Writing, Meet Wall

I was reminded by Facebook today that, at this time last year, I was painstakingly "cleaning and organizing" my office in the house that A and I shared— a euphemism for preparing to leave and packing. I didn't even see it that way at the time, but even a few days later, it sunk in that that was what I was doing. 

Along with the above Christmas card from my sister, I found a pile of various birthday, Valentine's, anniversary and other cards from A. One in particular caught my eye for some reason, and I opened and read what she had written inside, a very flowery, romantic and affirming message. 

The above was the image on the card. The date was the Valentine's Day a year previous, so basically with 369 intervening days. 

I had the gall to confront her with her own flowery, "loving," romantic and flattering message and ask something like, "what has happened in only one year that this is no longer true?"

Now, we both know, this is a shitbird thing to do, tempting as it may be. Because we also know, deep down, that people never necessarily mean what they say or write. That it is possible to write the most florid purple love letter to someone while actually fucking someone else. I mean at that very moment. I'm not sure anyone has ever done this, but the point is: it is possible. It is possible for me to say anything at all. For example: the first person who is reading this and responds in the comments, I will send you a check for $5000. Obviously, I neither intend to do so nor do I "mean what I wrote," but by golly I can write it. 

So, to hold someone to what they write in a Valentine's card is unfair. Of course. And yet, on some level, it is a deeply disturbing and unsettling truth about our relationships with each other, that we are capable of the most avid and ardent declarations and the most backstabbing, lying, betraying and hateful behavior. On what then are we supposed to build trust? 

I am currently struggling with repeated bouts of severe paranoia regarding the behavior of others in general. Specifically, the loml, who attracts men readily and in particular, seems to be one of those people whose Facebook presence in particular attracts the same men, repeatedly. It's harmless, (probably?) I know with my mind, but when I see the same guy's name repeatedly showing up with likes, hearts, comments on every post, my skin starts to crawl. Then I sometimes spin out and imagine the loml is carrying on with this particular man. I was talking with one of these men who is a regular follower of the loml and he told me he is in a long distance relationship with an unavailable woman who is in the same profession as the loml and my stomach about fell on the floor. "I KNEW IT" said my wounded, paranoid, insecure self. Of course, he was talking about a different woman. 

Anyway, the paranoia is definitely rooted in this deep seated knowledge that we humans are capable of saying any damn thing at any time, and behaving very differently. 90% of the relationship with the loml is in words. In actuality, it would be possible for her to be doing any damn thing. The way the rug got pulled out from under me a year ago has left me with a weird, paranoid and traumatized part of myself where I fully expect every single goddamned human being is lying at all times. Obviously that's not a sane and sound way to live. 

Another weird aspect to my experience of the relationship with the loml is my sexual jealousy. I have not felt sexual jealousy since about 1983. Not an exaggeration. It burns in me pretty toxically sometimes regarding the loml. I had myself convinced for about 6 years that I was naturally polyamorous and that jealousy of my primary partner wouldn't be that big of an issue. Now, regarding the loml, the thought of her fucking someone else triggers horrifying levels of weird, primal ugliness in me. It doesn't help that she isn't naturally given to effusive reassurances until I flat out ask, and I am too proud to ask. Once I made a sarcastic comment about one of these guys who is always all over her FB timeline and all she said was "oooh, jelly?" haha. Uh. well. 

Anyway, yet another echo echo echo echo echo of last year's process. I wonder if I shouldn't try trauma therapy specifically, like the highly recommended EMDR. 

On the other hand. I guess evidence is mounting that EMDR is, like so much else human, a crock of shit. 

Humbled by Nonsense that Works

The year anniversary of the horrifying series of events of last year continues to unfold in odd ways. It hit me for the first time in a long time last night how bizarre yet commonplace (can those two co-exist? oddly, somehow, yes) it was that A fell in love with my first year college roommate. And how weird it was that she just stopped talking to me altogether for the entire month of February. And how I finally started getting counseling and saw a psychiatrist. 

I remember that for almost the entire month, I slept on the not particularly comfortable sofa in the living room. A had offered to switch and I turned her down, in retrospect I realize because I didn't want to sleep in our old bed. I was falling asleep out there on the sofa at about 2 and waking up at 5 every day all month. Most of the time, I was embarrassed to have A's kid find me out there, so I tried to get up before him. From February 1 to March 1 I lost 14 pounds. 

