Today I am thankful that I figured out the root cause of my depression: It is learned helplessness.
I am normally a joyful person.
I typically love sex with one guy who will let me take the time to figure out what makes him jump out of his skin.
I love to try new things.
I am not squeamish.
I typically love art.
I typically love walking around town meeting new people.
I rarely go anywhere without making new friends.
I usually smile so much that glycolic acid does not get rid of my laugh lines.
I am generally a happy person.
The past two years have been hard. It was two years ago that I learned my ex-husband had gutted $69,000 (70%) of our retirement accounts. He was my stalker. His sister was stalking me, too. We were bankrupt and that all of this happened because it was his idea of forcing me to stay married to him.
The past two months I have had trouble getting out of bed. I'm not losing weight. I cry all the time. I have no motivation at all. I don't know what to do. I am typically a very active person.
In my psychology practice, I learned that most unmotivated people simply lack direction. I need to find my direction in order to feel better.
I spend about two hours a day in meditation trying to figure this out.
Today I got my answer.
I am depressed because everything I do gets taken from me. Everything I can count on gets taken from me. I need Mike to leave the house before I can move forward.
He'll take the car. He'll take my money. I'll get stalked at work and fired over it.
In the psychotherapy world, we call that learned helplessness.
I was looking forward to him moving out in October of 2013.
I was looking forward to deepening things with my best friend. I guess after three years, I hardly knew the man.
I just didn't expect my ex-husband not to honor the separation agreement, refuse to split the accounts, and spend a good chunk of the money I was awarded in the divorce. Due to that, I have to allow him to stay. The money is gone.
I fear working (although I am actively looking for work). I don't want my colleagues to be harassed by Mike's family.
Mike has never hit me. He rages. He hits the walls. The man has never hit me.
I can survive in this environment IF I get creative.
I have to get creative about ways to pay my office rent. I've been given $500 of the money I was promised. $300 went to repair the van I gave to my ex-husband so he could keep his job. The other $200 went to food. Last month, I sold some things so I was able to pay rent. I was lucky. Damn.....
Before we were divorced, he literally stopped paying the bills. We are two months behind on water, electricity and other utilities. This pisses me off because in November (after he was supposed to sign the money over to me), he took $5,000 from the account that was slated for me to pay the bills. I am not sure where the bulk of the money went. The value of that account is around 18K now. It was 32K the day I filed for a divorce and $28K the day I was awarded the account.
I still cannot access the money.
I am really upset. I am not sleeping. This is killing my creativity. I make money from my creative endeavours. Since all this crap blew up and I learned who my stalkers were, I have made very little money.
Arguing with my ex-husband really doesn't get me anywhere. I need money for a lawyer. I don't know if I want to harass him to repay the money he took. I am probably safer if I keep my mouth shut.
*****
This is bad enough, having a "boyfriend" pick me apart in long obnoxious emails did not help the situation. There was one where he tried to defend Michael. He had claimed that a Facebook post I had made about "The Hobbit" was actually a depiction of my ex-husband. He wondered how long it would take before I would say mean things about him like that.
It was a cartoon inspired by The Hobbit. It was a caricature of Sméagol and me. My back is turned to the hobbit turned bad and the caption reads "You call all the girls precious."
My ex-husband thought it was a snappy response. He has this horrific habit of demeaning me by calling me "his precious." He still does it! UGH!! The girls are his "precious-es", too. I jokingly refer to all of us as "hobbitz-ez" when my ex is around.
It's an inside joke.
The deal was that if I re-friended Steve on Facebook, he'd keep it light. He's stop jumping to conclusions and triangulating about me. He can't do that. I had to block him.
I have a new series of emails from Steve to read. They are disjointed. I don't know if I should share them as examples of abusive Non-Violent Communication (NVC). They have so many twists and turns that I cannot follow them. He calls himself vindictive. Then claims I called him vindictive. The he claims that I am being vindictive. I don't get it. It goes on and on....the things he writes make absolutely NO sense.
