The Best Part of Waking Up

I woke up this morning in a tizzy...thoughts were swirling in my head regarding my wife and I, my therapist appointment today, school deadlines that I'm behind on, work obligations that I would face today, feeling exhausted with NO possibility of more sleep. I realized on my way into work that this is pretty much every day. Even on "days off" I'm either worried about my marriage or jumping into a school assignment, or something else. My eyes close and my eyes open to the same crowded roar in my head.

I really, really want to figure out how to wake up, take a deep breath and just be thankful for the day. I want to make things right so that I can curl up with my wife and hold her for 5 minutes before my day starts. I want my thoughts to be how nice my wife's hair smells, how lucky I am to have another day on this planet, how quiet the morning is.

I have to figure out how to get that....

Let's see I.D.

I mentioned mourning a couple of posts ago, which has been a hard, strange trip. A recent event made me drop into a significant depression that I didn't see coming.

My wife and I have friends that just sent their daughter to college. Here was this girl, who we have known since she was just a girl, who seemingly overnight turned into a young woman ready to spread her wings and leave home. I saw the happy/sad/excited/nervous part of going away and it struck a bizarre chord in me.

It jolted me into the realization that I am not that age, at all. I think of my college years as a struggle that I ultimately lost - I ran over 700 miles away only to crumble (with a semester to go, no less) under the strain of having my abuse unresolved. I saw college as my salvation, only to have it not be. I saw it as a chance to be "normal", which didn't happen. Somehow, in my mind, I didn't stick myself back at age 12; rather, I continued to hold some sense that I was "just out of college"...young, fresh, ready for the world with time to spare. Seeing our friend's daughter made me realize that this is absolutely incorrect. I'm 35 years old...leaving for college was over a DECADE ago. Heck, leaving college under the pressure was a decade ago! I'm closer to 40 than 25. I'm not "going to clubs", drinking, partying, etc age anymore...I'm really grown up.

So why do parts of my soul hurt like a child? And how can I leave that chapter behind with grace and peace instead of a sense of loss? Why does this realization make me sad? Will I ever not be behind, missing the present by thinking I'm in the past? How do I live as the real now? Who or what am I supposed to be like at this age? I feel so much pressure to be something right now, but I'm not 100% sure what that "something" is...I mean, I can only be me, but...

My advice to our friend's daughter? Live in the here and now and soak it all in. Live life in the present and live it to it's fullest. Don't wish for the future or the past you'll miss chunks of your existence which you can never get back.

Let's talk about S-X baby, let's talk about you and me...

So, in reading back over my posts thus far in this blog journey (blourney?), I've talked about a few things here and there, but I think it's time to cut to the quick and make myself pretty damn uncomfortable. It's time to talk about sex. (For anyone playing the home game, I'm reasonable sure this will span a few entries, or will spawn a few entries...)

It's probably unnecessary to say, but sex during my abuse was confusing, bizarre, hurtful, and ranging in the gamut of activities from relatively benign (as much as a malignancy can be benign, I suppose) to the bizarre and brutal. When I revealed to my wife one example of what I thought to be some of "the worst" that was done to me, I wasn't sure if she was going to bawl or throw up, or both. If nothing else, it's proof that an adult female abusing a male child is not "The Graduate", or some other romanticized version of this act.

What the abuse became, unbeknownst to me, was the basis on which I would build my understanding of sex. It's the ground upon which I learned what things were, how things worked, how to do this, how to do that, etc. Strangely, although I have some memories and thoughts that I wish I didn't know about, I didn't think that the abuse had messed me up too much.

My basis for this thinking was when I first became physical with the beautiful woman who is now my wife. (There's a gap between my abuser and my wife, kind of...it's strange and is fodder for blogging yet to come. For this time, suffice it to say that I had a few girlfriends with whom I did very little, physically. My wife was the first serious physical relationship). I feel that I moved a little quickly through the courtship, but to me only getting to first base after little bit ~was~ going slow. Regardless, I did ok. I took direction well, was always interested, and made it a goal to make my girlfriend (now wife) feel fantastic. She told me I was skilled and good at what I did, although it was a common complaint that I wasn't interested in build up and anticipation, foreplay, etc...I was always heading to a few key spots. In other words, I was lacking the ability to connect intimacy with sex. I loved this girl and thought I was connected, but I realize now that I wasn't truly bridging the gap between sex and love and intimacy. At some point, I was moving from intimacy and/or love into sex mode. As we matured in our relationship, it became obvious to her that I wasn't connected for some reason. Her suggestions were that I move slower, why didn't I want to kiss longer, and, dammit, why did I hop up from bed the millisecond that orgasm had completed?

What's interesting is that I didn't know the answers to any of those queries.

But, sex moved on and, after becoming married, we entered the realm of intercourse. We hit some highs and some lows, but I attributed any waning to being tired/busy/etc. I truly had no idea of how much I wasn't giving my wife of myself.

Then, through a series of emotional/relationship pits from hell, I had to turn into the leg of the journey I am on now. The one where I'm owning the fact that I survived abuse, that I wasn't at fault, that I was taken advantage of, that a lot of bizarre sex stuff happened without me being able to understand what was really going on.

And sex, which had been a least semi-normal for my me and my wife, turned weird.

