And the healing begins..

The Treasure Map has been a really positive force in my life. I can already see that it is working.

I have been drinking more water, I bought some new exercise shoes, I got my teaching license out of storage, I am looking at options to continue my education *either continuing the Library Science degree at University A or going for my Masters at University B*, and people are starting to like me again.

I am blessed with people in my life who pretty much tell it like it is. Apparently I was the Bitch of the Universe when I was with my husband. I blame that on the untreated sleep apnea and having to walk on egg shells all the time with my husband.

I really let him take a big part of me. The main part of me. I am just now getting her back.

I am starting to open the door at work and actually go out and venture in to the world of people. And I have heart countless times the past few days "You are so funny." and "I had no idea you were so funny!", etc. Basically, I am funny. I already knew this. But I just never let anyone see this.

And it feels good to laugh. Gosh it had been so long since I had laughed when I was with STBX. I have a standing break time chat session with a coworker. I spend each Wednesday with at least one, if not two, others. I am enjoying getting to know people. And even if we are just all standing around complaining about the drama or the budget cuts, etc, at least I am interacting. I actually have people upset if I don't say hi to them when I walk by. Before no one could have cared less.

I feel good that I am giving myself the opportunity to be me.

I am thinking that it is probably okay if I move away to get a teaching job. I figure it is okay if I am paid what I am worth for a change, instead of always settling for a low paying job because that is all my STBX ever thought I was worth.

And I drinking Crystal Light again. I could not drink that for months, not after he threw that two gallon pitcher at me. It just representing so much hate and shame for me. I am glad I got over that hangup, because I really enjoy drinking it.

I think it is okay to laugh in the kitchen while the kids are napping. It is okay to joke with my coworkers, even though admittedly I often do not understand the music they listen to or some of the slang that they use. Which is odd because we are all around the same age. But I feel safe. I don't feel judged. No one is whispering behind my back anymore because I am no longer hiding in the domestic violence closet.

Yes, my husband was a total jerk. Yes, he was evil and he did terrible things to me. No, it does not define me. It does not take away from who I am. I deserve to smile. I deserve to laugh. I deserve to get to know other people and to let them get to know me.

I deserve to go back to school if I want to. I deserve to move out of state and get a better job, if I want to. I deserve to eat healthy 95% of the time and to have some ice cream once in a while. I deserve to move my body and to enjoy it when I work up a sweat and feel my muscles moving. Nothing is holding me down. Nothing is holding me back. Nothing is out of my reach. I am capable. I am intelligent. Just because one man on the planet was totally out of touch with reality does not mean that I must live DOWN to his expectations.

It is good to be me, right now.

However, I will admit that the thought of registering for college scares the crap out of me for many reasons. One reason is that I tend to get overwhelmed when large documents are in front of me. And two, I can't fit in the desks and getting one is a huge ordeal. However, now that my Mom works at University A, I figure I wont have a problem because she is kind of scary ;) And thinking about moving to work scares me so much.

I am trying to embrace these fears. "I am safe, it is only change" is written right on my Treasure Map. I am safe, I can do it, God wont steer me towards anything that I can't deal with. Whew.

I finished my Treasure Map

And it is fabulous! I love it! Here is a link to the picture if you would like to see it :0)

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=72104&l=ce578f9de3&id=100000880402818

I worked really hard on it and I think it looks good. Mainly, I am hoping to be more of my true self this year. And to work hard on establishing a healthy relationship with God and maybe finding a new church. And getting healthier is also on there. Career change, perhaps! Following my dreams!

I changed my routine around so that I can exercise in the mornings, then shower and go off to work. I am doing Walk Away the Pounds with Leslie Sansone. The DVD I have right now is called "Walking the Walk" and it has a book with it.

Things are going well for me right now. Very calm and relaxing at the moment.

Useless

My STBX is useless. And no, I am not being mean again. I am just stating what appears to be a fact :P

He is only allowed to talk to me about the divorce. Other than that he isn't allowed to contact me. Fine. So I e-mailed him asking if he had the copies of the last two year's tax forms, because I need them to file for divorce.

