The past month whirled around me, through me, like a red wine hurricane. I feel alive and strong, but spinning uncontrollably in my heart are questions and wishes that I’m not ready to answer or fulfill. I feel like I’m in danger of losing my vision because time isn’t pacing itself with my desires – what I want to become, who I want to be is not yet centered inside of me. The person I want to be is still ahead of me on the timeline while I’m forced to continue living in the present.

I am grateful beyond words that the only voice in my head is my own. After so many years of sharing space with Will’s voice, I had hoped hearing only my own would end the confusion and doubt. Living free and dis-anchored from Will’s reality set loose a storm of giddy emotions, loving dreams, and happy thoughts within me. I’ve loved the time I’ve spent in the whirl, loved the people I’ve met, loved the feelings of re-connectedness to life itself. But, as all storms, it is passing and I’m left to deal with the thoughts and decisions I made in the spin-cycle.

Despite the whirlwind of emotion, underlying it on the earthy path of my soul, I knew I was in danger of being swept away into a different kind of false world. If I weren’t careful, I could easily exchange Will’s version of reality for another unreal reality, a possibly more dangerous one made up of my own delusion and wish-craft. A conversation with the powers that be warned me of the magical world of delusion and falsehood and then my flesh and bone therapist said, “It isn’t REAL, Kellie. You’re not yet separate from Will, from that life. You need more time.”

Of course, my ego denied the gods and the therapist outright. This delusion was FUN, it was EXCITING, and it was WORKING! … Dammit. And people around me were in danger of being hurt by it; I was in danger of being hurt by it. My boundaries blurred, my dreams for myself pushed aside, I realize I am spending too much time in the whirlwind and not enough time feeling my feet on the ground.

Right as I left my therapists office, I turned and asked her “How long should this last? Do I have at least another month?” I meant the storm of good-emotion fuel, the feeling of being high on living. She said, “As long as it needs to. There’s no set time.” And although I told myself with forced smile that I could ride for at least another six months, inside of me, the storm began to quiet.

I tried to deny the silencing of the storm. I forged ahead, made an emotional decision that felt good in order to re-ignite the dramatic whirl. But what I found was the drama wasn’t worth the price I asked another person to pay. The seed was planted in my mind, I know the storm is coming to an end, and that the person I am right now is not the person I’m destined to become. I’m not the person I want to be…yet.

So now I’m standing here on a muddied path, feeling alive and humbled, letting the greenish overcast that fills the atmosphere after a storm flow through me. The color green heals, so I know that the coming down from the high is also part of my destiny.

Although I’m saddened to know the storm has passed, it also feels good to know that I’ve weathered it. I haven’t blown so far from my path that  it is unrecognizable. My feet are firmly planted in about a half inch of mud, much different from the waist-deep shit I was entrenched in months ago. This mud will dry, the sky will turn blue, the birds will sing and life is good.

Life is different, again, but washed clean and humbly refreshed.

One time an old friend said he pictured me as Peggy Hill and I about had a heart attack. Right there. On the spot. You can’t forget being compared to Peggy Hill. It ain’t funny, y’all.

I felt like sending him a picture, but seeing that I was 200 pounds, I refrained thinking he would then picture me as Miss Piggy! Besides, it wasn’t the physical aspects, I hope, but the simple fact that I now lived in “The South” – that foreign, steamy, mystical place we Northern Chicks sometimes think about, but don’t want to live. Now that I have lived there, I’ve found that most nights are not sultry, sit on the porch fanning and drinking tea kind of nights. They’re merely frigging hot. I still feel out of place, out of sync, with the others who can point to their great-grandmother’s house on that hill over there.

I don’t transplant well, I suppose. It’s been fourteen years of Southern living. If I were gonna grow roots here, they would have sprouted by now.

I’m starting to see myself as a traveller. I’d like to visit foreign lands and stay for awhile. I’d like to move to different areas of this country to see if I mesh with the natives a little better in the West, or the Southwest. Or maybe New England, although I have the feeling that like the far South, the extreme North may be foreign to me, too. I’ll visit Alaska via cruise ship only – I hear it’s breathtaking. Then, after the travelling, I’ll pick a place, or maybe the last place I travel to will simply pick me and I’ll stay because it gets me, through and through.