I managed to go through the motions of my daily life at ASU. Barely. The weirdest shit was yet to come, when I moved all of my stuff into storage on March 1 and floated for a few weeks, until I landed at an AA friend's. Well, I guess the summer was pretty weird too. 

Anyway, having just met with my counselor yesterday, I had a chance to compare where I was a year ago with where I am now. I've been disturbed by a return of some wild mood swings and darkness, but when I think back, I am on much, much more solid footing now. 

And here's the main reason: the crisis of my entire life back in February was essentially me hitting bottom with codependency. I absolutely felt that without the relationship with A, I would die. I would never be okay. And this triggered an avalanche of despair because it was a seemingly hopeless place I had been several times before. The basic idea being that, without a partnership and without love, I am a dead man. 

And the reality now is that I feel much more that, no matter what happens, I'll be okay. I might not be thrilled, I will surely suffer, I'll feel loneliness or abandonment, or I'll be stuck, or whatever. But I won't crumble, I won't die. The counselor asked why that has started to shift for me. I think it's because I have cultivated a relationship with myself. So now I have much more of the feeling that I am reliable for me. That I won't abandon myself, which is at least as important as trusting that another person won't abandon me. When the counselor first started suggesting that I work on my relationship with myself, I thought it sounded ridiculous. 

Cool CD cover bro

But it turns out it isn't. Or maybe it kind of is, but damn it, it's still helpful. Like the list of affirmations the couples counselor gave me back around this time. Ugh, what is this shit? But when I read through them, they actually help. That's humbling for sure. 

Instead of "we have met the enemy, and they is us," maybe it's more like, "we have made a friend, and he is us." The reassuring thing about this gradually developing friendship with myself is that it has the potential of never ending. I could make the commitment to never leave. Again, maybe that sounds moronic to some of you. But for a guy with mommy/abandonment/coda issues, it's gigantic. 

wow, just looking at this makes my skin crawl

Moody's Mood for Moods

In spite of almost a year of counseling therapy and buproprion in order to live better with persistent depressive disorder (what used to be called dysthymia, which I prefer, just from a linguistic point of view), I still wrestle with mood troubles. I can be easily sent into a spiral of a variety of chthonic states— paranoia, jealousy, resentment, self-loathing, despair. 

So I was telling a recovery pal of mine who goes to the weekly CoDA meeting I attend about this general mood disorder, and she recommended I try an app called Pacifica. I downloaded it, and it's been interesting. 

The app is based on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which I don't have coverage for in my student health insurance, so it's kind of cool that I can access some of the framework on my cell phone for free. Basically, the app randomly prompts you to check in once or more a day, and then track your mood, list associated feelings and carry out some kind of structured activity to become more self-aware. 

Screenshot of the first seven days of tracking my mood on Pacifica

It seems to help me realize in particular how often I drift into two self-destructive areas: catastrophizing and engaging in absolute thinking. When my mood has been low, the story seems to be that I am saying, first of all, that the future is going to be awful, and, second of all, that what I want will NEVER happen or what I don't want will ALWAYS happen. I have known this about myself in a mental sort of way for years, but it's interesting to have a daily reminder that I can become aware of these patterns and shift my perspective. 

In particular, the weird emotional landscape of both graduate school and being in a long distance, problematic love affair provide a lot of opportunities for me to feel many different kinds of uncertainty and challenging feelings. I like how the app also lists feeling words when I am trying to characterize my emotional state. The list is truly extensive and gets me to think about more subtle shades of emotional reality, rather than my usual blunt anger, sadness, fear, happiness. 

Behavioral therapy is particularly well suited to an automated process like an app, it seems to me. My only reservation is my resistance to developing an even more personalized connection to my technology. I have already been doing a lot of fitness tracking using the Fitbit Charge 2. But I guess I can think of it as adaptive and assistive, however, and in that way, see the good in it and take what I need, leaving the rest. I don't resist the technology of glasses to correct my shitty vision or all the other ways technology makes a better life possible, so I guess using digital tech to become more self aware isn't all that bad. 

