I’ve been holding on to my feelings for a while now. Sometimes because I know J reads this, sometimes because I don’t have the words, sometimes because I’m annoyed that I’m still bothered by the past.
All through the years of verbal abuse, whenever I was upset he would tell me that I was being too sensitive; he would say, ‘Yes, I called you fat last week, but that was in the past why can’t you just let it go already?”
After the incident, he went to anger management and counseling for a few months. We’d talk through instant messaging and emails. He’d ask how I was feeling. Sad, I’d tell him. Alone. Scared. Upset. Angry. Confused.
His ears would prick up at “angry”. It seemed like that was the only part he’d cared about hearing. And then he’d turn all of his anger management techniques he’d learned in therapy on me, eventually telling me that I was just like him.
I knew it was absurd then, and I know it’s absurd now. I did nothing wrong, but from then on in order to keep him from having any ammo, I shut my anger away and locked it tight. Those months living alone in Italy I was sad, devastated, afraid, unsure, terrified for myself and my kids and our future, but I was never angry. I felt bad for him. I felt bad for blowing the whistle on the abuse, I felt bad that he had to live in a dorm and wasn’t allowed back home. All his stuff was still there. It was like he was a ghost. But I kept my anger in check.
He flies back in tomorrow. He’ll be back and he already stated that he wants to stay with me the month he’ll be on leave. I can’t allow that and it upsets him but I just can’t.
Now that he’s almost here, I find myself swallowing the anger, and it is bitter. I have every right to be angry, being angry doesn’t make me like him, it makes me human.
You tell that son of a bitch to fuck off. HE doesn’t get to be upset that you are doing what is best for you. HE should have kept his fucking hands to himself and been a better husband and father. YOU and your CHILDREN deserve better darling. You deserve a man who loves you unconditionally, who treats you properly and who would protect you from harm, not inflict it on you or the kids.
Oh, he reads this? Well, then let him read this, too:
Dear J,
You haven’t learned anything from your anger management classes except how to transfer the responsibility for that anger to those you’re angry at. That’s your definition of “management”: offloading the responsibility. You’re an immature, selfish, delusional jerk.
You have the nerve to ask to stay with your ex, while still exhibiting the same abusive and manipulative behavior you swear you’ve left behind? While still blaming her for your faults. While still ignoring your responsibilities toward the past, the present, and the future. While still threatening harm to your ex through the proxy of your children. Show me where you’ve stopped being a manipulative, abusive piece of shit and I’ll show you a liar drunk on his own myopic ego.
This isn’t about who’s fault anything is. It takes two people to make any situation happen. That said, the only aspect of this you’ve got any business addressing is YOUR PART IN IT. Your responsibility. Your failure. Your abuse. It doesn’t matter what she did, what she said, or how she made you feel. Even if we say, for the sake of argument, that it’s all her fault, it doesn’t mean a goddamned thing and doesn’t excuse you for a goddamned thing. What matters is your reaction to the situation, and that reaction was, and remains, unacceptable and unreformed.
You know how abusers manipulate their victims, J? They apologize, they swear it’ll never happen again, they plead and they beg. Then they dig in and remind the victim of how vulnerable they are, of how much they need the abuser. They remind the victim of how “good” it was, once upon a time. Then they turn the screws and blame the victim for the abuse. “You know it was good, then. I wouldn’t have done that bad stuff if you hadn’t pushed me. We’re the same.” Tell me where I’m wrong. Tell me where you’re not that guy.
So, no, you can’t stay with her. And, no, you can’t tell your kids it’s their mom’s fault that you’re not there. You can’t tell your parents that, either. Because it’s not true. You don’t deserve to stay there.
It’s all on you. Stop poisoning her, stop poisoning your kids, stop poisoning her relationships with the rest of the world. Own your responsibility, own your guilt, own your actions. Be a man. She’s busy trying to do the same on her side.
Until you can, nobody’s got time for your bullshit.