Empty shell

So I have left and I guess this is my life for now: Wake up, dress in one of three available outfits, and wonder what to do with my day. Being free does not feel like finally flying aloft above silvery clouds as my troubles drop away. Being free feels like being kicked out of the nest, even though the nest was lined with barbed wire and electric shocks. It will take some time to find my way. I understand that.

When I think of things that were done to me, that he did to me, I become so angry – no, not angry exactly. I get so puzzled. How could that have happened? I remember a story my grandpa told about when he was a little boy and he was on the other side of town buying milk when the Turkish troops began attacking his village. He was so scared of the gunfire and shouts that he ran all the way home. When he got there his mother said, "Oh, your feet!" and he realized for the first time that he had run over the broken windows of stores and houses and cut his bare feet to shreds, but he was so scared he had not felt a thing. When he told this story, he did not tell it with angry fire in his eyes, he did not tell it so we would hate the Turks. He didn't say anything about anger, just fear, and puzzlement: at the end of the story he always shook his head and said, "I just don't know why they did that. I don't know why they did that."

Not that I lived through a genocide or anything, but I know what he means. I don't have anger in me, not yet at least. All I have is this feeling of pity and being perplexed. Why on earth would anyone do that? Why would you grab someone by the hair and pull her up a flight of stairs? Why would you slap someone across the face or slam her head against a wall? Why would you scream at her after she's already dissolved into tears? Why would you destroy things you wanted to keep? What a stupid way to behave. I don't want to figure it out, I just regard it as a lump of curiosity. Hurm.

First dream of him

Last night: Dreamed that I went back to him, as I have done so many times. I felt the old familiar mix of relief (to be back in my routine) and dread (at having to explain to everyone else that I had gone back). I got my bird. One of our other birds had died of a mysterious ailment, and there was a new one. They were kept in an antiseptic but nice white basement. I thought, "I should just grab my bird and go," and composed a note: "I don't know how to say this, but I have left." I felt too guilty to do it. I could not do that to the person I had come home to. I felt like my heart was breaking and it was overwhelming. I decided to stay. That's when I jolted awake: didn't know if I'd just had a bad or a good dream -- because the relief of being somewhere familiar was so intense, I guess. Well. I guess these are the feelings I'll be dealing with.

sudden leaving

everyone keeps saying I am so courageous. I do not feel courageous.

here is what happened:

we had a wonderful weekend. but on sunday night he began nagging me about borrowing money from my parents. he kept haranguing me about how I was "sitting on a mountain of money." we sat in the car as he nagged and nagged and said "you had better work on them this week when you see them." which soon became "I'm locking you out of the house until you agree to get the money." then the subject switched (money is the theme of the evening) -- to life insurance. he was incensed that I did not have a life insurance policy with him as the beneficiary. he said "you will get the papers tomorrow or you will be locked out every day until you leave for california. this will make it difficult to pack, won't it?"

I said I would get a policy when I saw proof that I was on his policy. As usual, he said he would not show me anything till I did what he asked of me -- got a policy, showed him the papers. From experience I knew that if I did my part, he would still not do his, and I said so. And round and round we went...

All evening I tried to do what he wanted -- took out the garbage, cleaned up, didn't eat when he told me I could not eat, just didn't make a fuss -- thinking he would stop eventually -- but every time Ithought I was done and sat down, he asked, "Did you get the money yet?" "Did you get the insurance papers yet?" in a taunting voice...

Still the next morning I felt relieved when he told me to drive him to the station and did not mention locking me out -- but on the drive to the station he began grilling and nagging me again -- rather than lying (why did I not just lie??) or saying "yes" to his demands, I just kept on my course, saying "I am not going to ask for a loan, I do not want a country house, I am not getting life insurance for you," and he said "That is the wrong answer" and turned around to go to the house and lock me out of it -- he said I could get my computer -- I went in and grabbed it -- I had packed it with all cables, external hard disk, and my most importnat files -- I wanted to grab some other things but he was screaming -- so I left and drove him to his office --

I was so out of sorts and miserable -- here i was, locked out again-- he called twice to taunt me further, to nag me about money -- and to inform me that I would be locked out every day till I left for my trip. I was feeling frayed when my mom called...

she said "are you coming to see your father today?"

I said "it's too late, I have to be back at 5 to pick TK up at the station"

she said "Why? You're an adult with your own life."

I said ruefully, "TK would beg to differ."

She began talking gently about her cousin who was killed by her husband. She said "her husband was so charming. We never saw him act that way. And after he killed her he was horrified at what he had done."

Rather than argue and defend, I just surrendered.

"Why would he do it if it made him feel bad?" I asked.

"Because he was crazy. Because they are crazy. Please just get in your car and come home now."

I did. I left with the clothes on my back and my computer. I turned off my phone and changed my email. I went to California and moved in with my sister. I feel lost, alone, weird, unsettled. I knew this would feel like chaos. but I am so relieved. The pain will come later; for now it is a relief to know i can sleep through the night without being awakened to nurse him thru a panic attack. To know I can refuse to clear the table and not taste floor as a result. Oh god. It's so sweet not to live in fear... is this what it has come to? The simple pleasure of not living in constant fear? Why did I allow it to go on for so long?

