My Verbally Abusive Marriage

Abusers kill their wives and then themselves because once she is finally dead and motionless on the floor, he realizes that the life spark was hers and hers alone. In killing her, he sought to absorb her; now that All is gone from her, he realizes he will never ever and had never ever been able to use her life spark for his own.

Overwhelmed with true grief because he feels unable to live without leeching from her, he turns the weapon upon himself.

He truly loved her life force. His mistake was thinking he could ever take it from her and use it as fuel for himself.

Scary.

Will and I were unhappily married and I once mistakenly blamed him for every one of our missteps and evils. Although I thought I was trying to make him happy, I was really trying to make him happy so he could make me happy. When I failed, I wanted to run far and fast. I tried running away into motherhood. I tried running away into shame. I tried running deeply into loathing and hate and sickness.

I’ve run, but I haven’t left.

There must be a reason for it. There must be a reason greater than my experience to explain why I haven’t run from here.

Why must there be a reason? Why must I seek a reason why I’ve stayed?

I want to say I’ve stayed for love; but by my own admission, I don’t know what love means. So if I haven’t stayed for love, then why?

Maybe I’m tired of running. Or maybe when I ran into the arms of my husband, I did it for a reason other than escape. Is it possible that he offers something that I need to be me? Does and has he challenged me to finally find the All within myself? Is that why I’m with Will?

I know that being with him, in part, has caused me to find “Big Me”. Being with Will has forced me to look and listen inside myself, peeling back layer after layer. Most of the peeling hurt badly. Most of what I peeled back tore me apart, exposed old wounds. It fucking hurt.

I turned inward, away from him, away from what he said and how he treated me, seeking refuge in scarred and burned scabs that didn’t want to be ripped off, but in my frenzy to run, I ripped them away despite my fears.

Now that I’m getting a glimpse of the All, I want to pluck it out of me like an unskinned grape and present it to him. I want to show him what I’ve found so he may believe that the All is within him, too. My old habits tell me that I am supposed to use the All in me to save him. But that isn’t what All is telling me to do.

All tells me to stay quiet about what I’ve found. I’m not supposed to define it for Will because he, out of habit, will try to shame me into putting All away again.

You see, Will has bad habits, too. He cannot bear to think that All is in me because he thinks he should have All only to himself. If my sin is pride, then Will’s is probably selfishness. I don’t think “selfishness” is on the 7 Deadly list, but it’s enough of a sin to cause problems. I digress, “selfishness” is on the 7 Deadly Sins list; it is called “greed”.

I could be wrong about Will’s sin. I have no business in his mess right now anyway. This is about my mess. My pride.

In today’s psychology, there is a less deadly word for pride. It is codependence. Ask a hundred people what codependence means, and you’ll get 100 answers. Codependence is practically indefinable because it is a catch-all phrase for people who do things they shouldn’t at the expense of themselves and those they love but just happen to have an alcoholic or other dysfunctional person in their periphery. Codependence is acknowledged as a problem in itself; the codependent has her own set of problems, presumably exaggerated because of the “other” person involved.

My definition of codependence is the belief that I can fix everyone around me and that they, by doing certain things I decide, can fix me. Sounds like pride to me.

Pauline clued me in to two little demons running amuck within me, waiting for their day in the sun. I haven’t asked her why she did it, yet, and I will. But first, I want to take a stab at guessing.

As science is now showing, we find what we’re looking for. We thought an atom was as small as it got; then we discovered protons, neutrons and electrons living inside the atom, then smaller bits making up those bits. Light measures in waves and in particles, depending on what we are looking for it to be. No matter what we look for, we’re going to find something; the act of expecting to find something else always results in finding something else.

So, if I keep on looking for the bad shit floating around in myself, I am going to find it. Imagine for a second that I found every little demon wandering the halls of my mind. I named it and exorcised it. When I exorcised the last demon, when there was nothing bad to be found in me, what would I feel? Probably, you guessed it, Pride.