Part of me knows that this search for the perfect exterior place is a pipe dream. I don’t really believe I’ll find that place until I know myself through and through AND am strong enough to not compromise what I want for myself for what someone else wants for me, or for what I want for them. The exterior world mirrors my soul; if I’m uncomfortable somewhere, it’s because I do not know who I am there. It’s because I’m looking for some external validation that I am okay, perfect the way I am.

I have to be very careful and remember to pay attention to my self, my opinions, my wants and needs, before I go searching for someplace (or someone) that TELLS me I’m okay. I want to know that I’m wonderful, beautiful, creative and strong deep inside, for me.

This is a stream of consciousness writing I did on the beach some weeks back. Little punctuation, bits of clarity…just felt like sharing.

Sun Surf Freedom Coincidence and Lack. Suntans, sunburns and jumping in the waves, shaking Saltwater out of his hair. Sunshine and goodness, fisherman, vacancies. Maybe too windy. Waves drop into us as we struggle against their push. Wet and warm waves like the aftershocks of sex. The smile and sparkling eyes of a lover and the touch in intimate places feels like warm red wine not meant ot be drunk but for pouring pouring pouring.

Crafty and cunning is the body which longs to experience the carnal quickening of the heart, pulling hair just enough to remind of vulnerability but not enough to threaten. I could but I won’t. I trust but I watch and listen and compare those words to the ones I’ve heard oft repeated in anger.

There is a difference and the difference may merely be time. Perhaps at once, time catches up to us like a freight train with no brakes, slamming into the soul. All at once, one day, one small thing is simply too much anymore to tolerate that one thing shines a bright light on the multitude of smaller harshness from the years and it is too much. Too much.

I fight back. I try to regain some knowledge of who I am and what I want. What I want. The red pouring wine. The small kisses. The shining light from his eyes as he looks at me instead of past me as if i don’t exist. I miss the longing…but he cannot long for one accessible, easy. He longs for what he may not attain, not that for which he has conquered. And he conquered me. He took me. He swallowed me. And he was satiated.

I sat so long in hs gut that his insides started to churn and struggle to digest me…but I wouldn’t leave.  And he hated me for it.

Hated me. Hated him. I gave him all of me – All of me. And he hated me. Iam sorry I surrendered to him and I am sorry I remember the harshness of him.

I wish I remembered what my light reflecting from his eyes felt like. What I looked like to him when I was still me. I want to see that light again. I doubt that he will be the one to see me…but perhaps someone else will. I will see him, too.

A man who is tall and thick, with laugh lines around his eyes and a leisurly pace when we’re together. I’ll drink him in like warm red wine and touch him along the lines most will never touch. I will see his light and soak it in, then release it back to him so I can delight in his presence instead of his shadow.

He will lift me, I will lift him. We will be as one but two distinct loving hearts. His arms will open to me a billion times, and a billion times I will rush to fill them. Strong but soft. Supporting but freeing. If I fly away he will patiently wait and if he flies from me I will allow him freedom. Coming and going. Coming and going. Coming together in the end.

For the first time in a very long time, I’m dealing with a variety of emotions, bad and good (if I have to judge an emotion as bad or good…). In the last year(s?) of my marriage, I dealt with anger, betrayal, fear, bitterness, probably even hate. But now there is a whole world of emotion to experience that I didn’t recognize or had forgotten about or refused to feel. Most likely a combination of all three.

I was talking to someone tonight and realized that EVERYTHING is different now. The way I experience the world thrills me beyond hope and reason. My microfiber chair is softer, my cat is crazier, food tastes better, music means more. Water is a need instead of a treat I may give myself if I pass a sink on the way to do something for someone else. Now I stop by the sink all the time and I love the sound of the water whooshing from the faucet, anticipating the non-taste of the cold, and quenching a deep thirst I hadn’t paid attention to before.

The emotions swirling around my heart and mind excite me. Some I think I “shouldn’t” feel, but I’m trying not to shut them off. Maybe letting them run their course, as I’ve let my anger and hate run their course, will ease the intensity and mystery. Pretending not or trying not to feel something I feel is not a good thing – I know that now. Being inundated with these new-found high-energy hopes (and doubts) is luxurious. Like a cold drink from the faucet “just because”. I need it. I need this time.