This is off topic- but does anyone know how you can get those forms if you don't have them? I mean, somewhere, someone has had flood damage or a house fire and has lost their documents, yet they can get divorced. I need to know how they did that. Because I don't think he will ever look for them- because he is useless.

Anyhow, I e-mailed asking that several days ago.

My STBX is OCD. He would spend a half an hour arranging the shower curtain in a certain way so it would dry properly. Being disheveled is not in his vocabulary. He has a ridiculous filing system. It would take him all of one minute to open the cabinent and see if the taxes were in there. Neatly labeled, of course.

He is just lazy and doesn't want to look. So I sent him another e-mail asking if he had a chance to look yet. He wrote back that it was on his to-do list and I needed to get over my expectation of a quick reply.

I wrote back that I expected very little of him. What I really wanted to say was "Is getting a JOB on your to-do list?" Or "Well it shouldn't take you too long, since you do NOTHING."

But I did not say that, but I really wanted to. Because, you know, he is useless and stuff.

Just give me the stupid papers so I can get divorced.

Muxed Up Puzzle

So we got a new puzzle some time ago at work. It doesn't come in a box, so the kids are pretty much on their own to put the picture together. The puzzle only has two shapes of pieces, so they pretty much all fit together, no matter if it makes the right picture or not.

I was sitting at the table with one of my students, and she put the puzzle together. The picture was this fabulous jumbled up mess. I don't think more than two pieces could have been in the "right" place. I thought to myself that there is no way she will be able to figure this out, because even I had a hard time with looking at it being all jumbled. I would have had to take it apart and start again.

However, she, very simply, changed one piece at a time, until eventually it was right. I just watched her and was amazed by the process. And it made me think about my life.

My life is a puzzle, and the pieces are all mixed up, for sure. But I can sort it out one piece at a time. It will take a while, but in the end I will be back together again. Thanks for giving me hope, M!

Conditional Love

My computer is still in the shop, so I've not had time to update as much as usual.

Today was a bad day for me. I cried a lot. I am very frustrated.

My Mom got mad at me because I yelled at an egg. Basically I couldn't get the damn egg peeled so I threw it in the sink and yelled at it. She got in my face screaming that I have to respect her in her house. I didn't realize that yelling at an egg was disrespectful, but fine, I aplogized, whatever.

I resent being treated like a child. I can't do anything right according to her. I was trying to cook my meals for the week and she said I was doing it wrong. Well, you don't have to eat it!! She said that I had to cook the pot roast for three hours today, even though I knew there was not a snowball's chance in hell that that dang roast weighed enough to warrent three hours. But far be it from me to doubt her highness. So I put it in for three hours and she bitched about it being done an hour before dinner. DUH! I told you that it would not take three hours to cook!

I just resent the conditional love that seems to be offered by the people in my life.

My Father loves me.. as long as I am not a lesbian and I don't date any African American, Asian or Latino men.

My Mother loves me.. as long as I don't have purple hair or get my nose pierced.

My husband loved me.. (admittedly he only said he loved me about 4 times total over the 8 years, but humor me on this one) as long as I did everything that he said and worshipped him and acted like a "good girl".

Does anyone love me just for who I am? What is wrong with just loving me for me. I am not nearly as bad of a person as the Big Three people in my life think that I am!

A letter to my husband

Okay so I have been working on this for a few days now. It is a letter that I wrote to my husband, and at the end to my cats, my MIL and to myself. It is a letter detailing what I wish I had had the courage to say to his face. I will never send him this letter. It is a way for me to let go. I want to cleanse the negative energy from my life.

I will warn you that it can be dark and possibly triggering and maybe even offensive to some people. If you are really sensitive then maybe you shouldn't read it. I will not post any comments that seem to be judgements against me. I own my feelings and I am entitled to them.