Pauline may be trying to tell me that it sometimes doesn’t matter what demons are running around in my head. Punishing myself by trying to exorcise tiny laughable demons is a waste of time. It’s not that I’m bad and there’s nothing that can be done about it, the key is that I’m bad and I’m good and there’s nothing to be done about it. I’m going to see-saw back and forth at times, and that is okay. The challenge is to keep looking for the good until I find pride, then back off and fix the bad until I find pride again.

This playground game can be played in seconds, in days, weeks, months and years. It is a constant, and it is to be an experience. Period. Not a good one, not a bad one, but always a grand one. It is the mystery, the life, the quest of a human. I will push the limits and get pushed back, continuously. This is what we’re here to do. Stretch and contract, stretch and contract, but above all, remain flexible.

I had become inflexible. The years I felt I wasted are simply years that I refused to stretch or contract. It took me longer than some and not as long as others to realize that I’ve got to keep moving. Standing still denies the All the opportunity to live through me. Being stubborn in my belief that I am any one thing (codependent, abusive, victimized) causes All to stop experiencing life through me. Life ends.

All is inside of me. All is constantly moving, growing and being new things.

Consider God, Christian format, for a moment. Old Testament God was full of fury and vengeance. He turned women to salt and burned cities, flooded the earth and murdered men who spoke contrary to Him. New Testament God was full of love and gentle guidance. He sent and sacrificed His son so the rest of us could take a lesson on what it meant to love outside of possession and desire. You could say the Christian Bible is a snapshot of God, or perhaps a three minute youtube video of God expanding and contracting. He definitely isn’t staying still.

God also fractured himself in the Bible. He created angels to worship Him, and humans to look like Him. And then He allowed a piece of his creation to go rogue. Lucifer (turned Satan) is the best of God who found Pride in Himself and exorcised that piece of Himself to the Earth. Why didn’t He send Lucifer and his buddies straight to the promised Hell? Because God knew that killing Lucifer wouldn’t solve the problem.

You see, God is ALL. He is darkness and light. He lives. He experiences. And He put Himself in each one of us so he can experience what we create as well as what He has created. God knows that to stand still means that He will die. Yet He gives an entire portion of Himself to each of us, as a loan, so when we return to Him, our bodies decaying in the earth, we can watch our selves reunite with All, and we will know, beyond the shadow of an earthly doubt, that what we experienced was worthwhile.

Funny, “I Want to Lie to You” also fits in the Six-Word Memoir category. I wonder if that’s a good or a bad thing. No judgment; I’m not going to lie to you, so it’s really a moot point.

I visited my attorney for the first time on January 26th – two days before our first court date. On that day, she asked if there was any chance of reconciliation. I told her that he would have to do a lot of things he swore he would NEVER do if we were going to reconcile. I told her that reconciliation was out of the question so far as I could see.

On February 13, I wrote Too Soon. At the end of the post, I said:

“Instead of blogging, I am going to write out what I want. I’m going to give that to my attorney (for record-keeping) and have her send it to Will. Then maybe he’ll tell me what HE WANTS and I can either be pleased, hurt, or angry, but I would be able to move ahead without feeling unheard and rushed.”

I wrote it out, everything I wanted. What it would take to maybe repair our relationship and maybe save our marriage. I never sent it to my attorney, but last weekend, I gave a copy to Will.

I told him that I was holding onto it because I didn’t think he’d agree to it. I didn’t tell him that if he didn’t agree to it that I would be hurt, knowing beyond the shadow of a doubt that he didn’t think “I” was worth the effort. If he doesn’t agree to the terms, then it means we’re finished. Completely.

But I want to know. I want to move forward in this life knowing I did absolutely everything I could to prevent our divorce. To prevent my children’s hearts from ripping in two. To prevent my heart from ripping the rest of the way. To prevent destruction. To give him a chance to face his demons as I face mine, individually, but together.

In the document I gave him, I tell him the what I want. I tell him he can add to it, but not take away from it; if I cannot agree to his additions, then we divorce.

