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Saturday, September 30, 2006
I'm finding that I have less and less time to blog, which kind of bothers me - I don't like being so disconnected from people. From the world. I think every now and then a little disconnect isn't bad, but I made a promise to keep journaling, and I'm trying to do it. I just wish I had more time.I found out at my job this past week that I am my boss would like me to run all the programs (or at least have a lead hand in) that deal with my age group. So, in addition to running the before and after school program, I'll also be picking up 4H. I remember that some of my happiest times have been when I have been the most busy, and I hope that holds true. I'm not really worried about it, but it explains my lack of time. To me, at least.When I first got here, Dick told me that it was like Groundhog's Day (the movie) and I really couldn't understand why, because I didn't have a routine. Now that I'm working, the days just fly. Even if I'm working evenings, which is unusual for me. Usually I know exactly what day it is, what time it is...now I don't. Here it is, the weekend again, and I feel like it was just the start of the work week yesterday.I worked at the teen center last night. Teenage boys are a completely different breed. Especially out here. There are no strangers and no limits to them. They speak to you like they are adults (as do the girls, but there were not any there when I was there) and it can be difficult to maneuver. I am VERY, VERY careful to make sure that I draw a line. One of the boys who has trouble getting along with his peers (and who I am unfailingly nice to) has developed an attachment to me. Last night when we were playing a board game (he was on my team) he put his hand on my knee. I didn't want to hurt his feelings, but stood up under the pretense of checking the time. He put his hand out and I gave him a high five. A crush is okay. But, with Mary Kay Letourneau and all those other teachers out there, I just don't want him or anyone else to get the wrong idea. It really bothers me that such strong emphasis is put on physical appearances. I was an ugly duckling, and a late bloomer; the sudden emergence into being considered attractive was awkward and painful for me. I went from being ridiculed, teased, and (to my relief) ignored, to being talked about, misunderstood and hit on (sometimes with physical consequences). Even when I read this, I think some people will think, "Oh, poor you. So people think you're attractive - so fucking what?"I don't really know what to say about it without sounding like an asshole. Only that I didn't enjoy the transition, or many of the moments following. I am made even more aware of how I felt now that I watch the teens battle amongst themselves for power, dictated by looks. They are unaware how much people (and appearances) can change over the course of a decade, or half that. Blemishes vanish. Weight is gained or lost. Hair grown, styled. I was going to say that what doesn't change is who you are on the inside, but I don't even know if that it true. When the counselor asked me if I knew who I was, I said, "No," but I don't think I'm the same person.I'm sorry, I'm distracted. Some kids I work with (and a couple I don't) saw that I was here and have come in to visit - I guess 5 days a week isn't enough! They're serenading me with "Beauty and the Beast," "Proud to be an American" (which I don't know the proper name of) and Celine Dion. It just doesn't get better than this :)
Monday, September 25, 2006
I've been thinking about John going to meet my ex, and it really bothers me. Yesterday when we got home Dick asked me if I was okay, if I wanted to talk about it, what I thought about it, and I thought I was fine. Well, I said I was fine, but maybe I was overtired, I don't know. What I'm realizing is that even though the medication helps me to deal with what is going on in my life CURRENTLY. I feel okay CURRENTLY, I'm not going to panic CURRENTLY, I really have no coping or processing mechanism for what happened to me in the past if I don't feel okay with it regardless of how long ago it happened.6 years is a long time. By all accounts I feel like I should just be able to smile and say, "Sure, yes, he was a part of my life but blah blah blah (insert something mature and unaffected here.)