Disappearing

I've told Christina a few times now that I am not even trying to be seen anymore; only in moments of exasperation and after she's asked a question that prompts it. She takes that as giving up, I think, and she's mad because I didn't make a declaration about it...but it didn’t happen suddenly. There wasn’t a moment where I made a conscious decision. This has been slowly happening over a long time. Today I realized it's more than not trying to be seen - it's that I actually want to be invisible again. I am angry and resentful. I feel hopeless and helpless inside my own body. I've been holding on to unidentified anger for a long time now, and even when I tried to understand what it was about, I couldn't see it. I believe all this is at the heart of it.

I don’t even want to tell her any of this, because what I say doesn’t matter at all. She doesn’t listen to hear me anymore. She only listens to dispute. She loves to say “perception is reality” unless it applies to me. If it’s me, my perception is just wrong. And she will tell me what my “actual” reality is. And what I "actually" think, believe and intend while she's at it.

She doesn't treat me like an equal. She doesn't respect my decisions or the things I say. When I make decisions, she frequently comes behind me and tells me to do something differently. Or tells the kids to do something different than what I said to them. 

My primary emotional/psychological wound is not being seen, heard, or believed. It took a lot of work to reach a point where I trusted myself and my decisions, and I feel like that has been obliterated. When Charlie and I first began EMDR, one of the core beliefs we identified is "I can't trust anyone and I can't trust myself." I don't feel like it matters if I speak or don't speak; the outcome is going to be whatever Christina wants or thinks is best. 

I don't even feel like an adult. I don't feel like she respects me .I feel like she thinks I'm stupid. I feel like the kids don't have any respect for me because I say "Ask Birdie" anytime they ask me if they can do anything. But that also developed over time - Eventually I began doing that to avoid the corrections. Whatever I say is going to be wrong. 

So I'm just disappearing. And I hate it. And I hate her for it. I'm so mad. And under all my anger is so much grief about it all. And shame. This is who I was before treatment. And I'm almost at my 4 year sobriety birthday and I'm back to this version of myself. Even in my parenting, she believes she knows better. She will know better about me sharing these things with her. She will tell me how I “really” feel, what is “really” happening and tell me all the ways I disappoint her or fall short of what she wants in a partner. Telling her feels hopeless to me, which is exactly why I haven't done it. I expect it to anger her and for her to come at me with aggressive and accusatory words. That's honestly all I expect to come of even sharing this.

If I tell someone they can do/have something, she comes behind me and says they can't. And the kids stop and switch to whatever Christina says. If I tell them they can’t do/have something, she comes behind me and says they can. And we switch to whatever Christina says. There is no point in me even speaking. What I say does not matter. I feel like she is judging me at all times, even when she doesn’t say anything. I don’t want to even be seen. It would be better if I was completely invisible. I don't  even want her to look at me because I'm sure whatever I'm doing is stupid, or wrong. I feel like I'm drowning in anxiety about who or what I am. or  She acts like she thinks I’m an imbecile. That is how all the things she says and all the things she doesn’t say make me feel. And I believe it at this point. 

My memory is fucked right now because thinking about all this is making me cry. Even if I gave her every example from the last year, she is still going to tell me I'm wrong. She believes that her recollection of every single interaction of ours is always the right one. There has never been a time, in the 3 years we have known each other, that if we disagree on a memory of something that was said, she concedes "maybe I'm not remembering correctly." I admit that I don't have the best memory, but when I know something happened a certain way, I say that. But it does not matter. No matter what I say, Christina knows and I do not, even when I say that I do.

She has begun telling me what MY OWN intentions are. Twice now, she has told me what I am doing or thinking - when I said the way she said something made me want to get junk food secretively, she declared "then you already are. You're already doing that. You wouldn't say that unless you already were." I absolutely was not. I was trying to communicate my feelings in response to the tone and delivery of what she said. She didn't hear that. She insisted definitively that I was actually sneaking around with food. I wasn't. Last night she told me I don't bring up Christmas money because I don't want to have the conversation. Nothing about that statement is true. And whenever I say that something isn't true ABOUT MY OWN SELF, she DOESN'T FUCKING BELIEVE ME. It’s my childhood all over again and I don't know how to make it stop. How can you get someone to stop hurting you when they won't listen to you or believe you?

She has stopped apologizing, ever, after we argue. I think she's apologized once in the last year after a clash and that was in the car. She doesn't initiate physical contact after a fight or disagreement. I am always the one who comes to her for physical touch and/or says I'm sorry. And I frequently feel that I have been seriously wronged by her words or behavior although I'm the one issuing the apology. But if I don't do it, she’s not going to.

None of the kids view me as an equal to Christina, because I'm not. I feel like I'm the version of her own mother that she hated growing up. She hated her because she didn't stand or speak up for herself, and Christina thought she was weak and stupid because of it. That's exactly what the fuck I look like to the kids, and to myself. Someone who says “whatever Birdie says,” even if I’ve already said something totally different.  She wants to know why I don't want to communicate with her. When and if I do tell her any or all of this, she is going to tell me I'm wrong. With 100% certainty. I will be wrong. So what is the point?

She didn’t communicate with me about her wanting me to get a job. She said something about it to other people in front of me twice, but we never had a discussion at all. I just came home and did the Uber application and started when I could because obviously she wanted me to. No communication. I’m making the money she wanted me to make - to be able to cover my expenses. But if I work extra because I want to make enough to get something specific for myself, that’s wrong, too. I shouldn’t be spending that money on myself.  

So my whole life is being a 41 year old walking, talking human being who is stupid and completely worthless. According to her, I don't even know when I'm telling the truth about myself. I don't know how to make decisions about my own children. I don't know how to make day to day decisions, or what order I run errands in. I don't make the right decision about which vehicle to use for Uber or to take the kids somewhere. I don't know how to make sound decisions about money. I don’t buy the right things at the grocery store. Most of what I do is questioned and undermined. I don't even feel like a whole human anymore. I feel like a shell.  

When she challenges something I've said or decided, I usually try once to explain my position or perspective and without fail, she just restates the same thing she said using different words. Then she gets angry that I shut down. But what good is talking? She doesn't hear me. She doesn't care. She says she wants to communicate and understand. I do not believe that. When you're just repeating yourself back and forth, there is no communication. It's a line drawn in the sand, digging your heels in and talking AT someone, not with them. And in the end because I do not want conflict and also because I know I won't be heard, I say "ok" to whatever it might be. Anything and everything: Ok. That pisses her off, too. Every time that happens, I walk away more wounded, more resentful, more hopeless and more alone. And by virtue of the very nature of what is happening, I can't talk to her about it. But I can't talk to anyone else, either. I'm no one. I'm nowhere.