Gaslighting or selfish, naive and blind...

[ciluzen]

Hey everyone; Pinn, Sotto, bttrfly, Pax...thank you for the support and input. It's always nice to have others who have been walking this road to talk with.

Whew! What a year! I have just finished the first year of my master's program and the hardest semester so far...for everyone. We all are not only taking pretty intense classes, but seeing clients at two different sites. I'm awake at 5am and sometimes don't get home until 9 at night. Part of the intensity is that we are all having to face our own demons...in our clients. I've seen individuals with symptoms of depression, anxiety, loneliness, confusion and so,so much past trauma of all kinds and levels. I've seen families dealing with substance use issues and grief and loss of loved ones. And couples...lots of couples trying to find ways to communicate with each other and be understood.

I find that in trying to understand and empathize, I see something of myself in all of them, and I learn more about myself or those close to me by listening so closely to these clients. By helping them I am helping myself. Selfish, maybe. But it seems that there really are no unique emotions; just unique perspectives.

We all say "let go" in these forums, but I'm realizing that its complicated...very complicated. In trying to understand yourself and your spouse, you can't help but have them on your mind. And we all want to understand what happened, at least at some point, so they are on our minds a lot. I feel that those who are able to let go best are those who end up staying angry in some way. Angry at how they were treated or, since it is more acceptable, how their children are being treated or are suffering. If you can make your spouse into a crazy, selfish, even personality disordered narcisist or borderline man or woman, it's so much easier to move on and away. The people we used to have loving relationships with won't tell us what's going on in their heads and they won't trust us to help them so the behavior is bizarre to us. We try to see their side and try to find our part in the demise of the relationship, maybe even beat ourselves up a bit; but with no input from them and often no spouse present to even ask, or no comfortable way to speak honestly to them any more, its easier to go back to our feelings of anger...and moving forward and away.

In my own life, I'm realizing I have know idea what will happen. My ex and I have talked a few times, but I realize he talks around the subject of "us", dropping cryptic metaphors while gazing at me intensely as if willing me to understand what he can't find the ability or strength to say directly. He's talked of how "people" should accept apologies and forgive the apologizer. How one can only do so much to save a tooth (he's a dentist) befoere it just needs to be pulled. He recently suggested to my daughter that she "kill two birds with one stone" and invite me to celebrate her birthday with him, I believe the first time that he ask that I be included in his plans with the girls (I usually invite him for holidays). He ended up not allowing me to pay and the two of us spoke in the parking lot for over an our afterward. He also called to wish me a happy Mother's Day for the first time since he left.

I'm more and more ok with being on my own, but that becomes another issue to wrap my mind around. People who know me, including my therapist, seem to love asking me if I think we will get back together or what would I do if we did. I used to think all of the time about that, but now I'm not sure how that would even look. He likes to keep me up on what our (his) friends children are up to and what he does or thinks about. He specifically avoids certain subjects (Bubbles and her family). But I sense that he wants to be near me, to talk to me more, but he is afraid. I feel that he is afraid that he will (again) do or say something that will cause me to become hurt or angry and that I will react the way I did before...with anger. I now realize how deeply that would hurt him...that he had lots of experience as a child with being screamed at and punished for doing something that he thought was fun, but found out was "wrong" when he would get in trouble.And getting in trouble in his family was traumatic.The rules were chaotic. Sometimes things that most people thought were bad were encouraged in his family. Things that many people think are good were made fun of or seen as bad. You didn't always know the rules unless you broke one. Obviously, anxiety was a family trait.

Anyway, again; I don't know what it would look like to be back with him if that was attempted. I still love him, but I see him as a child that needs comforting...less as a husband. Yet I still love talking to him...we still somehow have that strange connection that we had when we first met. He obviously has it , too. But there just seems to be so many things in the way. And I have so much to do on my own theses days, while he seems to be surrounded by both support and responsibility.