Fiona

Out walking around the block last night, I was remembering how my dog Fiona died. She had had a large growth on her abdomen for a long time, but it became malignant. The morning I woke up, had to urge her to go outside to pee and then when she came back, she wouldn't eat, I knew she was very ill. She was always crazy excited to go out into the yard, and had never refused food in her life before then. 

In 2002, 8 years old, shortly before moving to LA

I took her to the vet and they said there wasn't anything they could do for her. She was too old for surgery and it probably wouldn't help anyway. So we put her on painkillers and fed her white rice and boiled chicken and tried to make her as comfortable as possible. But then she stopped eating even the boiled chicken. She had difficulty standing. It was clear that she was still in pain, even on the painkillers. 

The vet offers euthanasia at one's home, so my partner at the time and I decided it was time. They came over at the appointed time, on November 11th 2009, and we all sat around on the floor with Fiona. Another sign that she was not feeling well at all was that she barely reacted to the presence of these new people in her domain, the living room. Usually, she greeted people ferociously; one of her really bad habits was jumping up on people in a fit of mad love.  We took her outside. We wanted her to die out in the yard, under the open sky. Her favorite places were all outside. The yard was her haven. 

She hobbled out and took a pee and then stood there for a second, milky-eyed and snowy muzzled and as if trying to find her feet. Then she turned and hobbled back toward the house. "No honey, come on, come over here." She stopped and looked back. Then she started walking back to the house again. I went and got her and led her to the vet and his assistant, on the ground. My partner and I pet her and held her. The vet got a syringe ready. 

Fiona always hated needles and she flinched at the sight of it, but I took her head in my hand and cooed in her ear. "It's okay girl. It's not going to hurt." The vet worked the needle into her leg and she barely reacted, and an entire syringe of probably pentobarbital coursed into her. She started to buck a little bit and got a wild look in her eye. It seemed to me that she figured out what was happening, which is of course a matter of interpretation and is perhaps unlikely, but she was pretty smart and that was the impression she gave. 

She tried to get up and pushed against the six hands that were on her. The vet had either missed the vein or her heart was so strong that one syringe was not doing it. Hastily, the vet loaded another and injected her. She was not comfortable and seemed terrified, the exact opposite of what I had hoped for. I had imagined that she would just drift off peacefully, and I think that is what usually happens. But Fiona and "the usual" had little familiarity with each other, so I guess it's not surprising that things were going a little bit haywire. 

But finally, for about 10 seconds, she did calm down, and her muscles went loose. I kissed her head, and stroked her sleek back. She heaved a few very deep breaths. In a few more seconds, she was gone. She rolled completely on her side and her tongue lolled out of her mouth, her eyes wide open. You could tell her old dog's body was soulless now, inanimate. 

The vet carried her to the car out front. "Her ashes will be ready in a few days. We'll call. Take care of yourselves. She was a strong, good old girl." 

My partner and I went into the house and, in the kitchen, I collapsed into her arms and sobbed and sobbed and sobbed. 

12 years of her being a vital spirit, a problem dog, destructive, restless, neurotic, terrified of thunder and bed sheets, always eager for endless exercise, her toes broken repeatedly in her refusal to slow down, her love of water, her obsession with human food, her endless, unconditional, infinite and always forgiving and huge-hearted love. 

Gone. 

Where she spent the last 8 months of her life, mostly sleeping

I have had some weird experiences since she died where I could swear she was present, paying a visit. The sense I have always gotten is that she roams wild and free in many dimensions that only partly intersect with this one. Once, while I was camping on Isla Magdalena, I swear it seemed she was excited to see me and tearing all around, chasing birds, trying to find coyotes and reassuring me that everything was all right with her. It also felt like maybe she was saying a kind of final goodbye, like she might not visit again. She hasn't, yet. Strange experiences, to be sure. 

On my walk last night, the memory of how she died reminded me that all of the love that has come my way has been a tremendous gift. While it is true that I want to be discerning and aware of who my trustworthy people are, this is a kind of counterbalance to my last post about "the currency." No matter how much heartbreak, sorrow, loss, betrayal, confusion, jealousy, anger, resentment— love is a tremendous gift. I experienced a wave of forgiveness toward those who had wronged me, and forgiveness toward myself for all of my own self-inflicted harm. A sense of all of us simply doing the absolute best we can washed over me.