I still don't understand why he thought I was calling my ex-husband a troll. He's uncooperative. That does not make one a troll. It makes one uncooperative.
Steve is upset that I haven't told him my life story. He's upset that I am not vulnerable around him anymore (when before I was too vulnerable). He claims he doesn't deserve that kind of poor treatment; it is wrong for me not to trust him. He claims to deserve my vulnerability.
The last time I saw him, I tried to talk to him about someone throwing out my birth control pills and he told me to be quiet because the topic was too heavy. Look...dude...if you want sex and no babies...that topic is probably important.
How can one be vulnerable when she is shushed all the time? I can't deal with this relationship. We are NOT right for each other.
He got drunk and grabbed my neck....twice! He must've forgotten. It's not going to be easy to open myself up to him in private now. I am not sure I want to even speak to him again. I have told him this many times. The attacks are ongoing. I am not in a position to deal with them.
He said that he writes mean things to me because I want time to myself to clean up my life. Why can't I have time to clean up my life? He can see other people. Who is he to tell me that I can't do the right thing for myself and the people in my life?
Geesh....I want my ex-husband to move out of the house. I want to make 100K a year and become self-supporting. Wouldn't he like that, too? Especially if we shacked up??? Wow....
This line of reasoning makes no sense.
I fear he's drinking again. His emails are filled with delusions. Those delusions scare me. I am not in a position to help him. His lifestyle coaches are enabling him. This is going to get ugly for someone. I'll feel horrible if he winds up in the hospital again. I can't anything.
State law forbids me from acting as his therapist....ever. We were close, so close that my giving him advice would be in violation of the law. I can't diagnose him. I can't tell him what appears to be going on. I can't talk to him without it getting twisted back on towards me. The man needs help. It cannot come from me. The only thing I can do is ask him to see a licensed therapist.
The last email promised to leave his therapist in order for more one on one time with me.
So.....
I can't talk to Steve anymore. Every little thing is harped on and picked on. I just can't take it anymore.
Today Steve and one of those coaches referred to me as a wounded dog who clawed Steve's heart out. I have never told anyone what he wrote in those emails. They are bad. My natural inclination is to run away. I broke up with him. He wanted a commitment in response. He wants to know why I won't be vulnerable with him. Nothing screams unhealthy more than trying to push a relationship faster than it can go.
I've cried too many tears about it. I have sensitive skin and the salt from my tears burns my face. I look like a clown. I can't afford to sit around crying anymore.
Having someone constantly criticize you is toxic. I think I'm going to have a good day and then...BAM...I get a crazy ass email accusing me of all sorts of stuff. Steve brings me down because he is down. Then I bring all my friends town because I am down. It has gotten to the point that they will actually email me to ask if Steve is driving me crazy on those days I don't post to my blog on time. My sadness is soo bad....my ex-husband wants to hug me. Those hugs give him erections.
No man gets a woody when he sees his ex-wife. Especially if she's 40 pounds heavier than she was the day they married. Yeah....I used to be anorexic. I'm 20 pounds overweight. I want to lose 40 pounds.
Okay.....I realize that in order to get my energy back and not be sad anymore, I have to create stability in my life.
I'm going to do what I know. I'm going to revamp my website the way I want it. I'm going to sell some stuff in order to start advertising. I'm going to go back to my political activism.
I'm going to start hanging out with my musician buddies and cheering on the bass players. If they get too drunk, I can help 'em out.
I'm going to visit the local campus about a P.hd. program in counseling psychology. I do that on Wednesday. I truly regret turning town teaching positions at a local university. I couldn't teach there due to the stalking. I am being told that the stalking is over. If so, I'm going to try again.
I'm going to stick with what I know and see if I can create a life out of that.
I decided that I don't have the energy to deal with Steve. I think I'm going to do a banishing spell before the moon turns new. I either banish him now or curse the holy snot out of him later.
Love ya,
S.