." For whatever reason, I'm not there. I have thought that I was there, but I'm not.In Japan, I saw a guy that I thought was my ex and I really thought I was going to have a heart attack. No exaggerations. I had to slow the car down and take a closer look before I broke into a full blown sprint.Last night, when John said that he was going to meet my ex, everything stopped. My brain stopped. I felt hot from the inside like I was just going to faint. And then I just panicked and listened, horrified, as the words fell out of my mouth before I could realize what an ass I was making out of myself. I wanted to say nice stuff to this guy who I don't know who is flying off to meet my ex (his girlfriend is the ex's current wife), but I didn't. I told how he threw the bottle at my head. Controlled what I ate and wore. How I was scared of him. The mental hospital. The suicide attempt. He's been divorced before, too, and I just felt like I had to explain. Why would I feel like that? Maybe the counseling for me is about learning to process, more than focusing on why I do things. I feel like if I could process, maybe I wouldn't be so angry.I was the only one not drinking last night, and I stuck to it. One of my friends said that I was stronger than she was, while others remarked, "You're STILL on a break?" and I nodded. When questioned as to why or for how long, I just shrugged. I did mention that it kept me out of trouble, but then was told that that was no fun. I take it with good humor, though. I know what's good for me. I will be honest and say that after I found out the ex would be meeting an acquaintance of mine, I smoked a cigarette. It didn't make me feel any better, but I just wanted to do something rebellious. I am certainly happy that I was not drinking - that would have been a HUGE trigger, and I'm sure I would've headed right for the Jaeger bottle that was making the rounds.I felt like I wanted him to be on my side. If it weren't such a fishbowl it probably wouldn't matter. I am also hoping that since the ex is a father now, he'll have softened. Let go of the hate.I don't know why I care so much.I wish I didn't.When I spoke to the counselor about this whenever ago, she asked me if I regretted the break up. If that was why there were left over feelings. I said no, that wasn't the case. That I had left over feelings because of the fear and discomfort that I associated with the ex.I don't think I've ever been that scared of anyone. Jane Says: They'll treat me bad, but I don't mind. They'll treat me bad, they do it all the time.
Friday, September 22, 2006
I read that post that I wrote yesterday over and over today. At work, at home. I was inexplicably angry today, grumpy, muted - but I just chalked it up to being tired. I haven't had a day off in nearly 13 days and I am exhausted. Kids wear me out.As I was reading about Mike, a flash of recognition came to me. We reconciled, very briefly, because I wanted redemption from him. I had to prove to him that I was worthy. Because he said I wasn't. Every time that I kiss a guy or a girl now? And tell Dick? I have that EXACT same sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. But Dick forgives me, because he knows that this is bigger than me. Or was. The counselor said maybe it is because he operates from love and forgiveness. And I would like to be there. If he were to kiss another girl, I would forgive him, because I had done the same. I like to think that it would be out of love and forgiveness, but if I don't have that for myself, how can I have that for another person?We also covered molestation from when I was little. We lived in Chile. I was at my friend Maria Teresa's house. Our parents were gone and her older sister Pilar was watching us. A guy came around with a big wagon of oranges, but no horse to pull it. He pulled it manually. He asked to be let in to the courtyard to show us some exercises, and Maria Teresa and Paulette agreed. I didn't. I knew it was wrong, but I followed anyway. I can't say why. Maybe because I was 4. I remember feeling like the odd man out between those two. Girls are like that. I'm a teacher, I know that it starts from a very young age.
They let him in the back and I don't know how long he talked to us. Or whether he started out with regular exercises. He told us to line up against the wall and pull our pants down. We did, and he pulled his pants down as well. He began to come toward us and the other two ran away. I stood, frozen. He touched the outside of my vagina with his penis. There was no penetration. I suppose I was lucky. At that moment, Pilar came around the corner with a knife and told him to get the fuck out of there. He did.
They all teased me ruthlessly. Told me I was going to grow a penis. And I believed them. I was terrified. For years. I didn't tell my parents. I was too embarrassed.
Two years later, when we were living on Saipan, I finally broke. I just cried and cried and cried until I broke down and told my grandmother. She said, much to my amazement, that my parents already knew. That they guy had been caught and put in jail.
When I was relating this yesterday, I wondered out loud why I hadn't been told. I don't know if this is something that I blocked out, being told the guy was put away, or if my family just never told me. I can't imagine that they wouldn't, but I honestly don't remember.