Fiona had that big-hearted capacity for forgiveness, for enthusiastic love, and an almost total lack of self-consciousness. She simply loved life and people and the world. She was game for anything. She, like all good dogs, always just took me exactly as I was. There was a sacred and wild joy in her that refused to be dampened by disappointment or other circumstance. I sometimes wonder how I might have better let her know how deeply I loved her and appreciated her, beyond what I had already done. I guess it has to be enough. 

She was with me for the last 7 years of my alcoholic drinking. Over that span of time, she and I moved seven times, including into a house with many other animals and into a tiny apartment in Los Angeles. Then she was with me for the first 5 years of my sobriety. We moved five times, including back to Santa Fe and then to Arizona. It amazes me now to see people post on Facebook or wherever that they have to get rid of a pet because they are moving. It never even occurred to me, with Fiona. 

The big lesson from her life and death is to love fiercely and with as open a heart as possible. The opportunities to love are gifts that come along unbidden and over which we have little control. Even when our hearts get mangled, if we keep showing up for the lesson, it's there. And we can stay ready for the next one, instead of closing off and becoming bitter. Because, one of these days, we'll be out in the yard and we'll start to hobble back to the house and the universe is going to say "No, come here. Come over here."

In the apartment in Los Angeles, just after the carpets had been thoroughly cleaned. She looks so excited to have new barf space. 

The Currency

"I think about you all the time."

That's cool, but I am not a mind reader.

Even in the best of connections, where there is a lot of intuitive knowing, mind reading is a toxic expectation

"You are important to me."

Funny but I often seem to be last or near last on the list. Or an afterthought on a side list that is on the side of the list. Or an area of your life that you have to set aside, because you are living a real life that I am not in. 

"I would like to communicate more, I'm just busy."

Very fine intentions. And I know you're busy. And I know why, and those are totally legit reasons. I respect the reasons you're busy. In fact, I spend a lot of time acknowledging the amazing things you do and the loving and intense ways you show up for others. But those reasons don't replace the space in which we could interact. 

"Here are all of the reasons I can't create space to interact with you:"

Here are all the reasons I don't find it satisfying what the reasons are, in the long run. Stand me up once and have a good reason, I'll get over it. Even a few times. That's how open and understanding I can be. But over and over and over as a general pattern where it feels to me like you are holding tight control over our interactions? I will eventually bail. I will eventually just not be able to believe or trust.  

Watching the movie with the sound off. That's it. Words don't mean much. Promises don't mean much. Intentions don't mean much. 

Action is the currency of love. Action is the currency of love. Action is the currency of love. 

Not: "what has this person said to you?" But: "what is this person able to do, what are they doing?"

Amazed by my tendency to make excuses for others because it is so important for me to believe that I am loved and that I hold a valued and respected position in people's lives. 

"It's okay man. You just don't get what you want. This person you want to be in relationship with just can't give you what you want, it's not possible, there's no room for concession. But you get to hear what you want a couple times a day at random intervals that are entirely up to the other person, and that's what matters! Besides, wanting this other person who is incredibly busy to interact with you, even to just throw you a pathetic little bone every now and then that just says, 'thinking of you' or 'I woke up with you on my mind' or 'I miss you and I'll talk later', well those expectations are just absurd man! And sure this other person can do it a few times and then just forget to do it, in spite of repeated requests, that's just how this other person is, this other person is just so busy! Even if you wake up every morning to absolutely nothing and go to bed many nights without any reliable communication or with the slimmest of indications, it's unreasonable to expect more!"

It's such horseshit. Unreasonable to expect more from an other person toward whom I have gone all in. Where I have made it clear I want all of it. Why do I do this to myself? I have ripped myself off for decades by settling for being second string, less than, an afterthought and being put on the back burner, but taking people at their word, that I am actually important. I end up being a goddamned sucker for a lot of people who know they don't have to work very hard to get with me because I'll just accept like one goddamned sentence a day. I end up trying a lot of different sick strategies to get reassurance or to get what I want. 

