Next Step, Moving On

[dorightman]

I'am at my mom's house for christmas, w and kids didn't come. I've been thinking about my switch and feeling down. I have an email from w she wrote a few weeks ago. Will post and am looking for your advice/impressions of her "story". Also want to know if anyone thinks there's any hope at all. I'm not feeling hopeful at the moment. email from w:

I'm sorry. I hate hurting you. I have carried with me so much sadness throughout the years...and yes, our relationship has served to reinforce so many of my problems. It allowed me to be invisible in the ways I believed I needed to be. But the converse of that experience was also missing in our relationship. I didn't shine. I was ignored, mostly. I didn't see a reflection back of myself that I could embrace. I felt dulled, ignored and stifled. I knew you were attached to me, but I felt dispensable a lot of time. I felt like I could be any girl so long as I could cook and clean, not to mention how much more valuable I be if I earned a dime and quit making so many demands. I felt criticized and unappreciated so much of the time and before I became a mother, it was somehow easier to deny my feelings, though never easy. I think deep down I never really loved what I was doing or who I was. But once I became a mother my whole world opened up. I wanted to be seen for all the work I was doing, for the miracle of having created something so spectacular together. I wanted support that was more than financial. I wanted a best friend and partner. For all the efforts you've been putting in recently, you have to remember that mostly you were absent to me. Not because of touring, but when you were here. You were hermited in your room, cut off from the family, resentful, angry, depressed. You showed up to eat and [censored]. And that was it. You told me you only needed a piano and a bowl of rice and this nice lifestyle I "needed" was not what you wanted and that essentially by supporting it, I ruined you. I ruined your finances, your career, your health. This was the ongoing message I received. I started to believe you. I started to listen and hear that I was hurting you and much I felt you were hurting me. I was trying to adapt to family life, adapt to new motherhood and the countless demands it required. I was alone meeting those demands. One of the greatest gifts you have ever given me though was the opportunity to be a stay at home mother. I met every single need I could because of your financial support. It never goes unnoticed or unappreciated. Money cannot ever be enough though, at least not for me. I am relational, social and loving. I don't know how you can tell me I'm not. I'm having a reaction to years upon years of emotional neglect. When you perceived me to fail as a homemaker, I was punished, criticized, mocked. No mention or compassion for how busy I was trying to figure out how to meet the ongoing demands of a child on virtually no sleep. This went on for years. When I sought out ways to do for myself - either through friendships or anything really - you told me how high maintenance I was, how your mother never needed these things...blah, blah, how much we couldn't afford my high off the hog needs. I was never good enough for you. But I fought for our family....way longer than these months you've been fighting. I've been begging for years to wake up to your blessings. I know you went to therapy. I was and am thankful for the efforts. But you didn't go in with an open heart. The message was, "I'm doing this for you. I'd never do this on my own...besides the fact that we can't afford it." My response was always that financially we could find ways to support it, but emotionally the battle was nearing an end for me. The focus had to come off you finally and I needed to start to focus on myself. You cannot criticize that. Not really. How long can you continue to knock on a closed door before you realize no one is going to answer? And when I arrived at the place I am at emotionally and told you that our marriage had died for me, that is when you woke up? Do you realize how much that [censored] for me? This space that I've needed has been all in an effort to get clear. When we're together I feel smothered by your energy, your intensity. I understand it, but its working against what I need. So yes, I see the sacrifice. I see it and I feel it. It pains me more than you know. But our home situation was escalating to such a bad place because neither of our most pressing needs (besides the most basic) were being met. I know how wonderful you are, how brilliant you can be and how much you love your family. I've always encouraged you. I've always been a good friend to you. I've listened, cared and helped you sort so much of your own stuff emotionally. But I needed the same back. And when I got it from friends, you punished me for it. Just imagine what that like for me. Just imagine how alone you feel now and multiply it by years and add two babies under the age of 3 into the mix. Sprinkle on criticism for having those feelings and then give your body to me even though your heart feels battered. That is what I need to recover from. And yes, the wounds pre-exist you. My parents did a number on me. My father was absent always. I've been grieving that for years. But what I am grieving more than anything right now is how I betrayed myself for so long. How I allowed this treatment to go on, how I gave you my body so much when I didn't want to. I am battling my own feelings of self loathing for having gotten stuck in something so toxic, for having failed to get through to you in a time when my heart was still hoping. Go have your anger at me and your hurt, but please let me have mine.