Married to Will, I spent my days deciphering HIS emotions, his thoughts, his wants in order to avoid upsetting the balance. I didn’t do it very well and beat myself up about that. But what I was missing was my own life, my own internal workings. Outward focused, I forgot what it felt like to truly FEEL something that came from ME.

Now I am trying very hard to stay inside my own body. I am refusing to guess what he meant by that, what she meant by that. I am trying to ask questions and accept the answer. I think I throw people off a little sometimes. They’re not used to it – being asked to clarify. But I think most appreciate it when they realize that I am truly curious, not judging or waiting to judge their response. I’ve been lucky to be around people who are open to me.

Life is a luxury that I haven’t lived in a very long time. I’m changing that.

Absolutely! I can do anything good!

As you may have gathered from my last post, I am entertaining the thought of having some wonderful sex in the future. (:Pd:) While that is true, I can’t seem to think about sex without also thinking about a “RELATIONSHIP”. Well, that isn’t entirely true. I very well can imagine the sex without a relationship, but I can’t imagine me having sex without also having it evolve into a relationship.

Crap. That isn’t entirely true either. Grabbing some guy off the street has crossed my mind. But I’ve got to tell you, I don’t think it would work very well today. When I was in high school in the 80′s, probably; today, I doubt it.

I have a good reason for doubting it, too. The first weekend I was without my boys, my good friend took me out to a bar. (She’s a brave woman!) We got completely wasted, and bless her dear husband who both dropped us off and waited patiently until the wee morning hours to pick us up again.

I was not there to “grab a guy off the street”. I was there to drink. With my friend. And hopefully not cry. Which I didn’t.

What I did experience were several conversations with several guys ranging in age from about 25 to 65. Some were creepy, some were soldiers, some were creepy soldiers. Anyhow, at one point when a young soldier who hadn’t found a woman his age to talk to, he began talking to me and my friend. I asked how he felt about sex with strangers, and his answer was, “Well, I’d have to think about it. There are STD’s and shit out there.”

I wondered just how long a young man in this day and age would think about it. Back in my day, the thought was probably about 15 seconds. But I digress.

His answer made me think about a hundred million diseases that are out there, and that if I did decide to have sex with some guy, then I couldn’t trust a mere condom to protect me. I’d have to know him, know his history. I’d have to trust him (and the condom brand).

And TRUST is a difficult feeling for me to conjure these days. Anyone I’m with, from here on out, will be someone I trust. Which takes “some guy off the street” out of the running.

On the other side of it is “the guy”. If I am looking for someone similar to me, then he’s going to want to know my history, too. He’s going to want to be able to trust me. Because I do want to trust a man again in the future, then I have to make sure – completely positive – that I am being honest with any potential lover I meet. Or know. Or knew once upon a time. Or imagined and then discovered that he was real after rubbing a genie bottle.

And to be honest with HIM, I have to be honest with myself. And that could very well prove to be the hardest thing to do.

After all, I am getting to know myself over again. I am discovering how I’ve changed as well as how I’ve remained the same. It’s kind of exciting, but it’s also a tricky ride. Sometimes I don’t know if “old Kellie” is at the wheel or if I am doing the driving. It’s confusing.

I don’t want to default to “old Kellie’s” thinking because it may not be my true thought. That girl may be long gone, but I don’t think so. There are some things I remember about myself that I would like to repeat. For example:

• I loved to lift weights. I loved to eat foods that allowed my muscles to show. I cheated on those diets back then but couldn’t now because of slowing metabolism…but still. I liked that experience very much.
• I loved to draw and paint. I still “think” I would love to do that, but I’m wondering if my creativity is best served via writing now.
• I loved sex. It was fun and adventurous, loving and crazy. I made mistakes with sex that I won’t repeat, but I wouldn’t take the experiences back for a million dollars. (Well, maybe I’d cash in on a couple.)
• I loved seeing people grow and become more of who they were. I loved it when my friends did something they thought they couldn’t. I loved it when I reached a goal for myself.
• I loved being able to accept that people could freely move in and out of my life while leaving the door open for their return. Sometimes when they left they never came back, but sometimes the miracle was in their return.
• I loved being a free spirit. “Things” weren’t always rosy; in fact, sometimes they were pretty shitty. But my openness to life and its miraculous events created more goodness than I had imagined. Being free allowed the flow of life to continue.

