Sometimes you feel in control but the waves might surprise you.
Be warned: this something like therapy for me today. I have been trying to get an appointment but no luck so far. Please forgive for using you.Thanks for reading this far.
I will be 74 in a few days. It was about 30 years ago that I tried to commit suicide, 25 years since I got divorced, 15 years since I almost died from sepsis. All these experiences have mostly turned out to be good for me.
After trying to commit suicide, I realized that I am stronger than I gave myself credit for. After my divorce, I grew a backbone (as both my therapist and the lawyer told me) and got my very favorite job. After almost dying, I found out that I don’t fear death but would prefer to skip the pain. I live with my daughter and her twins and they keep me busy and take good care of me. I have good lifelong friends and intellectual stimulation. I am relatively healthy despite being an insulin dependent diabetic.
I never got to go to Australia and I never made it to Whiskey School in Scotland. But I did other things and all 3 of my children are employed and doing decently. In short, life is pretty good.
BUT about 6 weeks ago I was ambushed by a huge wave of adrenaline and anger, rage actually. I had such a strong reaction that I found myself hyperventilating and having nightmares.
I was reading an article on gaslighting and how it manipulates reality and there was a passing comment about Betty Broderick. I had never heard of her but apparently she is fairly notorious. A quick google search gives lots of information. Hers is the age old story of a wife who supplies support while the husband prepares for or grows his career only to be dumped for a much younger woman when the going gets good. Except she did not go meekly and quietly, still proclaiming how much she loved him. Betty killed her ex and his new wife, shot them in their bed. One of the things that stands out in ky mind is that her ex chose to marry his arm candy who looked remarkable like Betty looked when she was much younger and before 5 full term pregnancies and the second wedding was 10 days away from what would have been the 20th anniversary of his first wedding. Talk about being replaced.
For me, the horrible part is that I wanted to say “You go girl” and to tell her that I am in awe of her. That I admire her strength and conviction. She has been in prison over 30 years and is unrepentant. She calls herself a political prisoner.
I can identify with her although I assume that she is not the most wonderful perfect person. Reading about the gaslighting she endured brought back all my demons. In my case, It stared when I was little and heard my father point at me and say “That one? She’s not mine.” It continued through the theology of my conservative church that encouraged me to think that it was a good thing to support the men in my life. So I didn’t exactly submit but I certainly worked so hard at helping him achieve. I even wrote some of his papers for graduate school. And I used most of my resources on my ex's career.
Finally, it got to the breaking point. He was having an affair and a new position in a difference city. So I suggested that he move and since I had gone back to school and had one more year, I would stay and then he could say that I had decided to leave him and his woman friend could go out where he was and they could get married. I was taking care of him even then. But he didn’t want that, he was basically scared of moving without me. Unfortunately for me, a friend recommended someone I could talk to and he was aghast that I would think of abandoning him. These were all white men who were telling me my place was forgiving him and helping him. So I moved with him and abandoned my program. I was so confused found it easier to do what was expected of me than to buck the system. I sometimes feel angry with myself about how I could proclaim myself a feminist and talk about deconstructing patriarchal structure and then, when push comes to shove, I fall right back into them. To make a long story short, he went back to finding comfort/ excitement else where and we finally got divorced. But although he was the one who cheated and finally wanted the divorce ( because she wouldn’t have sex with him otherwise), everyone turned against me and I had no support. Nobody wanted anything to do with me while he was offered the cabin the mountains if he needed some place to recuperate and also got invited to dinner so he didn’t have to cook. All my history of abuse and injustice welled up in me when I thought I had already dealt with it, thank you very much.
I told my friend that I feel as if my septic tank has over flowed. All the ways I had been put down as the identified family victim, as a woman, as a minority, as a quiet person, as someone who is a nurturer by nature gathered into a giant wave that overwhelmed me. And the political danger that is looming over our country made it worse and not entirely personal.
I remember the hope I felt in the late ‘60s when I first when I first realized there was a world out there that was not restricted by my abusive family and my conservative church, a time when society sought me out because I was a smart Chicana. But slowly all the doors that were open to me seem in danger of closing for my grandkids.
Now that freedom is being threatened and restricted by the rulings of the SC, by the hate, anger and violence of our political scene.
It’s scary and I am filled with rage that there are people that totally buy into the ‘good old ways’ when uppity people could be kept firmly in their place. Except this is not a ‘somewhere out there’ situation. It is up close and personal and fills me rage, with a fight or flight adrenaline that almost paralyzes me. And I don’t know how to deal with it. It feels like my life and my hope has been stolen.
I really don’t know how to deal with this overwhelming rage at the injustice. I give money, I write postcard and do phone calls and vote. But all that is impersonal. The rage and the nightmares are still there.
Thanks if you got this far. I am hoping that writing this will somehow put things in perspective for me and I can go on instead of being a paralyzed.
