somedays…

some days it is so hard to even stay here. i feel like screaming and running. i do know it is my choice to stay. i also know that he has become almost unbearable to like most days, let alone love. our journey in life is more and more separate. as individuals. hardly at all as a couple and rarely as parents together (most days i am told, “you are such the better parent, you just deal with it.”)  there are so many pieces to this broken messed up puzzle and i honestly don’t have the energy to attempt to put it back again. i guess i have given up trying and as far as our marriage goes, i realize more and more each day that is dissolving. fast. along with my husband’s health and his spirit. and ugliness and anger and resentment has taken over.

we had a doctor appointment today. we were told we are pretty much out of options as far as his treatment goes. i am not sure what we are going to do. he has stopped his treatments and i do support that. he has let his bipolar meds lapse and i am very much not in support of that at all. he is still grieving his illness that he has on top of his mood disorder and they both are complicating each other and his not accepting of one makes him unbearable and ugly and i hate coming home.

we try to not even talk to each other much. we both just get on each others nerves. he is always telling me to shut the fuck up. to leave him alone. he hates (HATES) that i am able to drive and that he has to rely on me for everything and i know he doesn’t ‘blame’ me for his lack of independence, but he sure as hell takes it out on me. and the kids. though i try so hard to protect them from all the emotional stuff.  he really makes it hard to stay.

i used to try years ago. even at times when i was still with j. to try to continue to work on my marriage and work on me and my husband being partners. but it is so broken in so many places. and i don’t think that me trying is going to make it any better because it hasn’t in 20 years. i sure don’t see it getting better now that things are at their worse. but i don’t know what the future holds. (my therapist keeps reminding me that…lol)

so i put my protective walls up. around me and my children. and i promise myself that i can do my journey myself. that i don’t ‘need’ him the way i used to. yes he does still need me. more so now with his health declining. but with me emotionally detached and in self protect mode, i am slowly becoming more and more distant mentally from our marriage. the big thing that really REALLY sucks.. is that in the past, when i had my relationship with j, i didn’t feel the loneliness that comes from that distancing. i still felt connected to someone, because i WAS..

not now.. i have lost that connection all around and the realization that i am alone whether i stay here or not fucking HURTS. it sucks. i tell myself that it is not forever. this feeling. this situation. things change. this feeling will change. this loneliness will change. i will get stronger and more independent every day and i keep reminding myself that.

that, and even though i really WANT to run screaming from here most days, i know that my staying, my and the children staying, are what is best for us… for now. .. and someday in the future, perhaps that will change. so i create downtime for me (i actually have it scheduled in on the calender!) and i try to create less and less time that i am home with my husband and his negative energy and that if i AM home, that i remember to self protect. i remind myself that he is sick and that it is his disease talking, not my actual husband. *i don’t exactly buy into it yet, but i am trying*

i try to be patient. with my husband, with me, with the process.

it is such a hard change to be the caregiver, not the wife, the lover, the friend and to have to be guarded in your own home. trying to think ahead for me, not ‘us’ and yet try not to think ahead..lol. like, i know i will probably go back to school eventually. the kids won’t be young and live here forever (right?lol) so i try to think ahead slowly what that will look like without getting stuck on thinking about it. if i am still here as caregiver and not as a wife/partner, i will need more for me (me alone) to survive and be happy in the situation. for now, i have so many appointments and crazy schedules that i hardly have time for myself. but i want to plan that if we do get to that point that i will have something to fall back on, some life plan that will make me happy and i will not need my husband in the plan if things continue as they are.

he has accused me of getting my cards in order (his words) so that i can leave him when i am ready. i did not deny it. i just listened. he is so angry anyway he didn’t need any extra ammunition. he knows i am less and less dependent on him each day and each day that he gets more and more dependent on me as his disability takes over. its hard to watch.

i dont’ really have a point to this post other than needing to vent and get my thoughts out so i don’t scream (and wake the kids). tonight was a hard night to top off a particular sucky day and he said a lot of ugly and mean things. my walls are up, but sometimes i just get tired and i get hurt with his behaviors.  so he went outside for his escape. i went online to write. to vent & clear my head some.

tomorrow with be a better day…