It's okay or even required for me to ask for what I want and when it is clear I am not going to get it, to move on. To withdraw, let go and accept that I am not going to get what I want and to reconfigure my investment accordingly.

I have been identifying my codependency as too much of a desire for interaction with people I love. That may well be a powerful part of it. But what is now waking up ferociously and stoking a blazing fire that I have to work constructively with is that another huge part of my codependency has been accepting less than what I want, sometimes accepting a fuck ton less. Because a). if I hold fast in my demands for more, I will be rejected and b). I am only loved to the degree that I can allow the other person to disappear on a regular basis and not be available. I have been judging my desire for reliable, sustained, trustworthy communication as being a codependent dysfunction. Clearly, this is not entirely the case. It's the way I want to relate. I want action. I don't want promises. I want a trustworthy and sustained connection. That's okay for me to want. 

I want to not take people at their word when their actions are contrary. Now what I want is the currency. Bring the currency of what you are saying. Show me through your actions. If you don't, then I will work on not believing your words. You can say whatever you want, but if I am worth less than your time, then I will conclude that I am worthless to you, I will feel worth less. It won't even matter why. Why just does not fucking matter. Why is a goddamned consolation prize. If you wish I didn't take it that way, too bad, that's how I take it, truth be told. I want to be in relationships with people who are trustworthy. I want to be in relationships with people who do love. Who show it in action. For whom I exist out here, hello, in the world. 

I want to have healthy and loving relationships that are about the currency. Not the promise. Not the excuse. Not the intention. Not the verbal reassurance behind which is behavior that looks like I am being ignored, taken for granted and put aside in favor of other things. 

"I am doing the best I can." I am absolutely certain that is true. And accepting that often means I have to alter, sometimes radically, my level of attachment, involvement, investment and expectation. Sure, the spiritual bypass says "just meditate and become like Buddha and let go and all shall be well." But I am also doing the best I can, and that means acknowledging the blood and guts of my humanity, and that means being honest that when you are repeatedly not available my feelings get hurt. Repeatedly. 

This is not a way I want to live my life. 

I want to work on having a firm boundary around what I put out into the universe, and make it a reflection of what shows up as reciprocation over the long haul. If you can only bring a few minutes of your time to my life every day, then that is all you are going to get in return. And the rest of the time, I am going to focus on areas where I am getting paid in currency. Where I am getting back to the degree that I am willing to give. Where I can trust that the scenario is trustworthy because it is reliable, focused, attentive and generous. These probably won't even be relationship scenarios. I have plenty to do as it is. 

I am generous with my time and energy. I pay attention and keep track of people's lives. I set aside time for people I love. I know these affirmations sound like I am leaning over toward martyrdom. "I do and do and do for you, and this is what I get?" But they are also a reflection of my relationship style. I show up. I make space for people I enjoy and care about. I pay attention and ask questions and open a channel for communication and then I stay on the channel. I notice. If someone I love makes a request, I do my best to honor it on a consistent basis. These are habits of mine when I am able to love through action. I tend to bring a lot of currency. 

I am choosing to interact at whatever level in relationship with people who are able to meet me where I am. TO DO the same. Not to say. Not to promise. Not to intend. TO DO. 

Action is the currency of love. 

Not Invited. Violated.

A weird event a couple days ago: arriving home to a large package on the front porch courtesy A. Inside, a stack of CDs of recordings of various performances and rehearsals I have done over the past 28 years or so, and a fork engraved with the letter "P", wrapped in a paper towel. 

At first I thought, well that's nice of her, to send these things. Then it slowly started to dawn on me that it was an act of violence. Because if you do not have any space in which to communicate with a man with whom you were in a partnership for 6 years, and you have completely cut that man off, but then you pull these weird, wordless creepy stunts like returning some of that man's stuff by mail without any communication, you are on the attack. You are creating a weird, creepy, abusive, unclear, symbolic arena of stalker-esque unpredictability. You are hostile and expressing your hostility in a way where there is no opportunity for it to be returned or even called out.

Irresponsible, immature, weird, unaccountable, wounding, creepy, hostile, sick and toxic. 

Good riddance to bad rubbish. Why I was actually trying to be in a communicative and meaningful partnership with such a toxic, narcissistic, emotional pinhead asshole is the central question. Why do I do these things to myself? 

