My Job(s), I quit

In every crisis there are ‘jobs’, someone who organizes, someone to strategize, someone to be a cheerleader, someone to be the comforter, someone to take care of the practical parts of life ……….. Ideally, it is NOT the person in the middle of the crisis……… At least, in the last 8+ months, that is what I have figured out…….. Yet, in my life, those have been my ‘jobs’, and they are still assigned to me, as well as battling my monsters, flashbacks, known and unknown triggers, terrible rages, inconsolable sorrow and fear, night terrors, dissociation, inability to eat, sleep, getting myself out of the damn bedroom, and loss of days at a time… I am trying to heal myself from a blindsided betrayal and subsequent demolition of my ‘box’ of monsters, that I truly did not realize how big and terrible it was inside there…….

Diagnosed with what I see as a bit redundant alphabet soup This summer after knowing I was losing my mind and begging Vern, my Mom, my Sister for help for months, ultimately having to do it myself ….. PTSD, AAD, and DDNOS (what is PTSD but acute anxiety??)  I am still expected by those I love to be all of the above mentioned jobs holder……..  As I was for 40+ years, I started as a ‘caretaker’ young and it carried through to my adult life. Now I am ‘punished’ by those that love me if I don’t live up to ‘normal’ in their eyes.

Sometimes I have bad days, well, more than ‘some’ to be honest.. I am a very verbal chick, I believe in as much ‘transparency’ as possible, in that, if my day is tough, I work at saying that out loud so I won’t blindside someone. That is not fair to them in my mind, I do not like to lay landmines  and wait for them to hit them… I avoid conflict as much as possible. Doing this for them, is no favor to myself. Inevitably, one or more of my loves will push, prod, snap, chastise or any number of other things that are grinding me to dust… Most, circling around what I have fallen short on, or how I am not working hard enough to make THEM ‘feel better’ about me…. How they are so worried about me and it’s my fault I am not ‘all better’ by now.. It is making them live with undo stress, again, my fault…

I have ‘run away’ from the strife in my marriage, for a few days here and there… It has taken me a while to figure this out, but I now know there is no where for me to  ‘run’ for sanctuary, where someone would help me take care of me.. I have gone to my Mom and Dad’s only to have my Mom push and prod, wanting me to make decisions or just do what she wants me to do.. I can’t have ‘just a bad day’, it HAS to have a ‘reason’ and she will mine for information, rock solid reasons and if I have none, she will inform me of ‘what’ it is (because she ‘knows’ me and can ‘fix’ me, if I would only let her)

While at Mom’s, Vern is on the phone, defending himself and letting me know where I fell short… That happens for at least the first day, up to a few days.. Until I (if able) dismantle his justifications and he sees that…. Then, I get the, “I think this was really good to work through and I have grown for it, I understand now.” (again) I get that from him, he feels better about us, while I am laying on the floor bleeding, again (figuratively)

Gosh, I am SO ‘happy’ I could help YOU feel better… Pardon me while I just crawl to the corner to bleed out……..

I went to my Sis’s for the first time recently, since this mess started, thinking it would be the ‘quiet’ place I crave, only to be put under a microscope and pushed because I am not working on me hard enough… After the conflict that I was desperately trying to avoid, SHE tells me how much better SHE feels………

Then, of course, I have Vern, he cannot seem to keep it together for more than a week… I had found a book a few weeks ago that really ‘spoke’ to me, about me and ‘us’… In it, it spoke of ‘styles’ of conflict in attachment relationships in crisis… I clearly recognized ‘us’ in the ‘pursuing and distancing’ description… I am the pursuer (no surprise here). Here’s the thing, I see this, I told him, asked him to read it… I told him I am working to no longer do this, to give him space… Conscientiously or unconsciously he does not like this, at least that is what I am seeing… When I do not pursue him, he raises the price of poker….. As of this morning, I am done, I see it, I see him and I will not join this toxic dance anymore……

I am done bleeding out for these people….. At moments every one of them has been a bright star for me during this.. Trouble with bright stars, they burn out and the ensuing inconsistency messes with me……. Frankly, I don’t want to ‘bright stars’, just slow steady consistency and compassion at times, that is all…

I know this is not too much to ask, to take in me saying it is a bad day and just be a bit more careful, not much, don’t walk on eggshells, don’t get tense and wait for me to blow, don’t watch me like a bug on the wall……… Until YOU can’t stand it and start poking me……

How do I ‘know’ this? My Children, My Son who is 25, My Daughter at 20 (21 tomorrow, btw 😯 ) both of them knows my diagnosis, that I am in therapy (was, and going to again) They know the barest of outline of the ‘why’, it is enough for them, they accept it and ask no more….. If my day is ‘tough’, I say that out loud, they ‘note’ it and off we go, no microscope, no poking, they just accept me and my deep flaws and love and support me anyway… I don’t have to work to make them feel better about me, they are a bit more careful, yet there are no eggshells, no landmines…. It is a quiet’ support, I am still ‘Mom’, maybe ‘flawed Mom’, but, I have never felt I was ‘less’ with them.. They do not assign me ‘jobs’

Unlike the ‘mature adults’ in my life……….