I wanted to lie to you for awhile longer, waiting to see if he would agree or not. If he did agree, then I would tell you all about it.

But if he never agreed, then I would keep the shameful secret to myself.

I do feel ashamed. Once I left, I knew I’d done something that my family and some of you had been praying I would do. I feel ashamed because by giving him this chance, by giving us this chance, you may see me as a loser. You may see me as someone who retreats instead of someone who fights. You may see me as a true abuse victim, willing to subjugate my wishes to his. You may lose confidence in me, you may think I am a fraud.

I feel ashamed because I thought once I left, I would be gone for good, and here I am giving him another chance to break my heart. Even if he agrees to the terms, there is no guarantee he will honor them later. He has a tendency to forget things that are important to me.

But, on the other hand, I do not promise that if he agrees to the terms that all will be immediately well. I want this year apart. At the end of this year, even if we’ve both done everything I’ve asked, I may not want to stay married. He may not want to stay married. Maybe we’ll go ahead with the divorce. Maybe I’ll think we’re reconciling but he hits me with divorce papers.

I know I’m leaving myself wide open. That’s what I do – expose my soul.

Maybe it is better if you read the agreement. The only difference between what I gave to him and what I’m providing to you is his name. I changed his real name to “Will” as I do on this blog.

What I Want

Today, Will requested to come by at 3pm to pick up some of his things. The time wasn’t good for me, so I suggested a different time in the morning. I didn’t hear from him and he didn’t show, but that’s not what’s bugging me.

This morning, I waited. I didn’t do any writing or anything that I would consider “productive” because I was waiting for his interruption. Anticipating it. Instead of going on about my routine, I put it all aside so I would be emotionally “ready” for his arrival.

What did I do? I played a video game on the computer. Bored out of my skull, and waiting.

By noon, the deadline I’d given for him to come out here, I was angry at myself for wasting the morning.

I got to thinking about how I’d spent this morning, anxiously anticipating his arrival. I was nervous, borderline panicky; the match-three game numbed my mind and made it tolerable. Then I considered how many other times I’d played that stupid game and under what circumstances.

I played that game in the hour before I expected him home from work. I played it while he was working outside expecting me to be at his beck and call for food that he could prepare himself. I played it when he stalked around the house, pulling up couch cushions and bitching about the dirty socks and candy wrappers he found there (but didn’t throw away). I played that game a LOT, not because it is fun or engaging, but because it allowed me to jump up from it at a moment’s notice and TEND TO HIM.

And that’s what I was doing this morning. Sublimating what I consider important in anticipation of his arrival and whatever unknown emotions would accompany him.

You know, I think I did a video about this. Yep. It’s called Interruptions Caused by Verbal Abuse. In that video, I said, “I’ve been trained to receive permission to be myself, and then to have it taken away from me in an instant.”

I would now add that I’ve been trained to ANTICIPATE having that permission taken away. That’s what I did not only today, but last night, too.

Last night, I cleaned up the house some while telling myself “If he notices, I don’t care” (and not really believing it). Holy cow, the house wasn’t even a MESS!

This morning, I agonized for long seconds over whether I should make the bed or not. He’s been telling people I cheated on him; part of me wanted the bed to look like two people had slept in it and part of me wanted to make the bed but didn’t because then he’d suspect someone else slept in it because I NEVER make the bed…?! I decided to leave the bed looking as it did when I rolled out of it.

I brushed my teeth and put on some make-up because I didn’t want to look like I was a mess. I’m not a mess, not as much of a mess as I sometimes think I “should” be, and I worried about finding the right balance between OKAY and OVERWHELMED. What do you think of this: Mascara so he’d know I hadn’t been crying but no blush because I didn’t want to look too healthy. That’s what I went with. (UGH! craziness.)

Then I sat down at the computer, opened yWriter to work on my book, and then shut it down because he would be here right as I got going with it and I didn’t want him to interrupt the process.