Dear B,
I met you when I was 22 years old. I still remember the circumstances surrounding that. I was working with a friend of yours. He thought we would get along. I had never had a boyfriend before. I had never been kissed. I was living a pretty sheltered life with my parents. I had never lived alone or really ever done anything on my own. I was taking a break from college because my Mother enrolled me when I was 17. I almost flunked out, and I think I did that to rebel against her. I resented that she would not let me do what I wanted to do. Which was go to Mortuary College. Everyone thought I was crazy for wanting that, but it was my dream. I felt that my parents had raised me to be unable to take care of myself, so it was never really an option for me to move to another state to attend college (there are no Mortuary Colleges in West Virginia).
I gave my coworker my phone number to give to you. I did not think you would ever call, but you did. I remember seeing your name on my parent’s caller ID. Immediately, you pressured me in to meeting you that night. I did. I never really felt any sparks. I didn’t feel much of anything for you, actually. You were supposed to be going away for your summer job in a week anyhow. I did not think that I would ever see you again. But you did not stay there, instead you came back. And we started what would be a disastrous relationship. I can not help but wonder how my life would have been different had you not been unhappy with the living conditions of your job and come home.
I don’t really remember the details clearly of this time. I remember always thinking that you were not very ambitious. I worked a lot, as much as I could, actually. I was always working. I started working at 15. I worked two, even three jobs at a time. You would work in the summer then just hang out the rest of the year. You played a lot of video games. And your hygiene left a lot to be desired. You didn’t see the point in brushing your teeth or wearing deodorant, and you always looked like a slob.
I truly have no idea how I ended up with you. Neither did anyone else in my life. But I suspect my childhood played a big roll in that.
From the time I was 7 I have battled my weight. My Mother used to feed me diet pills as a child. She had this obsession with me not getting fat. My Father always told me that “Boys wouldn’t like fat girls.” I truly never did think that I would be worthy of anyone loving me. My Father also told me that when I grew up my husband would beat me for not being a good enough housekeeper. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that I did not think I could do any better and decided to latch on to the only man to pay attention to me.
I never felt anything. Kissing you made me feel sick. Being imitate made me feel worse. I would try so hard to come up with excuses to avoid being intimate with you. I have no idea why you would want to stay with me anyhow since I didn’t want to sleep with you. Not that you could have found another woman who would want to be with you. I really think I was the only one and will remain the only one. Many times I truly wondered if I could be a lesbian, because you repulsed me so much.
The first real abuse that I can remember was when you told me that I was worse than the terrorists who crashed in to the World Trade Center. You said that I was bad because when I was a teenager I ripped a picture of a figure skater out of a magazine. I got caught and had to pay a large fee to the library. That was the extent of my “bad side”. You were a full out cleptomaniac and admitted to stealing books from the local bookstore- however, my magazine picture was worse than that. I never could understand that- however, you were a genius and I believed that you were smarter than me. Of course you wouldn’t have passed English 101 without my help, but still I felt totally inferior in your presence.
The first physical abuse that I remember happened because I did not lavish enough attention on you in front of your friends. You were really mad because I knew a fact that you did not know. You were livid that I would do that in front of your friends. You did not speak to me for days. When I tried to talk to you about it, you backhanded me on your parent’s front porch. I felt that for days. I could feel your hand on my face.
You did not apologize for that. And when I told you later on that I would never allow you to hit me again you laughed at me. Obviously I did not follow through.
When you destroyed my parent’s living room furniture, my Dad banned you from our house. I still did not leave you, despite the damage. I was so stupid.
What hurt me the most was that you took away my choices. You made me do the dishes the way you wanted. You made me grocery shop in the order that you wanted. You made me put the shower curtain in a certain way like you wanted. You would not let me wash my car if I wanted. I was not allowed to eat some of the foods that you did not like. And what is worse, is that you made me feel ignorant for the way I did or liked things.
You called me “idiot” all the time. And “bitch”. I remember when you locked the computer so I couldn’t do my online assignments. You had a password set up and the question was “What are you?” And I would have to type in “A bitch” every time I wanted to do my homework. That broke me, B. I want you to know that that broke me. I want you to know how bad you made me feel. I want you to know how terrible I think that you are.
I believe that you are Satan. When I went blind in my right eye and they weren’t sure (and still aren’t) if I had MS, you punched me from the right side. You came at me on the side I was blind in so that I couldn’t see it coming. You are a coward. You are not a man. You never will be a real man. Real men do not hit their wives.
I remember the time you got mad at me at a gas station and you left me there. My purse was in the car. So here I am, no clue how far from home I am (we were traveling), no phone, no money, no nothing. I waited for a long time. You finally came back and asked me if I was ready to behave. If I was a good girl, I could get back in the car.
Fuck you. That is what I should have said. I didn’t. But I wish I had. If I could do this all over again, it would have been totally different.
I never stood up for myself. I never told you that I deserved better. I have no idea why. I had nothing to lose, you were already hurting me.
I ate. A lot. It was my only way to deal with the pain. I gained over 200 pounds. I don’t even recognize myself when I look at pictures before I met you.
I went back to college. I had a 4.0 GPA. I scored off the charts on my teaching license exams. I scored in the top 15% nationwide over a five-year period of time. Everyone at my University hated me because I was acing everything. You called me an idiot, and even after achieving all of that, I believe it.
But I am not an idiot. You are an idiot. You will never find another woman who will even want to go on a date with you, let alone marry you. I can’t help but think that the same will not be true for me. Because I am a good person. I am smart. I am funny and witty. I am not skinny, but I am working on it. I do nice things for people. I treat people with respect. I make people laugh. I am a motivated person. I am passionate about my career. I reach out to help people who are in the same situation and I encourage them and try to help them to see that there is life on the other side of abuse. I am none of the things you called me. I don’t have to wash the dishes the way someone else wants me to. I can hang my keys up on the keychain holder if I want to. I can wash my car anytime I want to. I don’t have to ask for permission to do anything. I am 31 years old. I am an adult. An educated, capable, fabulous grown up. I have a lot to offer the world. I dare say that the man who captures my heart is pretty freaking lucky!
And most of all, I deserve to feel good. I deserve to feel happy. I deserve to laugh freely. I deserve to hold my head up high and to be proud of my accomplishments. I deserve to be treated respectfully and to never have to live in fear of the next slap or kick. I deserve to make friends and KEEP THEM because I don’t have to be scared of what you will do or say to them to keep them from talking to me.
And I can promise you this- I will never settle for anyone less than what I deserve. EVER AGAIN! So if there is a person out there on the planet that might be for me- I wish you luck in convincing me of that. My STBX has made it that much harder for you. But I am worth it!
I have decided to forgive you, because that is a gift that I am giving myself. I have earned that piece of mind. I still think you are evil, but I can not keep playing the “What if” game in my mind. I picked wrong. I made a bad choice. It is time to let it go and move on. I put up with your abuse for eight years and 88 days. And I am thankful every single day that it wasn’t eight years and 89 days.
So goodbye. I am sure that I will see you in reference to the divorce. I will miss the cats. If you ever do meet someone, I hope that you are able to learn from your mistakes. I hope that you can treat her with respect and love. But mostly, I hope that you live alone forever, because I don’t think you can ever be with someone in a gentle, loving way.
So, this is officially it. I will no longer allow you to take up so much space in my head. I have $1.00 of energy a day, and I intend to use it on ME and MY interests. Not on my mistakes and your abuse. I think that could possibly be the best gift I will ever give myself.