The counselor also asked me if I felt traumatized by this. I don't know. I'm sure I did at one point, but now...I find other experiences more traumatic. My inability to stop kissing people, for example. If I lost Dick, I would know that he was the one that got away. And I don't think that I would recover from that. We didn't explore it further, because there is no point assigning trauma to something that I feel so removed from.
I still haven't been drinking. Reluctantly, sometimes. Last weekend when I was at work, Dick was out with everyone and I felt...left out. Just because I wasn't out, I think. I've put myself in social situations here where other people are drinking and I'm not. I was fine.
Days like today when I feel disrespected and maybe a little lingering anger from digging up the past are hard. I'd like a beer, or some wine. But I know where that goes. And I'm trying not to be stupid. I feel better when I don't drink, too. Especially since it seems like such a way of life here. But I feel bad saying that, because I feel like it makes me seem like I think I'm better than people who drink. And I don't. I'm just trying to do right by me.
I also remember that I drank into blackout when I first started - I find this kind of disturbing. One night I split a liter of coke with some Bacardi in it with a friend of mine and woke up locked outside my friend's apartment in my underwear and a T-shirt. I was 13. 14 at the very oldest, but I doubt it. My friend had put me to bed in her bed, in her bedroom, and somehow I made it outside. I hid inside the service entrance until my parents went to work in the morning, then I went inside to my room and crawled in bed and slept it off. I don't think that I did that again, but I still drank. And sucked long and hard on Marlboro reds. Anything to get that high, I think.
Looking at the behavior of my stepsons, I don't think this was uncommon. Or is uncommon. I just never stopped. It was brought up that perhaps I stopped maturing at 16, and that's why the kissing WITHOUT the sex happens. I suppose. But how do I get past that? PAST 15? Maybe I just stayed at the age that I felt the most in control. Of myself. Of men in my life. Of the bottle.
I really don't like thinking so much. I don't think it is good for me. I disappear into my head and into my thoughts. I'm looking forward to the weekend. I hope there is sun. My favorite thing to do is spend the day quietly with Dick walking on the beach, just the two of us.
Jane Says: I'm a Barbie Girl. In a Barbie World. Life in Plastic. It's FANTASTIC.
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
I promised the counselor that I would keep journaling in her absence. Not that this is the only reason that I'm writing on here.
I was writing back and forth with a friend today, and I said that I didn't like to write about a lot of stuff, because it was like reliving it for me. I feel the same amount of guilt. The same amount of shame. Well, at least I did before I started taking the Lexapro. I think that I liked to punish myself. Because I didn't know how else to operate. From a normal place.
I haven't been drinking since I started taking the medicine. Probably for the best. Tempting as it is - what with working with kids and all. If they don't drive you to drink with their crappy ass attitudes and shitty remarks, I don't know what will. Oh yeah, Dick's ex-wife. She makes me want to drink too. Not really, but I'd like to kick her ass. I'm always so worried that someone will find this, that I don't think I let it out. I just repress it. And now I'm all prickly, like a cactus. Because the anger is outward.
When I was in counseling today, we talked about a lot of things that I really haven't thought about in a long time.
My freshman year of college. Which I always said I would never wish on anybody but never specified why. Or maybe I did, but I don't remember.
There was a guy. His name was Jon. No "H". I remember that distinctly. I was drunk. Down in the French Quarter. 16. Passed out outside a bar. He got some ice and a water bucket from the hotel across the street and stayed with me until I came to. He drove me home, took me up to my room and forced himself on me. I don't like to use the word rape because I knew this kid. Not well, but he lived in my dorm and I saw him for the rest of the time that I was at Loyola.
I was too embarrassed to tell anyone because I had kissed a lot of boys and I thought that made me a whore. I remember distinctly that I said "No" more than once, and cried afterwards while he apologized and hugged me. His roommate, Dan (who I had also kissed) made fun of me in the cafeteria that day saying, "Where's Jon?" and I just smiled, like it had been consensual.
I didn't realize, at 16, that I had the right to say no AT ANY TIME. At any stage of undress, drunkenness, lust or whatever. Until I was at a Take Back the Night Rally and was listening to another girl describe her experiences. They were identical. And she called it "Date Rape." But by that time, it was a couple months later and I thought it was too late. Let bygones be bygones, I thought. I could take it. Absorb it. Pretend it never happened.