So I let my anxiety over his upcoming arrival preempt the process entirely.

And then he didn’t even show.

Despite the past 24 hours of self-induced craziness, I’m ready to do something else I said in that video:

“…[when] I hit that invisible wall where everything falls to pieces, I feel like I can’t handle anything, that I can’t do anything, then I’m just gonna tell myself, ‘We’re changing the training. My ideas are important. What’s going on in my head is important.’ And even if what I’m doing has gotten a little harder or hasn’t turned out exactly as I’d planned, that doesn’t mean that it’s never gonna be [the way I planned]! It just means that it’s time to learn something new. It’s time to figure out another way to get around an obstacle, and from this point forward, I am NOT going to NOT recognize when I am falling into the pattern of denying who I am.”

So here’s the good news. I did recognize the pattern this time. Next time I see it, I’m going to press on and do what I want to do, accomplish something instead of anticipate disaster.

Right now, I’m resisting the urge to calculate how much time I’ve spent in the past 18 years NOT doing something I wanted to do because I was anxious about something that he might do.

This morning, I sat down with my hot sweet coffee and my daily planner. I’ve got a lot going on. Fortunately, the time demanded of me by others is (finally) organized. I’ve got therapy sessions, domestic violence group meetings, a meeting with Mrs. Earl to hear the results from the military investigation, a court date on Monday concerning custody, a class from 9-1 next week called “Career Makeover” in which I hope to practice and relearn some networking skills, and of course, taking Marc to that stupid school that runs from mid-afternoon until way past dinner. Of course, that isn’t all there is to do…it’s just a sample of what’s happening next week.

This separation is overwhelming. There are so many things that must be done NOW, and that leaves little time to do what is also important and must be in place before the end of this year. Namely, I’ve got to financially support myself and my boys DESPITE the demands on my time requiring otherwise.

So, anyway, I was sitting there with my sweet coffee and daily planner, and decided to write in my journal pretty much what I just wrote. You know, “get it out” so I could move on to what I must do today. Taking one day at a time and all that happy horse shit.

But when I start to write, all that comes out is:

LIAR!
You damn liar. You promised that you would love me, take care of me, for the rest of my life. You said that if I agreed to stay at home and raise our children so you could go out into the world and provide for us, then you would provide for me always. You told me that if I waited to make a career for myself that you would support my dreams as soon as you retired – we were down to 5 short years! You said to wait, to trust you, to be a good wife and my turn was coming. Liar.

You said that you knew we had problems and you were willing to work on them. You said that when you got home things would be different. You said that it would be hard, but you were willing to put in the work. You said you loved me and keeping our family together was what you wanted too. When I told you back in July of ‘09 that I had decided to stay, to trust that what you said was true, you had relief in your voice. You said you were so glad to hear those words, that you were happy for the first time in months. Liar.

You said that you wouldn’t be where you are in the military today without me, and now you’re doing your best to get rid of me, one rank from the top. You fucking suck, you abusive, sneaky, foul-mouthed, manipulative, lousy husband. You fucking lied to me about all of it. Liar.

And then you have the nerve to call me a traitor. Liar.

I am angry from my bowels up. I don’t know how long this will last. I don’t know how long until I am a “good enough” person to let it go. I don’t know when I will be free of you, of thoughts of you, of love for you. Back in July I decided to keep loving you. You had given me every reason not to love you, some reasons you gave more than once. I was willing to look past it, to look deeper into you for the guy I married.

I was willing to live with rough around the edges – you’re a self-proclaimed asshole and chauvinist, you stereotype people, you drink, you party, you work before you love me, … all of it. I was willing to look beyond who you are, who you are proud to be, in hope that ONE DAY you would treat me well, love me like you promised. Liar.

I only wanted you to be nice to me. Treat me and our children with respect and civility. You can be who you are and still learn to be nice. You could have even looked at it as if you were playing a game with me, fooling me, manipulating me to believe good things about you – that may have been fun for you. But you wouldn’t try. You wouldn’t listen. You wouldn’t tell the truth.
LIAR!