Cornflake, BooBerry and CocoaPuffs- I love you and I am sorry that I had to leave you behind. I was financially unable to take care of you when I left. The marriage counselor said that B loved you far more than he would ever love me, so I feel secure that you are well taken care of. I am sorry that you experienced pain or felt as if I had abandoned you. I know that you are just animals, but truly, if I could take on your pain, I would. I know that you have forgotten me, because the time I saw you, you did not remember me. I am thankful for that.
MIL- you were a good friend to me over the years. I am sorry that I can no longer maintain a friendship with you. I will miss going to see figure skating with you and the times we spent sitting at your dinning room table chatting. I harbor no ill feelings towards you or FIL. You are truly good people who tried to raise your son the best that you could. I am forever grateful for the time you helped pay my medical bills when I had surgery and no insurance. If I am ever able to pay it forward one day, I promise that I will.
Jaime (yes, me)- I am sorry that I hurt you and abused you all of these years. I am sorry that I believe what B said and that I underestimated your ability to thrive. I am sorry that I used food as a way to cope, and have put you through physical agony on a daily basis. I am sorry that overeating has caused you to commit a long and slow suicide, and I promise to try and stop that immediately. I am sorry for the pain you feel every time the kids get upset when you can’t take nature walks with them or play more on the playground. I am sorry for the isolation. I am sorry I allowed someone to stifle your laugh and your smile. I am sorry I let him break your spirit. I promise that I will never let another person hurt you in that way again. I promise that I will be strong enough to walk away. I promise that I will be strong enough to let you live your personal truth, instead of constantly trying to manipulate you in to the box your parents, coworkers and general public want you to fit in. But most of all, I am sorry that I ever let you feel like you were not good enough, because you are an amazing person all by yourself.