I ignored him until I was a junior and found out that he did the same thing to my roommate, who was a freshman that year. Except she was bigger than I was, and he physically hurt her. Bruised her and left physical evidence. She hid it like I did.
After that, whenever I saw him in a bar with a girl, I took her away from him. If she was a freshman, and I knew her, I offered to buy her a drink and told her what happened to me. The one time he did confront me and told me to "Stop it," I said, "You stop it," and walked away. The counselor said that was a good thing, but I don't know why I did it. I guess I didn't want anyone else to feel that guilt. That, or I was lashing out. I WAS fueled by liquid courage, after all.
We also talked about Mike. Whitenener. Who I also had the misfortune of dating my freshman year. He was not right. And I knew it. He said stuff like "I hate my mother," and other niceties. Even though I was naive, I knew that I should stay the hell away from him. But as soon as I realized that, he tried harder to get close to me. One night when I was in his room he wouldn't let me leave. Physically held me down on his bed and said, "No. You can't leave." So I laid there until the morning, terrified.
The night I broke up with him, I slept with another guy. After I wouldn't sleep with Mike and told him that I didn't want to be involved with anyone. At 16, I didn't really know what the hell I was doing. I slept with Andy so that he would like me. He told me that I wasn't pretty. That he didn't notice me. And I wanted desperately for him to like me. So I gave it up, thinking that would make him my boyfriend. Which it didn't.
Andy was still an asshole, but Mike was angry. And he lashed out. A female acquaintance of mine told Mike what happened and that was the end of me. I walked into the lobby of my dorm to see him standing there with all the boys that I had kissed that first quarter, and anybody else who would listen. "You want to see a whore?" he questioned, proud of his power. "There she is," and he pointed right at me.
I froze, in terror and disbelief. And then I went up to my room and cried.
But it was far from over.
Mike memorized my schedule and followed me to class, ten steps behind me berating me. "WHORE! SLUT! CUNT! SLUT! FUCKING BITCH!" Every step. Every class. For days. For me to retell it now seems kind of surreal. I don't know why nobody stepped in.
A couple times, he got physical, grabbing me roughly by the arm and forcing me down in the grass on the courtyard so he could yell at me some more. I just sat there, figuring that if I just let him yell and yell and yell, he'd eventually get tired. He did. And then he'd get sad. "Why did you do that? I liked you so much. You seemed so perfect..." he'd trail off.
Only to get irate again and continue his tirade.
I shut down physically and emotionally. I quit eating. I became paranoid. I started going to class 45 minutes early so that he couldn't find me. He told me that he was going to tell everyone what a whore I was, and I believed him. I was convinced that everyone was talking about me, that I was ruined, nothing.
My RA finally stepped in and sent me to counseling. I went, and told the lady what was happening. And in one of the great disappointments of my life, the school did nothing. Not even when he swerved the car to try and hit me and yelled, "Hit that fucking bitch!" 3 years later. They just told me not to make him more important in my mind than he was, because he was only a person and only a sophomore at that. Hunh.
And that's the year Jody was killed.
And when I started dating Michael for redemption. I loved him, but it was not a healthy relationship.
Thinking about this stuff for me is not fun. I was asked (in session) what I did after the rape. I don't know. I just went on. The word victim was also used a lot, and I don't know if I like it. Victim. Of Rape. Victim. Of Mike. Victim.
I didn't even realize how much this stuff still affects me until I was talking about it and I could feel my voice getting louder as I said, "They didn't even do anything! I was a girl! I WAS A GIRL! I WAS LITTLE!" Most of the times when I recount this stuff my voice is, even. It didn't happen to me. I am strangely disconnected from these experiences most of the time.
I will say that it is good to talk to somebody about it professionally. Even though it is unpleasant and makes me feel angry and sad and longing to detatch, at least it's something. I'm going places.
Jane Says: I'm flip-flopping between "build a little birdhouse in your soul" and "one day, you will hate like I hate."
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