Why do I continue to try to fight a losing battle?

DT told me that he won’t ‘abandon’ me…he said that continuing therapy is my decision …but I often think that I’m way too demanding and unfair and I should ‘abandon’ him – so he can finally have relief from the border. He really is a nice caring person – I truly believe that – and he doesn’t deserve all the horrible **** I project onto him. He doesn’t. I do believe that he ******* up with the whole email/trust thing – but we all ***** up, right? Still, even with that, I’m like a walking time bomb and I have land mines hidden all over the place and he walks carefully because he never knows when he’s going to step on one.

I’m just so tired and frustrated. I feel like I’m in quicksand. My body aches so bad…my head always hurts, I constantly vacillate between sad/lonely girl, 5 year old, PAG…CONSTANTLY! I feel like I’m walking through a haunted house…I can turn a corner and something horrible can be there that will send me reeling – and then I’m terrified, curled up in a corner, wrapped in a blanket, trying to hide. And I can’t stop it. I can’t just throw it in a box and shut the lid. IT DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY! I can’t ‘ignore’ my body when it hurts, I can’t ignore the voices, I can’t stop “feeling”…IT DOES NOT WORK THAT WAY!

But DT doesn’t deserve it…no one does. I am way more trouble than I’m worth. It’s taking too long. I’m so tired and such a burden to everyone. Nothing works – there’s no “self-soothing” machine anywhere hidden away behind my heart, or deep inside my ****** up brain.
This whole process ***** BIG TIME! AND I’M TIRED AND I DON’T WANT TO DO IT ANYMORE! And I am such a selfish unfair ***** to DT. He doesn’t deserve my ‘wrath’. But I still get so angry at him and I CAN’T DO IT!

I only see one way out of this. And I know that DT needs the ‘relief’ just as much as I do. The whiny 5 year old will continue to ‘demand’ DT’s help and comfort…and DT doesn’t have the time, or desire, to deal with her anymore. I don’t blame him, truly, 5 year old is unbearable. But the fact remains that there is only 1 way to get her to shut up…only 1 way to provide relief and peace to DT and to me.

Dear Tears,

How very sorry I am for what you have lived with.  You and I have not spent much time together.  I avoid you because I despise crying.  You avoid me because we are not supposed to cry.

So other than objectives, we have not known much about one another.  Sure, I've squeezed out a few tears here and there; but a sob?  Not really.  And those times that I have needed to cry, you stood by and fought a deluge at much cost to yourself.

Over the past few days I have cried.  And when I say cry, I mean real and bitter tears.  Tears stockpiled over years of pain.  Tears we both did not believe to exist.  As this happened I watched you through my blurry eyes, shaking in a corner.  You were waiting for him and he did not come.  We were both surprised.

No one hit us until we stopped crying.  No one ****** us until there were no more tears to cry.  Not once was the blood running faster than the tears.  In fact, there was no blood at all.  

Each tear, it did hurt.  Like crying razor blades.  But it was a healing kind of hurt.  To borrow a thought... it hurts a lot less to rip a band-aid off quickly than slowly.  Or not at all.  So I sit in my car and cry while I peel the neglected, crusty bandages of abuse away.  I do this while I worry about keeping you safe.  It's a role reversal of sorts.

Watching you with intent, I see that you are small.  You are a skinny  girl who is young, about five.  And now I am not seeing you through the haze of my own pain.   Without the need to dodge his fists, I see that you have glasses and black hair.  Your glasses are broken and behind the cracks you have no eyes.  No eyes that cry no tears.

No wonder.  

I can cry your tears now.  And it's OK if you never shed one of your own; that is not your job.   It's mine now and you know, tears are not that bad.

And neither are you.  So go and rest.