And yes, back in the day I had no qualms with grabbing up some guy off the street. Now I do. So there are things “new Kellie” is not going to do:

• I hate that I used to hide my true feelings out of shame or because someone told me I “shouldn’t” feel that way. I feel the way I feel, dammit. When I express the feeling, maybe it will change or evolve. Maybe it won’t.
• I hate that I kept parts of myself secreted away because of fear. I don’t want anyone in my life who judges me against him or herself. We’re all different…we’re all wonderful. Let me be wonderful too!
• I hate that I acted proud of some of my actions but secretly felt ashamed. I want to do things that I am proud of inside and out. This will require thinking before acting – a forming skill that I will develop more fully.
• I hate that I allowed myself to be absorbed by another person. I want to always see the line of distinction between “me” and “you”.  And I want to choose what is good for “me” over what is good for “you” OR consciously choose what is better for “you” because that’s what I want to do, not because “you” say it’s the only way or promise me that my “turn” is only a little time away.

I am opening the flow once more. I’ve been closed off to it for long enough. I expect good things, and great things happen. Boy, some guy is going to be lucky to know me…in a few years.

A few days ago, my boss gave me a tape measure with my name written on it in permanent marker. I was so darn happy to see that thing – such a simple thing, yet it caused me so much joy! My name in permanent marker on a tape measure. Go figure.

So anyway, today she gave me a raise! I was so surprised I started jumping up and down and then realized I didn’t have the appropriate bra on for heavy jumping and composed myself.

No, I don’t make a lot of money, but when I’m careful, I’ll make “enough”. I’ve got some big dreams and hopes that need financing, and minimum wage plus a quarter/hour isn’t going to cut it. Nevertheless, I feel at home at this job. I love the people, I love the work.

In fact, I find wood-working to be very sensual. I absolutely turn myself on at work   I am wondering if it’s the wood and the work, or if I’m just horny all the time! LOL Oh well. I’ll just enjoy it while it lasts. But if I’m 95 years old and own my own woodworking/refinishing business, you’ll know why.

Speaking of being, um, sensually minded, I am finding freedom in this area too. With Will, the sexual aspects of our relationship were stale. He is a very attractive guy, when we did have sex I could imagine better times. But now, it feels like someone tore off my blinders. I inhibited my sexuality to fit into the mold 18 years of marriage created. There was no fun, no joy… Sex’s goal was to reach the end, the happy place, and the enjoyment of feeling along for the ride WITH him was lacking.

Not only his fault. It was both of our faults.

Awhile ago, running through my mind was the thought, “I wonder if sex would be better now, since we’re separated…?” My therapist told me lots of people wonder how sex would be with their ex after divorce. She said that she’d save me the trouble of finding out on my own – “It’s NO different.”  That’s good to know. It saves me some grief.

One downside to being sensually oriented these days is that I’m single. That’s a snag. I was married, so if I had gone through this awakening THEN, I imagine Will and I could have pressed on. Maybe made another year of it. I’m glad that didn’t happen on so many levels!

But hey, I get to work with wood all day. That’s enough for now.

Today I’m eating a really large beefsteak tomato, grown locally and full of flavor. I thought about having a sandwich, but the bulk of the bread doesn’t sound all that great. Sometimes, eating is a struggle. Still.

But instead of stress causing me to forget to eat, I just don’t feel like eating. I can be STARVING and not want to eat. I kind of like the hungry feeling, but it does absolutely nothing for my mood.

But this tomato, red and cold, hits the spot. I’m glad I took the time to slice it.

I’m struggling with more than my eating habits this week. There is a change going on inside of me, and I can’t quite put my finger on what it’s all about. I’m questioning my habits, good and bad, past and present. I’m wondering which old habits I could fall back into as I create my life, and frankly, although possibly damaging, the old habits sound comforting.