I got worried, I got upset, I pulled away. Then I pushed forward and was overwhelmed with emotion/reaction to being intimate. Where was the guy that was knowledgeable and confident (at least on the outside)? Instead of pushing to my wife, I pulled, then pushed, then who the hell knows? I'm trying to unlearn some sexual stuff while learning another set altogether. I'm trying to learn how to be intimate and close as if I wasn't abused from 12 on. I'm trying to disconnect any thoughts of sex as sex and replace them with thoughts of sex as sex...and love, and intimacy, and fun, and...

And what's even more difficult about the weirdness setting in is that I really want to have sex with my wife. My wife, and this is absolutely true, not the standard husband-has-to-say stuff, is stunning and sexy as all get out. She is phenomenal! I want to touch her, feel her, have sex with her. Often!

But it's hard to sort through and allow sex to be intimate and close and fun and spontaneous and unscripted and focused and loose...

I really want that relationship. I miss feeling that closeness with my wife (and can't even imagine what it could be). My fantasy isn't something crazy and off the wall, it's waking up at 2:30am together and making love with abandon. It's morning sex. It's honey-I'm-home sex. It's sex without my past, but with me, fully. It's sex without the running dialog of thoughts in my head. (I really just want to hear, "I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you...." so that I pours out of me to her).

It's a fight to get there. A fight I lose a lot. But I want it.

Of course, I like things complicated, so an upcoming next post will add another layer...

Good Mourning?

I am mourning and, oh, does it hurt. I'm not entirely sure the extent of what I'm mourning yet, but I believe that it's a mixture of mourning my stolen childhood and those lost years, the lost opportunities, and the lost relationships. The "if only" stuff...

I find my chest aches and it feels like my heart is in a knot. The person I mourn...is me.

I think of my childhood...not the terrible abuse years, but the good, fun, clean, innocent years. I've seen pictures of me then and the radiance in my smile was truly that of an innocent child. In that face I see the hopes and dreams, the wants and the possibilities that the child in the picture didn't even comprehend yet.

And thinking of that face causes me to mourn.

I miss that child...I miss that Me. I actually hate the loss of him more than I hate the "killers" of him. I need that Me...I want that Me...how do you move on without him? He (Me) was a great kid...full of laughter, absolutely overflowing with love and affection. Dreams poured out of him (me) at an unbelievable pace...and they were going to happen! They were true and unhindered! They were the way life was going to be.

I know I mourn him when I look at my face now and think of the differences. It's not age that makes us different, although certainly that is there. No, it's the slight crease or wrinkle that I know is from pain. It's the eyes...the eyes tell such a big story. There was a light in him (young me) that I miss...and I mourn.

God, how I miss him (me). Lord, how I hurt for him (me).

Land, Ho! No, sorry...still sea...

A teacher once described making progress in life as similar to steering a ship - if you point the ship at a target and hold the wheel steady, you will never reach your goal. The ever changing pushing of the sea requires that the wheel be constantly adjusted to take into account the waves that push the ship to a fro. Only through flexibility to not stay on the straight line will the "straight line voyage" be successful.

This is frustrating in "normal life" (a term I'm not sure is true, but I'll use here to differentiate from my experiences), but incredibly difficult in the healing process. I've been pushed by the waves a lot as of late. The lack of blogging is a prime example - I was writing fairly regularly, making it a priority. In the past week or so, I've let it slip behind other priorities. I find myself several degrees off course...time to readjust.

My work with my wife and home responsibilities is another area in which I've had to constantly adjust. I made a pledge a couple of weeks ago that, since I know that I will mess up and return to old habits, the millisecond I recognize that this has happened, I will fix it and move to a positive position. ("5 degrees starboard!") What amazes me is how many times I have to adjust and how frustrating it is. My turns of the wheel as of late:

1) I promised my wife that I would take a day off of work to work on outstanding yard work. The day approached and I forgot...I let it slip of the radar. The night before the day arrived, my wife became incredibly upset. To her, this signified not caring about our home, not keeping my word, and "falling off" of the healing wagon. Very fair assessments. To fix it, I called in the sick the next day and did my yard work. Not the optimal fix, but I felt deep inside I *had* to do it.

2) My wife and I went couch shopping and really felt close during the process. We were picking out a major item for our house. We settled on the couch...my job was to go back to the store, do the credit dealing, bring the couch home. 3 weeks (let that sink in) passed...I avoided the situation. I know through introspection and therapy that I avoid out of (mostly unjustified) fear. I was scared of the credit check - my earlier life was not "credit-pretty", but it is good now. Even so, I avoided the situation. What I did do was hurt my wife's feelings - I didn't talk about being scared, I didn't realize that I was hurting her feelings - "why doesn't he want to share this experience and make our home better?"

3) Reading and workbooks. I have read a few chapters of my latest book, but haven't set a dedicated time to do the reading, nor have I demanded of myself that reading and workbooks is made a priority. It is SO easy to let this slip...and this does not help the healing process.

So I adjust. Turn, turn, turn. What I am dedicated to is not stopping. Realizing how ingrained abuse made some beliefs and how firmly rooted bad habits are is so frustrating. There are times when I suddenly realize I'm messing up (without realizing AT ALL prior) and feel this sinking feeling in my stomach. I feel sick..."I can't believe I messed this up!"

As I'm turning, adjusting, moving...I want to let my beautiful wife know something: I love you. I'm sorry for every time I hurt your feelings, for every time my old, bad habits surface. I am dedicated to healing and dedicated to you. Thank you for your amazing patience, of which I am unworthy. I know that the "other side" holds beautiful life for us. I know I will fall, but I will always get up and make things right. I love you.