march 3, 1998

the sound of silence fills the house as you sleep your sleep of escape. i am left alone with my screaming thoughts as they pierce the peace i so desperately seek. it eludes me now as the fear overtakes it and i find no solace in the quiet of being.

tidal waves of emotions crash upon my rocky soul; guilt, pain, shame, anger, disgust and hate, all tangled together until i no longer can separate them into distinct entities. no longer do they battle for dominance, they have danced this dance all to often. it is easier to meld into one twisted web that rules my heart.

i can feel the numbness cover me like a security blanket, protecting the frailty i carry within. i keep it in a secret place locked away where "I" still exist. it can easily be destroyed if the facade were to drop, even for an instant.

if you only knew how effortlessly you could penetrate the barricade that weakens and crumbles each time i am struck with the blare of rage from your eyes, the daggers from your mouth and the atomic destruction your hands facilitate.

nothing is sacred, nothing spared from the war that rages in you, through you, spilled out from you. i look for cover and find safety any place you are not. i must swallow my pride and cower at your feet begging mercy and leniency to end the rage for now.

i replay the scene over and over again to find where i went off course, where i disobeyed the order given, thereby setting off the short fuse that always seems to smolder. just waiting for a few drops of fuel to set it off. any trickle of humanness that flows from me is the combustible tonic that sparks the explosion.

no place is safe from you. no situation exempt. all that matters is the excuse for the tirade, always the fault of someone else. i pray to God to strike you dead, to make you suffer as you have caused our suffering, sweet justice for a lifetime of ugly pain you've dispensed on your children and me. but that would be wrong. justice is not for me dictate or to demand.

one day you will look for the comfort that i give and it will not be found. your self-destruction will have mushroomed out one time to many. a chill runs through my soul as i live for, yet dread that day. the day we are no longer together........

passage.....

if someone would have told me that when i finally left him i would struggle with my feelings for him, i would have laughed in their face! when i was with him i hated him and wanted my freedom. no, not all the time. not even most of the time, especially in the early years. but the last six years we were together were the most difficult.

if i want to be fair, he probably couldn't stand being with me as much as i couldn't stand being with him. i was not a very nice person after a while. while i do not blame myself for his volatile and violent outbursts, i take full responsibility for the times i fed his cycle of violence.

i am sorry for the times i made him feel less than a man. i am certain that without my verbal commentary on the matter, this was something he already struggled with. i am aware of the abuses and pains he was dealt as a child. the lack of validation from his father. his father an alcoholic and his mother cheated. thus the beginnings of his demons.

if not for my faith, i would have handled my life with him in a very different manner. i craved his attention, used to beg him for it. it would have been easy to seek out the same consolation that his mother did were it not for the moral code i chose to live by.

time after time i would beg god to help me love him, soften my heart to his pain and struggles. and he would. i wanted james to know that i saw the good that he could be, not just the ugliness. my heart used to hurt for him. if nothing else, i can say that i loved him and always will.

i know i said i hated him, but that was just my pain talking. when i am removed from that pain i am forced to remember the things that were good. the things that made me laugh, made me want to be with him. it is so true when they say you always want what you can't have.

however, it is no longer about what i can't have, it is about safety. i can see the truths, i can see the pains, i can see the goodness, i can see and understand the demons, i can see my part in the cycles, BUT, i cannot make him see or deal with anything he chooses not to. and no matter how much i beg god to "fix it", he has given us free will to choose to be "fixed".

it has not been easy leaving. not for the obvious reasons like finances, but for the emotional ones. the scars may run deep, but my love for him ran deep as well. i took him back so many times because i beleived he would, believed he wanted to change. but i cannot hold on to that any longer.

for too long i lived in the dream of what i wanted our marriage to be and now i must let all that go. now i must forge a life without him. whatever my future holds, it will no longer hold him. i am still dealing with feelings of anger, jealousy and pain. when they seek to drag me down into my ugliness, i take a moment to pray for him and the woman he lives with.

the time has come for me to end this chapter, once and for all, and begin writing the new one. in letting go of my old life, my hands become free to embrace my new life. and part of that life is sharing my story, and me, to others who are hurting and struggling.

this blog will be filled with my past, but only as a tool for the task i feel has been laid out before me. it will also be filled with my present and my future. life is good, and today i am at peace. today i see that it is time to take that passage....