The Occam's Razor answer is I hate myself, so why not form partnerships with people who also either secretly or openly hate me? Or who are not available? That way in appearing to get something good, I can suffer as I deserve to suffer. Good plan. 

Maybe this tendency on my part is starting to lift, as it seems like the loml sees me and actually loves and accepts me for who I am. I hold her in the highest regard also. Of course, the reality is that we can't be together, so that unavailability is still operating. And the realities of the loml's life makes her an unavailable limerent object a lot of the time. So I wonder. 

Anyway, I am also quite sure, knowing A, that she timed this particular stunt to coincide with the anniversary or her trip to Seattle to see her paramour. Quite sure. 

The only thing I'm angry about at the moment is that these creepy bullshit gestures still seem to have the power to throw me. That I thought to myself "Oh, how nice, I should message her and thank her." Oh hell fucking no. The doormat days are over. 

I am glad to have the CDs back and had assumed that I discarded them after I digitized them all. I didn't need them since I have converted them all to mp3's. Thbe funny thing is, I am going to double check against my files and, if I have digitized them all, into the trash they go. I'm also sure there is some weird significance to the fork, but I'll be damned if I can remember what. Since it has the stench of idiot emotional shit attached to it now, into the trash it goes as well. 

Fuck all of this. 

Anniversary

This stretch from February 2 to February 5 marks one year since A went to visit her paramour. I am most definitely having an emotional experience as the year cycles back. It's odd how time itself carries energies, at least for me. Maybe that is because I am oriented toward ritual and the eternal return. 

I am incredibly angry, mostly, as I'm reminded of how everything unfolded. It's clear that I have reached peace with the rightness of the break up (in fact, I realized the wisdom of it by about June, during the wild field work season in Baja). I also don't fault A for her humanity, her falling in love with a new man, her path in general. It has taken a while, and a lot of stepwork, and a lot of prayer and meditation and self-examination and letting go and a fuck of a lot of fucking work to get to forgiveness for all of these things and for myself in my own role. I think forgiving myself has been the toughest of all. 

But the fact that is stuck in my craw like a rusted razor blade soaked in battery acid and that is triggering sharp, jagged, lightning bolt anger in me is simply the way she completely dropped, ignored, ghosted, disposed of and dismissed me. I had thought there were a lot of painful experiences, and of course there are, but it turns out that for me, one of the worst things of all is to be ignored. And I believe she knew this, and maliciously and hatefully stuck the knife in and then twisted it, for the entire month of February. 

And I am recognizing that my anger is mostly not at her, but at myself. That I stayed in that abusive environment for so long. That I was willing to "work on the relationship" even after she treated me like shit for the month. It was a nightmarish month of me sleeping on the couch, barely functioning, hoping for some kind of opening to at least talk, not getting one. And her lies and sudden Invasion of the Body Snatcher behavior— creepy and surreal. As if she became a different person overnight. 

And coming home from my AA home group on Tuesday, February 14th and knowing she was on the phone with her paramour. That scene was probably the nadir. I confronted her, asked her if she was talking with him, and she said "I don't feel like answering that right now." She was as cold as the bottom of the Kelvin scale, and out beyond planet Pluto. I collapsed into uncontrollable sobbing, feeling as if my heart, guts and gonads were being torn out by a sharp-clawed hand. And she didn't give a shit. The steely distance and her total lack of compassion stayed strong in the face of my misery. 

That event did at least dislodge me from my stupor long enough to get into counseling and go to a psychiatrist for depression, which had been plaguing me for about 18 months. 

But anyway all the memories are tumbling back. So I am working on making space for what I'm feeling. 

And right now, I am angry. Angry in that shaken hornet's nest, don't you dare even think about fucking with me way. Fuck all the people who take me for granted, fuck all the people who have sold me a fucking bill of bullshit, fuck my own gullibility for believing it. That's the storm currently raging. It's cleansing, but it's also fearsome. It's not the kind of energy I'd want to work out *on someone*, if you get my drift. That would probably lead to the need for amends down the road. But I am feeling it, and it is a set of whirling blades in my chest. I know enough to remove myself from human company when I'm consumed by this kind of storm.