RandomlyK (as she is known around here) posted a list of rules she must live by if she wants to keep the peace in her home. This life sucks. Read her blog at Randomly Kassiopeia.

I also posted 10 Rules to Live By awhile back.

What rules are you expected to follow?

Victim or Survivor? There has to be a different word for what I have experienced and what is to come. I don’t feel like repeating the word “victim” to myself or portraying myself as such. I am a “survivor” of abuse; however, the word survivor brings to my mind those who have been shot, bloodied, or on the brink of suicide due to the abuse inflicted upon them. I don’t want to run around calling myself a survivor when I haven’t survived any major types of physical harm.

I’m not taking away from the fear and pain physical abuse has caused in me – those feelings are real and valid. But I’ve never looked like Rhiana in her post-abuse photos, I’ve never been hospitalized due to physical abuse.

I’m looking for a word that describes what I’ve experienced. A short, small, easily understood label.

I also have to be careful of what I say to myself about my experience with abuse. I don’t want to blame or label HIM in order to describe myself. My and Will’s understanding and take on our experience is different, and that’s really all there is to it. I cannot force him to admit to nor accept responsibility for any of it; I cannot somehow force him to stop blaming me for it. I can’t even convince him that his behaviors are abusive, let alone that his behaviors have impacted me in a negative way.

So how do I describe me (within the confines of abuse)?

• Sufferer (no, I definitely don’t want to live my life as a “sufferer of” anything; I prefer to recognize and correct instead of suffer)
• Contributor (I did contribute to the abusive cycle, but in a domestic violence realm, if I contributed to the abuse, doesn’t that mean that I approved of it?)
• Participant (somewhat close, but implies the word “willing” to go along with it and doesn’t quite describe the confusion mental and emotional abuse inflicts)
• Victim (yes, I am a victim of abusive behavior, but like “sufferer” I prefer to not live my life under the victim umbrella)
• Survivor (have I survived it? are there degrees of  victim-hood that hold greater claim to this word?)
• Wife of an Abuser (labels HIM)
• Casualty (closer…implies that I am still living although I’ve previously been in the thick of it)
• Recovering Victim (yuck. plain yuck.)
• Misused (as in “not cared for in the way I would have liked”; still not right because it implies that I can be somehow “used” or did agree to someone “using” me)
• Living with Abuse (begs the question “WHY?” and that requires an answer that the asker wouldn’t understand anyway)

I cannot think of a word or phrase that succinctly labels my experience. Yet. Maybe the lack of vocabulary for “the abusive situation” speaks more than one word could. Abuse itself is insidious, tricky, sneaky and quiet. It makes sense that Abuse wouldn’t “want” a label pinned to it.

Abuse is what it is. Abuse creates victims for awhile, then either disposes of that victim (killing body or spirit) or the victim becomes something other than Victim. Abuse uses someone else to inflict it’s pain; the longer the “abuser” stays in the dark about Abuse, the longer the abuse lives. Likewise, the longer the “victim” doesn’t recognize Abuse, the easier it is for Abuse to infiltrate the victim’s behaviors as well.

Abuse seeks to win and live and thrive in two people, not one. When Abuse is able to accomplish that feat, it is more likely that Abuse’s two victims will stay silent about the torment they inflict upon one another.

There is probably no one word to describe “this” and that is probably why I’ve been writing about Abuse for over a year.

As usual, I’m reading books to educate myself. Tonight’s subject is divorce.

The thrust of Nolo’s book on divorce is on deciding what kind of divorce I want, then considering how I want to get there. Do attorney’s hash it out? Do we have to go to court and air our dirty laundry? Or would mediation work for us?

But then there’s the big question: Am I on the path to divorce? Is there NO alternative? Am I going to get divorced in the same hasty manner I married? Did I throw out the brakes on this vehicle without realizing the road was headed down hill?