So I struggle with NOT attaching myself to someone, NOT allowing my heart (or libido) to override my good sense. I really miss having “someone” with me. Cats are nice, my boys are great…but there is a void that I’m not accustomed to just yet. I know the loneliness will vanquish itself IN TIME. But I don’t know if I am patient enough, or good enough, to wait and grow.

And then, I think about if I did find someone to spend some time with and I wonder exactly what TIME I have to spend. I fear that time spent not working is wasted; I need the money work provides. I love my job refinishing furniture, but I knew when I took it that I would need something else to supplement the income.

Now I feel torn between web design and writing. And torn between sleeping and eating. Torn between dreaming and doing.

But at least the tomato is delicious.

In the weeks leading up to “the separation day”, I would cry to my sister over the phone and tell her that I was “so fucking lonely” even though Will, our boys, my friends, and she were there for me. I was lonely; it was the first time I’d realized it, and I wondered how I could be so lonely amidst so many people.

I was looking outward for the cause of my loneliness, just as I looked outward, to other people, for a solution to end it. Isn’t that what we’re told to do when we’re depressed and lonely? Volunteer, make friends, … fill your life full of activities and responsibilities to be happy. But that’s bullshit. Those good deeds, the other people, the outward motions, they merely distract from the loneliness. They don’t erase it.

When I drew this picture, I didn’t know that the blackness inside of me was loneliness. I thought it was a flaw within me; that if I could find the source of the flaw, then the blackness would disappear. I was searching the blackness with a flashlight, but looking for the wrong objects. What the flashlight revealed was a great emptiness. A vast, tightly compacted, black hole. Nothing else.

But I missed the blackness because I was looking for THE FLAW.

Realizing I was lonely when I was still with Will was more painful in many ways than the loneliness I now feel. I brought that pain on myself because I EXPECTED him to “make me” not lonely. I thought that if I reached out hard enough, long enough, that he would eventually connect with me, ease my pain.

Expecting him to “make me” feel something caused the flurry of side emotions. Every time he didn’t do as I expected, I felt betrayed, hurt, unloved, crushed…those emotions distracted me from the truth and any possible solutions.

Loneliness is realizing there is a black emptiness within myself. Loneliness is the place where I do not allow the light.

I chose to keep this black hole inside me because searching the blackness with a tiny flashlight is scary; finding NOTHING when I hoped to find THE SOURCE is actually terrifying. (Kind of like in horror movies when the flashlight is darting from corner to corner – you don’t want the heroine to find the monster, but when she does see it then there is a sweet release. At least now she knows from which direction to fight or run.)

But I am changing course. I’m not going to search that blackness with a tiny light. I’m going to flood it with light.

If my loneliness is like a black hole, a dead star, then in time, it will explode outward from the force of its own compaction. When it explodes, it will form a new universe, a new beginning. All new. All me, but re-formed and rejuvenated.

I am unaware of when my black hole’s lifespan will evolve. What is the moment before the explosion going to feel like? Will I notice when it happens? Will I feel the Big Bang?

Is it possible that an infusion of intensive LIGHT, which is both nothing and everything on which our world depends, could hasten a black hole’s end? Is LIGHT the catalyst for the Big Bang?

I am going to concentrate on pushing light into the vast emptiness within me. Whenever I feel the rumblings of discomfort in my gut, I am going to imagine real love as a light source and PUSH that light into that dark space. I am not looking for anything. I know there is nothing there to see because it is too densely compacted to see anything right now. But after the explosion, ALL will come into the light; I will KNOW what I’ve created. And once I know, then I can either do something about it or leave it alone to see how it develops on its own.

I will have a new universe inside of me. A new universe to tend to, love and cherish. I can enjoy it and cease to rely on the external world for manufactured and temporary joy.

Take in the light, black hole. Your lifespan is at its end.

“…Stephen Hawking thinks that once matter falls into a black hole and reaches the Singularity, this Singularity at the quantum scale may actually become a gateway or a spawning ground for a new universe which would exist in some adjacent set of spacetime dimensions. Black holes formed in our universe, according to Lee Smolin, may actually spawn universes beyond our own.” - Ask the Astronomer