Day of reckoning

He called me.

I didn’t think this day was going to come and because I had lost faith in him, I had stopped hoping. I had almost stopped counting the days I had gone without hearing his voice and feeling his touch. I tried to force myself to stop believing he existed.

Then, today.

Because I was supposed to get a tattoo removed that was in his honor, and because it’s hard to give up old comforts.

I didn’t know how to feel when I heard his voice and he heard mine. But quickly, instinct kicked in and I heard only the pain in his voice so I soothed him. My voice softened and in spite of all that has happened, I softly said “don’t cry.”

I wanted to add “baby”. I wanted to add “my baby.” My instinct was to hold the man that has brought so much pain upon me. My instinct was to wrap my arms around my baby.

I don’t know if I am extraordinary, or extraordinarily sick and damaged for this way of thinking. I’m willing to say it’s the latter.

What is it inside of me that makes me willing to let him hurt me? Willing to let anyone hurt me?

I know now what it is that makes me allow it.

It is how my brain was taught love.

Kids adapt to make their circumstances the best they can be in their little minds. They adapt because they need somewhere or someone to provide them comfort and safety. How love was shown to me by the most important people in my life, my parents, was a combination of neglect and reward. NOT neglect of my basic needs like food and shelter, but neglect in the form of long periods of abandonment during my formative years while they went to work to make ends meet and to prove themselves. Sometimes they over disciplined because they were young and stressed. To compensate for that, they were sometimes Disneyland parents.

It is a system based on intermittent reward. The intermittent reward makes the bad times or neglect seem less bad. The bad memories fade quicker, become more acceptable. Before long they are replaced with good memories and all is well until the abuse happens again. It is abusive but it is abuse born of ignorance and fear. I forgive them because I always felt loved and secure. I forgive them because we all grew up together and they are me and I am them and no division exists.

But it DID teach me that in order to be loved, I had to please others. Please my parents. Please my friends and most importantly, please my lover.

As much as I love my dad, you did NOT piss him off or disobey and when you did something that made him unhappy, he smacked you upside the head first and asked no questions about why or what, just a deliverance of swift justice that even HE felt ashamed of afterwards. That was evidenced by the aftercare that was provided along with the apology.

I love my dad fiercely. He was 18 years old when I was born. He made sure he was good and responsible and took care of his family and what made my dad hit me was two things… fear, and pride.

He did not want to fail. I was part of him and I was the reason he had to succeed and be a good man. If I fucked up, then in his mind HE fucked up, and his pride left him no room for failure. I did not make these excuses for him and he did not offer this theory up as an excuse. I know in my heart that he did his best and his best was awesome. I was spoiled in many ways and that too set the stage for my future relationships with men. Be good and I will spoil you.

I was good. And Roger spoiled me. It felt natural to me and the closest thing to love I have ever known. Roger did the same thing to me as my parents did, but he didn’t love me as much as they did. His abuse was his infidelity and the anger from his untreated depression fueled by his horrible marriage.

Losing him has been the biggest loss of my life thus far.

I am grieving his death, but he’s not dead.

In my heart there burns an eternal fire of devout belief. That belief is not in God or my country. That belief has always been in Roger. As he grew more addicted and further away, that flame began to flicker and fade.

All of our life we are growing. When Roger left me there was nobody to believe in. My flame was all but extinguished.

But then I woke up one morning and realized that the person I believe in is there in bed with me, greeting the dawn. The person I believe in is me.

Somewhere along the line, Roger stopped believing in himself, so me believing in him didn’t matter.

That’s what now separates us. I will fight for what is best for myself. He will settle for second best.

Second best isn’t good enough for me. I have ONE rule when it comes to ANY game and that includes both love and war.

Rule#1…

Never be #2.