If we lived in Texas, we could get a quickie divorce (so long as we were happy with the separation agreement). In North Carolina, we have to be living separately for one year. I am beginning to see the wisdom in the forced wait.

I find myself wishing Will and I could talk. We both want to be away from each other. We both want the other to change. We both want to renegotiate a LOT of crap. And there I go speaking for him again when there is no way to know what he is thinking. I cannot, by choice and by law, talk to him right now.

I need time.

But my attorney wants my financial documentation yesterday. She wants to know exactly where I’m headed when all I know for sure is that I don’t want him around me right now. Isn’t there some way to slow down?

Will wants me to not show up in court for his next appearance. If I don’t show up, then chances are the charges will be dropped. Good for him, makes me look like a liar. I’m no liar; I’ll be in court. What he says doesn’t align with what my attorney says. He says I can’t trust a civilian attorney; I think I can trust a civilian attorney because I have NO ACCESS to a military one.

I trust that everyone knows military courts are completely different from civilian ones. Even Will, an active duty soldier, cannot hire a military attorney to represent him in civil court. JAG is not a free attorney service for the military. JAG only governs what happens to a soldier under military law (discharge from the military, dock pay, reduce rank…that kind of thing).

Because the military now pays attention to domestic violence and abuse, what happens to Will IF he’s convicted of domestic abuse is set in stone: he would be dishonorably discharged if found guilty of domestic abuse charges. That’s what Will says JAG says. I haven’t been able to get to JAG yet – they have a class two times a week and my other appointments have taken priority.

So here I am, being pressured to “not show up” in court and to get financial documents so “we can proceed,” and all I’m really wanting to do is to SIT WITH THIS for a bit.

There may be a really smart way to handle this separation and divorce that doesn’t involve ridiculous amounts of pressure OR money. I’m no attorney, but I think, given a little time, I can get a handle on WHAT I WANT and then find out WHAT HE WANTS and then see how close to agreeing we are.

I’m thinking a mediator is necessary. Will wants the cheapest way out, but I have a lot at stake. If I don’t have someone who can protect my interests, then Will loses nothing and keeps everything WE have worked for and created in the past 18 years.

I think he doesn’t care about that. I think he wants to rush things so I don’t have a chance to think. Or maybe he wants to rush things because it hurts. But ALL of those ideas are simply me projecting my own thoughts onto Will, and that isn’t going to help me one bit.

Instead of blogging, I am going to write out what I want. I’m going to give that to my attorney (for record-keeping) and have her send it to Will. Then maybe he’ll tell me what HE WANTS and I can either be pleased, hurt, or angry, but I would be able to move ahead without feeling unheard and rushed.

Yesterday I visited the Women’s Center that acts as this area’s Small Business Association. The Center offers two programs that fit me. One caters to “displaced homemakers” and the other helps people wanting to start their own businesses.

Under the displaced homemaker’s program, The Women’s Center will pay for me to attend some classes offered at one of the colleges here in town. I’m rather torn between wanting a job that “makes money” and one that is light on cash but heavy on connections to people I may need to know as I pursue my writing career. For example, the center would pay for me to become certified in many different types of health care jobs (aging baby boomers are making the career field lucrative). However, I don’t want to work in health care. I barely have patience when my own children are ill…why would I want to inflict myself on aging ill people?

Actually, I’m not torn. I don’t care about the money. Not right now. I’m willing to work hard and make a name for myself…but I do hope the money comes at some point! I wanna be a writer. So there. But I’m willing to forgo the “starving artist” mentality if something comes my way that fits me well. Maybe the money will come easier than I think; I won’t know until I put myself out there.

Under the business program, the center will help me write a business plan and introduce me to people in the community in the writing field, at the paper, at area magazines, etc. I look at a business plan as verification that the service I have to offer is a viable commodity. Is there a market for my writing? What topics pay? Where? How much can I earn freelance? What’s the best way to become published? Would it be better to get a day job (related to writing) right now and write my little arse off in my down time?