What it means to be dying.

Every night, like clockwork. Three A.M. I wake up in pain. My back hurts so bad. From the stress of carrying my body around all day, no doubt.

It occurs to me, painfully, that I am very young, yet I must be dying. My body will eventually give out on me. My heart will stop. I will not live too long if I weigh over 400 pounds, I feel as if that is not possible.

I hate that I can't stop eating. I hate that the compulsion to finish something is always there. I hate that I have no self control. I hate that I feel powerless over food. I hate that I am going to die younger than anyone ever expected.

My heart is broken

I am so dramatic. It has been drama central at work this week because the two teachers I work with currently hate each other.

I have a really bad sinus headache right now. The Neti Pot didn't help much, although it got a ton of gunk out of there. I can't take a decongestant because I have high BP, so I don't want to mess with that. Although if I am still in this much pain tomorrow, I might stop at the pharmacy and get one on the way to work. You know, one thing my STBX was really good at was draining my sinuses. He had a knack of doing it and I can't teach my Dad how to do it because he is scared he will hurt me. Something STBX obviously never worried about :P

I have a feeling that I might cry myself to sleep tonight, which is bad for a couple of reasons. 1- the sinus headache and 2- the BiPap mask. So I am hoping to type this out and release it to the Universe somehow. Maybe it will help. I tried to vent on MDC but I don't think anyone knows what I am saying because of the Swedish Chef thing. And can I just say that my church totally ruined my April's Fool's Day fun on there? I was too upset to really enjoy it :0(

So my head hurt all day and my coworkers can't be in the same room together. That was the beginning of my day. Then I come home and my Mom gets mad at me for not leaving the shower curtain open.

Well, the reason I never did is because if I had left it open when I lived with STBX, he would have yelled at me and thrown a fit and possibly hidden the curtain so I couldn't shower again. So it is sort of ingrained in me to always close it. And really, all she had to do was tell me, you can't really expect me to remember from 8 years ago when I last lived here. I have been here for 7 months, you are just now mentioning it?!

Anyhow. I have blogged before about the Worst Five Week Time Period Known To Man. Going half blind, not knowing if I had MS, IV steroids, getting punched and having my STBX arrested, having surgery and my Mom having to move me in to their house, having STBX take my car from me and losing my medical insurance. Then the ladder hitting my new car, but that was small in comparrison. It really hurt me that my church did not call me during this time. Especially when I heard about them gossiping about me. Really? You can gossip- which is in the Bible you know- but you can't call and check on me?

I have held that in for a long time now. I never spoke of it to any church friends. It is hard to go to church now. I felt that I had given so much of myself to them over the years, that maybe they might care somewhat for me when my life went to crap? I don't know. I guess overall I feel very unpopular.

Not that I want to be popular. But if you had any idea the amazing support I have received from total strangers on the internet. Really, amazing. It is because of you people that my faith in humanity hasn't been totally shot.

I don't want people to feel sorry for me. I take on my responsibility for the mess my life ended up in. And I am rebuilding. I know that I complain about my STBX a lot, but really, I take most of the responsibility for being with him upon myself. I made my bed and I lied in it for years. I had the chance to walk away from him one month in to our relationship and I did not do it.

