Please pardon my French, but....F**K!!!
I'm so very much DONE with the way the highest of highs come with the lowest of lows.
A few hours ago, I was away from my cellphone for maybe half an hour, celebrating the massively successful completion of what probably was the biggest challenge I (voluntarily) set myself in my life with people who once were really good friends before I (had to) cut them off - all of whom welcomed me back with open arms and no resentment whatsoever.
All in the spirit of grabbing Life by the horns and practicing the whole self-care thing while my co-sufferer was once again isolating.
In those 30 minutes, he called, then sent an Email with scans of medical files attached (always his way of choice. He told me about his laundry list of issues by giving me full access to his files and leaving it up to me how much I wanted/want to know).
His ex-wife/mother of his child/friend/main stressor (yes, that one) has been given weeks to live. End result of pretty much the same health issue he is facing and that finally pushed him past "stressed" and into the first lengthy isolation that brought me here.
HE can be cured, although his depression has been running away with him.
SHE cannot.
She's always seen me as a threat to her status (which I was never going to be, the kid deserves to have both parents) and did her best to push my man's buttons until I got to handle the consequences - but NO ONE deserves this fate.
He can't fix this (in itself probably his biggest trigger), he can't handle being all alone with the kid (who's living with him and old enough to not need much actual parenting, but having a second person to bear at least part of the load doesn't hurt), and he's known/loved/cared about this woman half his life.
Now here's the deal.
There's NOTHING I can do, he's asked me to please let him handle this, and I will, but what I'm seeing at the end of this particularly dark tunnel now is a man who's probably going to be even more fundamentally broken paired with a kid who used to like me well enough as the new woman in Dad's life but probably (and rightfully) will resent me as a replacement for Mom (a role I'm VERY reluctant about to begin with and was happy to leave to her - but a part I might just have to get used to if there's any future beyond this at all).
I see lots of anger, four thousand steps back on a therapeutic path my man'd only taken maybe two hundred on, yet more triggering anniversaries and attempts to shield me from All Things Bad, even knowing full well that I hate being babysat, just so he doesn't lose anyone else.
I see a serious need for therapy for his kid (absolutely HIS kid - no way that one's going to ever agree to see a therapist), endless piles of crap and so F***IN' MUCH pain, it's doing my head in.
Within seconds, I went from incredibly euphoric and full of hope to get to the end of this round on the Ride Through S*it Creek soon right back to the beginning, yanked back brutally enough to give me whiplash.
Top of the world to bottom of the pit without a 'chute.
It'd be easier to give up on him. To leave him, his kid, and his entire clusterf*ck of a family behind and never look back, maybe I'd get a chance to practice self-care and actually reap the rewards for a bit longer than 30 minutes then - but I can't.
I won't.
I'd rather flood the country with whatever is going to spill from my cup within the next few...hours, probably, than ever drop somebody I love mid-war without at least trying to be there to pick up the pieces when the battle is done.
What I don't know now - and that's the actual reason I'm even rambling here - is...how does somebody even find something worth fighting for when there's nothing but WORSE sh*t waiting at the end of the climb out of the all-too-familiar pit? How can a lose/lose-even-harder situation be turned into something that might be lose/not-lose, at least, when there's no winning already?
Fear, helplessness, worry, a ton of guilt and anger aren't proving to be a good mix here.
I just don't see how I can push harder and farther, mentally and physically, than I did today to get myself to a point where I might be okay with myself and of any help to anyone. I'm also once again not at all sure why I should even bother when Life never fails to find a way to fling entire mountain ranges into that path.
This man is sick as a dog, he's unstable, stressed beyond anyone's limits and off most of his meds.He needs a break. He deserves a break. His kid deserves a break. His ex-wife would've deserved a break.
Does it make me a horrible person that I think I might've, too? :(
I'm so very much DONE with the way the highest of highs come with the lowest of lows.
A few hours ago, I was away from my cellphone for maybe half an hour, celebrating the massively successful completion of what probably was the biggest challenge I (voluntarily) set myself in my life with people who once were really good friends before I (had to) cut them off - all of whom welcomed me back with open arms and no resentment whatsoever.
All in the spirit of grabbing Life by the horns and practicing the whole self-care thing while my co-sufferer was once again isolating.
In those 30 minutes, he called, then sent an Email with scans of medical files attached (always his way of choice. He told me about his laundry list of issues by giving me full access to his files and leaving it up to me how much I wanted/want to know).
His ex-wife/mother of his child/friend/main stressor (yes, that one) has been given weeks to live. End result of pretty much the same health issue he is facing and that finally pushed him past "stressed" and into the first lengthy isolation that brought me here.
HE can be cured, although his depression has been running away with him.
SHE cannot.
She's always seen me as a threat to her status (which I was never going to be, the kid deserves to have both parents) and did her best to push my man's buttons until I got to handle the consequences - but NO ONE deserves this fate.
He can't fix this (in itself probably his biggest trigger), he can't handle being all alone with the kid (who's living with him and old enough to not need much actual parenting, but having a second person to bear at least part of the load doesn't hurt), and he's known/loved/cared about this woman half his life.
Now here's the deal.
There's NOTHING I can do, he's asked me to please let him handle this, and I will, but what I'm seeing at the end of this particularly dark tunnel now is a man who's probably going to be even more fundamentally broken paired with a kid who used to like me well enough as the new woman in Dad's life but probably (and rightfully) will resent me as a replacement for Mom (a role I'm VERY reluctant about to begin with and was happy to leave to her - but a part I might just have to get used to if there's any future beyond this at all).
I see lots of anger, four thousand steps back on a therapeutic path my man'd only taken maybe two hundred on, yet more triggering anniversaries and attempts to shield me from All Things Bad, even knowing full well that I hate being babysat, just so he doesn't lose anyone else.
I see a serious need for therapy for his kid (absolutely HIS kid - no way that one's going to ever agree to see a therapist), endless piles of crap and so F***IN' MUCH pain, it's doing my head in.
Within seconds, I went from incredibly euphoric and full of hope to get to the end of this round on the Ride Through S*it Creek soon right back to the beginning, yanked back brutally enough to give me whiplash.
Top of the world to bottom of the pit without a 'chute.
It'd be easier to give up on him. To leave him, his kid, and his entire clusterf*ck of a family behind and never look back, maybe I'd get a chance to practice self-care and actually reap the rewards for a bit longer than 30 minutes then - but I can't.
I won't.
I'd rather flood the country with whatever is going to spill from my cup within the next few...hours, probably, than ever drop somebody I love mid-war without at least trying to be there to pick up the pieces when the battle is done.
What I don't know now - and that's the actual reason I'm even rambling here - is...how does somebody even find something worth fighting for when there's nothing but WORSE sh*t waiting at the end of the climb out of the all-too-familiar pit? How can a lose/lose-even-harder situation be turned into something that might be lose/not-lose, at least, when there's no winning already?
Fear, helplessness, worry, a ton of guilt and anger aren't proving to be a good mix here.
I just don't see how I can push harder and farther, mentally and physically, than I did today to get myself to a point where I might be okay with myself and of any help to anyone. I'm also once again not at all sure why I should even bother when Life never fails to find a way to fling entire mountain ranges into that path.
This man is sick as a dog, he's unstable, stressed beyond anyone's limits and off most of his meds.He needs a break. He deserves a break. His kid deserves a break. His ex-wife would've deserved a break.
Does it make me a horrible person that I think I might've, too? :(