Will doesn’t pay attention to the labor forecasts because he knows that there will always be a market for “him” – he is very skilled at both soldiering (there’s more to it than wearing on a uniform!) and mechanics. He’s proud of his blue-collar mentality, and frankly, so am I. I’m a big fan of a good day’s work.

Will and I differ in that I see pursuits such as writing and art as valuable. Creating a work of art (whether it’s a story, a website, a painting) is challenging and rewarding. It’s not exactly blue-collar, callous-creating work, but that is okay. We each have our different skill sets, and I’m tired of putting my skills at a level lower than his. Yes, “he” places my skills at a lower level, but I have been the one who went along with it.

I don’t much feel like going along any more.

How the heck did Will get into this post?! I didn’t mean to drag him into this.

I suppose that Will and his ideas will be in my head and heart for quite some time. They’ve been here for almost half my life already.?

Some of his thoughts I will miss.

Right now, I am questioning my own darkness.

I know that I have tried to hurt Will before. I know he likes a clean house, so I would let it fall to hell. I know he likes me to serve him food so I stopped doing it. One time recently, I even tried to make him mad – on purpose! There have been times where I wished I were more like how I perceive Will to be. I have wished I could somehow learn what he was doing so I could do it back to him.

I always feel horrible about it.

Wait. Let me clarify that. There was a time when I didn’t know I was doing it. I didn’t feel horrible about it then because I was “acting out” in the only way that came naturally to me.

Since I’ve learned about co-dependence, I’ve been able to see how my passive-aggressiveness was a form of manipulation. It certainly didn’t work very well, but it was my attempt to gain control.

If Will came by his aggression naturally, then I certainly came by my passive-aggression naturally. It’s the only thing I knew. I grew up with it, accepted it, and never questioned it because it was what I’d been taught by the people who I loved and didn’t want to question. (Sound familiar?)

There’s a reason people like Will and I get together. We complement one another perfectly. We’re two opposite ends of the same spectrum, neither one less harmful than the other emotionally or mentally. Will’s bad luck of the draw is that aggressive people get physical.

When Will and I first got together, we both had the same traits as we do now. But our deficiencies weren’t as pronounced; they were easier to ignore and forgive. But neither one of us wanted to take responsibility for our own feelings. We wanted the other to “make us” feel better. Over time, our anger at one another for not “making us” feel better led to button-pushing. Every time I pushed his button, he inched further toward aggression. Every time he pushed my button I inched further toward passive-aggression.

Now, we’re at completely opposite ends of the spectrum and the distance between us is insurmountable. There has been so much pain, too much pain.

I am working my way toward the center of the spectrum. Sometimes it seems like a slow crawl, and other days I seem to teleport with ease. This weekend has seen my slow crawl. The exchange with Ramona brought out feelings that I thought were confined to Will’s behavior, but they aren’t. I am “healthier” when it comes to Will because he is the obvious perpetrator, but I realize that my co-dependent passive-aggressive behavior is not limited to Will.

A part of me wants to bring Ramona over to “my side” because to do so would hurt Will. Her appearance on facebook and on this blog took me by surprise, and the language she used sent me spiraling backward into my darkness.

She is right in saying the last post is how I see her family. “Growing Up Co-Dependent” is focused on mine. Neither family is healthy. One family has an outward appearance of aggression, and one has an inward expression of aggression. But the language I used in the posts is different. I am much more forgiving of my family than I am of Ramona’s and Will’s. To me, their family has been hostile. I’ve never been comfortable there.

I lashed out at you, Ramona, passive-aggressively with that post, and I am ashamed of myself. I thought about taking it down, trying to make it seem like it never happened, but I won’t. This blog is a record of my journey, and to ignore my mistakes or pretend I don’t make them at this point would be more shameful than making the mistake.

I do apologize, Ramona, for adding fuel to this fire and I promise you, I will overcome this nasty habit that is mine and mine alone.