July 27, 2004

i am trying to find a reason to salvage my marriage. after 14 years i am trying to figure out what contributions, sacrifices, what part you play in this family other than bringing home a paycheck. let's see-you dictate how and what we can watch on tv, how loud we can be, where we are and aren't allowed to sit and we are expected to make you happy all the while pretending we actually like doing it.

you have no desire to comprehend the family bills or to make sure you do whatever it takes to get them paid. you want cable, computers, videos etc. regardless of what we don't pay to have them. you have given to me and the children things we won't ever loose, like scares and pain we never deserved. numerous items have been destroyed that can never be replaced and memories that we wish we could.

i can't even say you've showered any of us with love and affection because you are not capable of loving anyone, not even yourself. you are very good at satisfying your own selfish needs and wants while we are left unfulfilled. our children needed a father and all they've gotten is a person who wants them out of his way and quiet so he can hear the tv, play his video games or sleep.

i have to muster up all that i can to try and feel anything for you other than disgust. i believed in you, i saw all that you were capable of becoming, but as i grew i realized that you did not see or feel these things for yourself. all you can do is stay stagnant in the place you have been since your teen years. you fail to grow because you fail to be accountable for yourself or your actions. excuses, excuses, excuses!

i have grown tired of your violent, hateful, controlling, temper tantrums. i am done with this marriage and i am done with you-it is just a matter of time. no more chances, they are all long gone and one day i will be too.

August 6, 2005

what is normal? what is love? what is life? what happens when dysfunction is the norm, hate masks as love and death imitates life?

most days i think that my "life" "love" and "normalcy" are what i have created them to be. they are the self made fantasy in my mind to keep me sane. what is real is that i am still here. what is normal is that i don't want to be.

i want so badly to feel love and to be loved, but i hate him. hate the distance between us. hate the violence he denies exists.

white picket fences and a lush green lawn are not what i craved, but family dinners and laughter, cuddles on the couch after the kids had gone to bed. what i got instead are the vivid pictures of your face in mine with that shark eyed look as you proceed to scream at me how you are going to hurt me. could you feel the fear seething out of my pores?

i feel so much just lingers beneath the surface of my contempt and loathing. there are times i just want to reach out and hold you, but i remember past rejections and don't. i remember all the names you've called me. all the ways you've hurt me.


i yearn for us to have a "good" life, but you don't believe you deserve anything that is "good". i can almost feel the battle within you rage-until it reaches your surface and then is evident for all to see in the wake of destruction you leave.

July 25, 2002

i am violated by your violence.
i choke on your wrath that i am forced to swallow.
my nostrils are filled with the stench of your weakness.
my soul is pierced by the bitterness you thrust at me, over and over again.
i will no longer allow this ritualistic rape of my emotions to be my destruction for i have let them die.
the shell i have become moves amongst the living but does not join them.
it hurts too much.

July 2001

it would be so easy to be like him. to allow myself to be controlled by the anger, allow it to become bitterness and finally to succumb to the banal rage of all that i loathe.

anger is safe, it protects from the pain. the pain is unbearable. daily i must seek out the feelings that make me human. i desperately cling to words, colors, phrases, songs that allow me to feel the things that i once felt. to just feel something other than anger. to feel me.

but who am i?

January 11, 1998

dear James:
i wish i could make you feel the intense, overbearing, crushing sense of pressure i feel everyday. i am like a rat scurrying around to make sure that everything is as perfect as i can make it. the impending explosion is building and nothing i do stops it from coming.

i pray, i try to be "happy" all the time, keep the kids quiet and out of the way, keep the house clean, prepare an acceptable dinner and yet it is never enough to stop the rampage from coming. i guess it's hard for me to face the fact that it's not my problem nor my fault. there needs to be accountability for these actions, a reason, so i will take that on.

then afterwards, i must pick up the pieces and trudge forward. this is the most draining on me. my emotional healing process is slower and slower after each "episode". a piece of me dies every single time and re-grouping more difficult. except by the grace of god am i able to function.

there is no one to talk to about what i think, what i feel, what i am going through except flo. but even this is not enough to heal anymore. i feel a festering emptiness that i cannot fill, a wound that just won't scab. and yet i must smile and go on. always i must go on. i cry in private and do the best i can to live everyday. i have children that need to be cared for. i look to see the good in what i have, but only find a miserable existence.

i feel so alone.
terri