Trying to detach from WTF world

[Treasur]

Thanks SJW - I was having a super bad day yesterday, not sure why. I think when I cry some of it is just about the horror of it all, at what he's become, and the pain for everyone including him. I saw some mutual old friends at the weekend who loved us both, but people don't get it do they? They think it is just a standard H runs off with a blonde game. That would have been much easier - easier to be angry too - but it is all the mad stuff that goes with it. It means I have to take a step back and remind myself that no, this crazy stuff isn't normal. That it isn't me deluding myself. That I'm not mad. My uncle said to me recently that if you put this stuff in a book, people would say it was nonsensical and too far-fetched. Yup. But I still have to deal with the practical effects of it. (That does make me angry sometimes.)

I think I'm with you, MrCAS, but I think what doesn't kill you makes you weaker for a while before you get stronger. I feel like I've been hard pruned like an old climbing rose! Like you, life is far from rebuilt and I'm still limping, but I am rebuilding slowly. I'm lucky that I have pretty good self-esteem and strong values and faith. Without those, I would have got lost in the mad confusion of it all. I don't know what will come next for my life but I've always known that this wasn't down to me.

I suppose what has mattered to me most is to not let my H's dark rollercoaster suck me into becoming who I am not or rewriting my reality. I can't control either my mother's dementia or my husband's chaos. It hurts when she spits in my face because she thinks I'm the devil. It hurts to see that my H lies and steals and sees me and our marriage as worthless. But I know I'm not the devil and I know I'm not worthless even if the crazy people think so! I can choose to be compassionate and rational, even when I feel hurt and attacked and overwhelmed. Still, I miss my mother as she was just as much as I miss my beloved.

I guess sometimes it is all so horrific that, like you, I just shake my head at the pain and destruction of it all, at how extreme it all is and how little I can do to change that other than turn away from it. And have a massive umbrella to protect myself from my H's storm!