Questions I'll have to answer soon. Not now. Not now. Too tired. Not now.

I feel so hopeless

I have not posted because my plan was to delve into my history (my god, I just made a typo and typed "shit" instead of the "hist" in "history" -- is that amazing?!), but to do so felt insurmountable, boring, and pointless. Maybe that is an indication that there's so much there that I must delve into it, but -- anyway, it hasn't happened yet, though I've disussed in in therapy a bit. Bottom line seems to be, as my therapist says, "It could be for any number of reasons, but the important thing is you have to get out."

Getting out feels completely impossible. I am told, "Leaving me is not an option." And I don't know if I'm brainwashed or just -- I don't know what -- but I believe him on some deep level. I believe that if I leave, I will return, and things will only get worse. I believe this the same way I believe that if I drive my car off a cliff, I will crash to the ground. It is a law of nature that I can not fight.

Today I wept into the phone that I hate him, I want to go, he has to let me go, and he says, "You can try to go. See what happens." A statement that fills me with a deep dread that I can't describe except to say it's the feeling you might get if you were afraid of heights and someone told you to cross a chasm on a footbridge. The frozen feeling. The disobedience of your body as you tell it, "You are hooked up to bungee cords, you are over a net, you are on a very safe footbridge, you can not die doing this," yet your legs remain frozen. Oh! That is really the perfect analogy. I know I have to leave, and I can't because I have some kind of phobia about it. I am fucking sick in the head.

He locked me out this morning because he wants me to get money from my parents so we can get a summer house, and I don't want to ask them for anything. He locked me out because I "gave him the wrong answer." When I became upset he said "You are violating me with your tone and your volume." He learned these therapeutic terms and now he uses them against me.

He says he will continue to lock me out and will not allow me to pack for my trip because I will not get a life insurance policy and name him as beneficiary. I am ONLY allowed to name him, and I MUST get this policy. He claims I am on his, as one of 5 beneficiaries, but will not show me the paperwork: "I will show you when you show me." (A promise he has laid out before and broken each time.) He says that he will continue to lock me out of the house and will not allow me to pack for my trip until I show him these insurance papers.

I used to post on a message board, but the people on it became disgusted with me and asked me to stop posting since I obviously don't want to leave. This is what always happens. I disgust and disappoint those who think they can help me. I do want to leave. I want to leave so badly. I'm sick and I can't manage it. I don't know why and I'm so scared and I feel so alone.

Every half hour or so he calls and coldly asks, "Did you get the insurance yet? Did you get a loan from your parents yet?" If I become upset he hangs up on me. If I answer him he twists away from my words, hammering me with his angry questions about anything and everything except the fact that he won't allow me to be in his house if I disobey him. I must get away; does he not see that's the logical response to his behavior? He says I must "go with the flow" and everything will become great: he won't yell, we won't fight, all I have to do is bend to his will. For seven years I have been breaking my back trying to bend to his will; it is never enough. I told him "There is no flow. Living with you is living in chaos." Of course he can not hear, and the fact that I still expect to reach him is proof positive that there is something very, very wrong with me.

I could so easily lie and say I will ask my mom. I could so easily forge paperwork. I could get a month's worth and cancel; he won't know till I'm dead. The fact that I won't shows how sick I am. I really have something so wrong with me. The counselor who said I'm not sick is wroooong.

The abuse has gotten worse, yet I can't convince myself to leave. I'm at the point where I say "I have to get out of here, I have to make a plan," but when I think of having a friend come help me get my stuff out, when I think of him coming home to find me gone, I crumple and begin to cry again, because I feel responsible for him, because I don't want him to hurt.

This is insane behavior. He clearly does not care if I hurt. In fact, he taunts me. My lower back is in terrible pain for 5 days now. Why? Because he shoved me to the floor on Friday and bent me forward, so that my spine was in the shape of a C, and slammed down on the back of my neck one, two, three, four times. Both hands. I was crying and asking, "How do you do this to somebody?" My words and the sound of my crying only enraged him more. When I think of this I feel nauseated. Since then he's been brutal with me, constantly and aggressively nitpicking everything I do, as if daring me to leave.

Yet I have not yet taken him up on his dare. I call it "the nuclear option." It means reducing my life to rubble. He's the one that misbehaves, but I'm the one that has to change my email address, my cell phone number, and live in transient homes where I can't be found. And it means hurting him. Which for some reason... I just... I don't understand it myself, so I don't blame you if you don't either.

I started with a new therapist, a very direct woman who calls me on all my bullshit, and who is as baffled as I am at my behavior. Our first session was a real reality check. She said, "I'm not saying this is your fault, not at all, I'm just saying there's something in you or on your past that made you stay the first time he did something like this. Because if you were in your right frame of mind, you just would have laughed and walked out on him immediately."

I said there's been a point with almost every boyfriend I've ever had when I said to myself later, "Why didn't I leave him then?" But then again, doesn't everyone feel that way?

Frankly, I don't care why I'm still here, I just want to get out so badly. I've been avoiding posting here because I'm bored by the idea that I have to write about my past relationships, endlessly poring over every mean thing ever said to me by a guy or by a close girlfriend. I know it's probably necessary but it's boring and exhausting... exhausting like the rest of my life.

I'm exhausted all the time.