I was desperate, I did not feel that I could do any better, and I did that to myself.

But I so badly wanted someone to call me and say "Hey, I heard what happened. That sucks. I will pray for you."

Do I deserve to have support from my church family? I have to say that yes, I believe I do deserve that. I think that I deserve to have my phone ringing off the hook. Yes, I said it. That might be entitlement speaking, but that is how I feel. I deserve to have some of the people who I went to visit in the hospital maybe come and visit me. I was totally alone. I don't think anyone understands that. I had never once in my life been alone before. Then the police came to my house and they cuffed him and they took him away. And I was alone for the first time in 30 years being alive. I went directly from my parent's house to his house. I never had been alone at night before. When he went out of town I was at my parent's house. I could have gone there, yes, but I did not want to leave the cats. So I was alone in the house and I was having anxiety attacks and I had to go on medication *temporarily, for some reason I feel the need to make it clear that I am no longer on it*, and my Dad was so angry and couldn't talk to me without yelling about STBX and my Mom was mad at me for having him arrested, and I was just really alone. So maybe I needed that damn phone to ring. Or I needed someone to come to my house after the CT surgery to help me pack. I don't know. Maybe I needed a friend? I wish I knew how to get some! Someone once described me as being popular online. Yet in real life I am quite litterally alone.

I think it's funny, the contrast in that.

So today I get a church bulletin in the mail. One of the church members wrote an essay about how people shouldn't play Farmville on Facebook. Well, yeah, so he is on my facebook list and I sort of play Farmville. I had many church members on there and I don't think any others except maybe one play it, so I am thinking "Is he talking about me?"

Then they put this note in, with an envelope, saying "Here is your envelope, please mail us your Easter offering!"

God forgive me for saying this, but my very first thought was: Bite me.

I dare say that I am bitter about this. Just a little. So basically when my life went to crap and I couldn't spend hours upon hours doing church work for free anymore, you drop me like a hot potato. But when you want some money, you think it is okay to just send me an envelope?

Again, bite me.

I don't have any beef with God. It is not His fault that some of His people are totally insensitive.

When I was in college I lived with my parents and went to church in my old town. My Mom is the kind of Christian who wont go to church when they take communion, because it takes too long, and who really only goes when she thinks the neighbors will be there and she wants to look good. Her choice. I sat in an Ash Wednesday service and the ladies behind me where whispering about how I rode the bus instead of having a car and about how my Mom never comes with me, etc. I put my head down and I cried. It hurt to hear people talking about me. Today, I would probably have just turned around and said "I can hear you!"

So I think that maybe I am just not cut out for attending church. I am not getting out of it what I put in, not by a longshot. I did not do the things for my church that I did in order to get anything in the long run- but I stand by my statement that I deserved to be emotionally supported. Which is free, it wouldn't have cost them any of the money that I tithed to them. :P

So I sent them an e-mail. It was short. I just basically told them why I would not be sending in my Easter offering. And that I felt unsupported during my time of need. And to please remove me from their mailing list. I seriously can't get any more mail from them asking for money, it makes me livid.

This has helped me a great deal because it has taught me that when the going gets rough, I can only rely on myself- and my Mother. She might fly off the handle and take my ex's calls and think I was wrong for turning him in, but at least she lets me live here for free and puts food in my stomach.

So now that I have made myself sound like an entitled brat, I am going to bed. I am reading "Dear John" right now. Oh man, how I wish I could have felt like that once in my life. The whole being in love and feeling like you have known someone forever and feeling safe. My husband hurt my feelings and made me feel kind of nauseated most of the time. I wish I hadn't given myself to him. I wish I had held out for someone who deserved me. Heck, does anyone deserve me? Maybe not. I can't help but feel jealous when I read these things. Is love really like that? Please tell me that it is. Please tell me that it is possible to feel so good about another human being? What is being in love like? Do you feel good inside? I never felt good inside. I read those words and I think that it must really be that way for some people, or else how could the author write about it?