Reality Hits

Finally my life seems to be turning a small but significant corner. I can now name one of my biggest problems:

Dependance.

I spent a while on the phone last night figuring that phoning helplines was an improvement on doing something I'd regret later. I really wanted to phone Paul. I was desperate to speak to him, as I was the night a couple of weeks ago when I rediscovered the itchiness and queasiness of taking too many co-codamol. I couldn't sleep and wanted to get some much needed rest. I was prowling the flat like a caged lioness obsessed with the "Do I? Don't I" question of contacting Paul.

It may seem strange to those of you not in my situation that I would want to contact my (still) husband after everything I've said in the past about him and what he did to me. That was half of my confusion over phoning him and desperately wanting him to talk to me and tell me he cares still, despite all the differences and the issues.

The National Domestic Violence Helpline gave me the answer: I have been so subjugated by Paul that I have been (still am?) dependant on what he thinks, what he says and how he feels. I still (up to last night... the future is still in the testing stages) want to know how he is, what he's doing, how he's getting on and to have him care about what I've been up to, perhaps feel guilty about not speaking to me and so on. It's a difficult place to find yourself.

I have been advised that his non-contact is just another form of abuse, ignoring me when he knows from what's been said in texts and so on that I wanted to speak to him. I also now see the incident in the garden, the one where he hugged me hard, kissed me like he wanted me so badly and told me he still loved me, along with saying "we can't live with each other, but we can't seem to live without each other either" was simply cruelty. He told me what he thought I wanted to hear. He said all the words that would soften me towards him, and I now believe that all that guff he spouted, on the back of all the other evidence, points towards him trying to manipulate me into not asking for a financial settlement when the divorce finally goes through.

He also phoned me when I was walking to hospital to hand myself in before doing something that I would probably regret later: Another instance of wanting/needing to talk to him and not being able to, sending a text, then sending another asking him to disregard the first. He responded with a phone call, and told me he cared, that he wanted to stay on the phone with me as I walked to hospital at some god awful time of night and said all the right words, but I now doubt there was more than guilt behind the call. He said he didn't want the police turning up at his door to inform him of my demise, but to be honest, I don't think he would be that bothered. It would get him out of an expensive divorce after all...

I'm being such a cynic, but then again, what do I really have to work with?

Following the revelation about the police and all his caring, there was literally one conversation to say I'd been let out of hospital (I thought I owed him that much... How silly of me) and after that, not a thing. There''s been no "are you alright?" questions in any media from him, no checking to make sure I'm coping, no asking if there's anything he can do to help.

Nope, he's gone silent. He's either under orders not to speak to me, in which case, if he really cared, and I mean REALLY, he would have found a way to get a message to me to say his hands were tied and he couldn't talk to me on the orders of his solicitor. The other side is that he just can't be bothered, and all the protestations about how much he cared, loved me and so on were just platitudes designed to make him feel less guilt after seeing the way talking to him about our "relationship" affected me, or because telling me the truth might have caused a scene or made me do something while we were talking in the garden. I had a spade in my hand digging up a plant, and it doesn't take too much imagination to figure out that since his mind can contemplate violence against me, he probably thinks I could do the same back.

I couldn't for the record. I've had offers, but have turned them all down. I'm not having someone go round there to beat seven bails of shit out of him, despite people saying he deserves it for all he put me through. That's not the way I am and violence solves nothing. Even I know that despite inflicting it on myself a few times since the split. All it does is cost money in elastoplast and antiseptic ointment and leaves scars that I will carry to my grave.

I now also know the self-harm aspect of my illness is caused by the mental hurt of the memories projecting themselves as real pain. I've stopped now, but a few people have commented that it must have made him smile quietly to himself that he could still cause damage even without being here.

I worry slightly about his new girlfriend, and aired my concerns to the NDVH last night, and the girl on the end was also concerned. There's not much I can do though: If I say anything about why I left, then I'm the bitchy ex just saying stuff to split them up. I'm not for the record. I'm actually pleased that he has a girlfriend, and I'm not just saying that either. I just worry about her and hope that she won't have to go through the same as I have. I know he can be a nice bloke when he feels like it, but I've seen the nasty, vindictive, cruel, violent and demoralising side of him too.

I'm hoping that the call to the NDVH and a call to the local Womens Aid tomorrow will help me get out of the dependency rut that I have got myself into. I know I need counselling, and I am going to request it. I hope it helps.

On a side note, I also have to contact the dental hospital about getting my jaw taken to bits because the stress has killed the joint, and have to have yet more investigations done at the gynae unit of the local hospital, just in case there's something nasty lurking in my cervix.

Ah well, I sent him an email from a strictly private email address as he suggested: no one has/will have access to anything printed in it other than myself and anyone he chooses to share his end of things with. So far there has been no reply, and I'm not holding my breath for one either. To be honest, it would probably be best if he doesn't respond. He's not done up to now with other mails or texts, so him replying now, after all this, would make it look mighty fishy anyway.

I just need time and a few counselling sessions, and perhaps life will start improving.