Hats

Hats

Throughout the healing process it hasn’t been the assaults, sexual coercion, and the emotional torture that has been difficult to understand. 

No, no.  It’s been resolving that reality to the person who was, on rare occasions, undeniably kind to me and charming to others.  The one who was loved by the family dog.  The one who helped out his grandma and had a really sweet relationship with her. 

It’s so much easier to think of them as monsters, and I’d argue that it is probably a necessity in the early stages of the recovery process.

But they're human.  And somehow that’s a difficult pill to swallow.

Fears

I’m concerned that I can attribute some of my recent progress to being with someone else.  I worry this makes the steps forward I’ve made “artificial” and if she and I should ever split I would crumble and regress.

Saw him tonight. On his new motorcycle.

We were in her car and the windows are very tinted. There's no way he could have seen me. But it still felt like he looked me right in the eyes.

Fuck.

Borrowed Time

"I’m going to leave you at some point.”

He left it open ended so he could use me, keep me anxious, and hating myself all at the same time.

I wish he’d just done it. Maybe I would have fewer nightmares by now.

Wrong

I thought that being with someone else would help me think of him less.

It hasn't really.

Despite understanding theoretically that 13 years of deep rooted programming doesn't just rectify itself in a few short months, in actuality it's... a little upsetting.

I can’t sleep tonight

Having no other adult experience with an actual relationship outside of him, I have fears.

I feel like I’m allowed to be human with her.  I’m comfortable blowing my nose and flossing in her presence.  That doesn’t sound like much, but it’s progress.

More than anything I feel animated, like, alive.  I can laugh loud and silly, and be excited about trivial things; I can take long, windy routes to tell stories, and forget what I was saying mid sentence.  None of this phases her.  I’m not an annoyance.  I’m not wasting her time.

Did I ever feel this way with him?  I must have.  I remember being willing to take a bullet for him.  Does that mean this is all going to fade too? 

I worry I’m going to turn into that hallow, emotionless shell again.  And that it had nothing to do with him always cutting me down, and everything to do with me just being soulless and horrible.

Maybe all this love stuff is short lived and fleeting for me, and my rotten insides will cause me to hurt her as well.