Learning to Love Through Hate

"Where were you in 2020" is going to be an ongoing conversations for the rest of our lives. This year has brought with it so many new challenges that for many of us have made us question our pasts, fear for our futures and look in disbelief at our present. I figure someday in the near future, when we meet new people, sharing our 2020 stories to get a picture of that person will be commonplace.

For me, it is going to be a hard story to tell. The year began with my marriage falling apart. My wife had always handled our finances, she was good at it. She was also good at letting it get to her in a bad way. She had such anger issues that she would warn my step-daughter and I to leave the room because she was going to be paying bills. Looking back I should be thankful that she was at least self aware of her issues that she knew she would take that out on us.

In an effort to ease some tension in the house, I offered to take over that responsibility, mainly so my step daughter and I didn't have to be afraid of her on "bill day" anymore. For a while, it worked. Then we hit some challenges. A couple of big and unexpected expenses hit, I started shuffling money around and we began to get behind. What I should have done in this situation was go to her. I should have said "Ok, the bills are going sideways, I need your help." But instead I kept it a secret and tried to fix things on my own. It didn't work and the whole thing snowballed.

Eventually when we were on the brink of financial ruin, on December 17th of 2019, it came out and I was forced to tell her everything. It was bad. We were about to lose our house. The savings was practically non-existent. Her being upset was always bad, but this went to a whole new level. I tried to hold things together. I accepted my failure and my mistakes. I had screwed up badly and put my whole family in very real financial danger. I accepted the punishment that came along with it. Until I couldn't.

She had always had anger and control issues. For as long as I had known her. And me being who I am, I accepted that because I loved her. Sure, she had cheated on me... repeatedly. But I forgave her. Everything I always did was wrong, and I was constantly screwing up at even the smallest of tasks, and she was sure to make sure I was aware of it. Everything was my fault. When she started getting sick and was later diagnosed with lupus, I did all I could to care for her. That's where I shine, putting myself aside and taking care of others. But even there I would screw up and not make her food correctly, or if I cleaned the house after a full day at work, it didn't matter because something was missed or didn't get done before I turned in for the day.

If we were out somewhere and she was driving, if I upset her, it was nothing odd for her to take the car and leave me there, or pull over and make me get out on the side of the freeway with no way home. Then, after finding my way home somehow I would find myself locked out and have to sleep in the yard. I still have scars covering one of my lower legs from the night a colony of fire ants found me slumbering. I was always in constant fear of what punishments would come next. And after December 17th, it had only gotten worse.

But how could I blame her? It was true, I had ruined so much. I deserved to be punished. The only problem was, I couldn't handle it. One day I texted her to ask a simple question. Of course it quickly turned into a list of things I had done wrong, and needed to take care of. I asked her to slow down and back off a bit, I was overwhelmed and upset and needed a moment to breathe. I plead with her to back off a bit. I told her I was upset and needed her to back off, but she had no interest.

I couldn't take it. I found every prescription drug in the house that I could find, put them into a plastic bag, and wrote a note before jumping into my car and driving away. I saw no other way out. If I left I would lose everything. My home, my wife, my daughter... everything. So I turned my phone off and went to a far out corner of a giant parking lot with a bottle of water and a bag of pills. She was right, I was a giant ball of anxiety and emotion. I was constantly frightened, every day. I was scared to make a mistake. I was scared what she was doing when she was out at night. I was scared I was going to wind up alone and on the streets because I was a constant failure and disappointment and I could not survive on my own.

When I turned my phone on again it was to see which of the pills I had with me would make for the best balance of painless and quick death. I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't take being such a constant failure. A failure that would be doomed to years more of a wretched and hopeless life. Of course, the moment I turned on my phone I had a mass of missed calls and texts from my wife and my mother, scared and calling out. The guilt kicked in and I called my mother back.

Through tears and choked words I explained what was happening. She told me that my wife loved me and wanted me safe. I tried to explain how untrue that was, how she was a monster that cared for nobody but herself. How I screwed up everything I touched, that I was broken and beyond repair, so I just needed to end it. In the end, I relented and texted my wife back. As always she said how sorry she was. How she knew she was mistreating me and how she and my daughter needed me.

She had called the police when she found the note, and when I came home, she called them to let them know I was home. They soon arrived and I was taken to the hospital for an evaluation. For the next 4 days I sat in the psychiatric ward of a hospital, talking to multiple doctors and therapists, and what they had to tell me did not sit well.

"You are being abused.."

Me? Abused? That is a ridiculous concept. I'm too smart for that. I didn't believe it. I tried to explain over and over how they just didn't understand the situation. I wasn't being abused, I was a failure and a screw up and every time she punished me, even if it was maybe a bit of an overexaggerated response, I deserved it. I was a loser and a screw up and I was lucky she was still with me. It took days for me to begin to accept what they were telling me, and in the end, I hesitantly did, but I still went back home when it was done.

Unfortunately, no matter how hard I tried, within a matter of weeks it was over and she said she wanted a divorce. So I moved out of my home without argument and went to stay with my mother. I was a mess. Each day filled with pain and heartache. Fear of the future. Jumping back and forth from missing her desperately to hating her for what she had done to me over the course of 12 years. I told her she could have everything in the divorce, the house, all we owned together, everything, just to have continued contact with my daughter. In typical fashion she let that play out and stay out of the divorce papers until it was final. Then she would tell me to never contact my daughter again.

My mom was doing all she could to help, but within a couple of months she would become suddenly ill and I would have to end her life support. And here I am. Alone in 2020, with almost nothing left. I lost my job to the pandemic. I lost my mother. I lost my daughter. I lost everything in 2020. And now I am trying to rebuild. I am trying to learn to do things like love myself, which is hard because as a giver, I feel incredibly selfish focusing on me and my wants.

I am learning to process years of abuse. I am trying to tell myself I can find love, happiness and trust in others again. Some days it works, most it doesn't, but it is a process. A process that there is no easy fix for. I didn't want my marriage to end, and I fought that ending every step of the way as hard as I have ever fought anything. I still think about her daily, my stupid brain focusing only on what made me happy with her and ignoring the bad, just like I had trained it to do for over a decade. Yet, I am not sure that if she were to show up on my doorstep today and say she is sorry and wants to try again, that I would actually go with her.

I think that is progress. I think that maybe, that is me starting to find some kind of love for myself. Learning to take care of me, even if I don't realize it. I think maybe I don't really miss her, I miss who I wanted her to be, and having someone there that I love and care about even if I was not receiving the same in return. I hope I am right, and that I will find what I am looking for in life. I don't know that I am going to be alright in the end, but I have hope, and that is more than I had before.