Saturday, February 26, 2022

LONG Time No Post

 ...but yes, even though Life kept Happening all around me in a big way, I have maintained continuous sobriety for what will be 6 years on this coming May 21. Here's the TL;DR version of the past couple years:

Marriage dead: corpse disposal yet to be determined.


THE WHY

February 16, 2022. A Wednesday. Not yet noon.  

I had just come back from my post-op visit [carcinoid tumors of the small intestine] and discovered I didn't need ANY kind of follow-up treatment. Smartest oncologist I know had weighed in and said no need for Octreotide. Let out a huge breath I hadn't even known I'd been holding. Even though I knew it was a daily shot and not what we all think when we hear that word, "no chemo" is still fantastic news. I had shared the "clean bill of health" with my friend group and to both social media platforms. In the six miles from MyHospital home, the praise and kind words and exclamation points were nonstop. LOTS of hearts and flowers emoticons. To quote Billy Joel, "the cowboys and their kin, like the sea came pouring in." 

I knew Spouse wouldn't be like -that- because he was too drinksick. I was a little surprised he hadn't managed to even get out of bed to the master-suite doorway for my big return but not very. So (after mentally preparing myself - remember he was here "to help you the way you helped me" [after liver transplant on July 19, 2019 and with broken arm for most of it]) I went upstairs into the bedroom, saw him lying there on the bed, and told him the good news. Weak, polite smile. "Great!"

That was it. No further words on his part about my illness, period. About me at all, actually. 

Well. 

Lotta stuff to accept right there and I really tried. Thought "he will get back to it when he's feeling better." After all, each kid had found a way to INITIATE conversation via voice or text to say "I'm REALLY glad you don't need chemo." I mean not a Big Deal kind of thing just one clearly deeply felt sentence. Figured he'd do likewise. 

Yeah, well.

I asked how he was, got the litany about how his arm hurt his feet hurt and he overdrinks so he feels lousy generally. 

But then he said the following:

"In a little bit I'm going to take a shower and I want you to sit and wait right there (gesturing to extra computer chair) so in case I fall or something you can come help me. I mean I can't depend on Eldest"

I stood there, just absorbing that with its command form and lack of please and total assumption of affirmative response plus insult to own favorite child, and he began to do the "...I mean if it's OKAY with you..." crap so I said lightly and with no anger just professional cheer "yes, I'll stay here while you shower just let me know when" and left as quickly as I could. He emerged later with wet hair having NOT asked me after all so perhaps he overheard the exasperated sigh on far side of gently-closed door.

That was it. Right then. Hand still on doorknob.

Done. Out. Nope, no more, doesn't work, doesn't matter. Just DONE. I mentally explored "and what if he _does_ get his shit together and is sober and truly does the work and -properly- repentant?" and decided "not about to kick -anyone- when already down but even THEN I want out. OUT." 

I mean. 

Way back in the end of January he started carrying on about "coming up there [to the Hinterlands of NY from the Pinelands of NJ] so I can take care of you the way you took care of me" and I started trying to figure out some Serious Diplomacy. However I couldn't come up with a tactful way to SAY "...are you KIDDING me?!? Not no but FUCK no you will be way more harm than good! Help like that I DO NOT need!!!" and since Eldest had her own reasons for wanting to come up, he had willing wheels. "Jokingly" reminded me it was half his house too, so fine whatever. They were coming on Feb 1 the day before my surgery. HIS dog, the 27-lb beagle travels with him which was actually the best part of this whole sorry plan because she and I have a lot to bond over these days and really get along. Silver lining. 

Yeah, well.

Sometime more than one but less than five days before arrival, he said "...and you realize of course BoyDog will be coming too."

This is one of his more annyoing conversational tactics: the "you realize [thing he knows damned well you aren't gonna like but CAN'T 'realize' because you haven't -heard- it yet]" method. It is one of many employed to deny choice. Anyhow, BoyDog is a teenie-weenie-beagle-inie. Twelve pounds, cute as a button, sweet and smart and runs cat software half the time. He's also an intact male who marks everything in sight because Divine was right "always the little ones got somethin' to prove." I had been quite explicit in my specific desire he stay _In_The_Pinelands_ for my post-operative state, multiple times...and yet he had urinated on my bed the night before I went in for surgery. Fancy that.  

Sometime more than three but less than six days after my surgery he asked me to drive him to the liquor store. (I wasn't on narcotics so I did.) By the one-week mark - POD #8 - he was ServePro about my gastric neuroendocrine carcinoma diagnosis: as if it never happened. 

Well.

As mentioned, I don't further hurt already-sick people so now that he's the FUCK back in the NJ house I'm not doing anything in particular any time soon other than taking off my ring. He had for a while after a "beyond repair?/I don't know" discussion on 2/17 tapered down to just a pint plus two or three minis (everyone else in the world calls them "shooters") but I hear that's gone by the wayside, at least temporarily. I also don't particularly WANT to cough up a 5k retainer or make him go on MedicAid either so I'm hoping that instead of "legal divorce" we can have "sensible arrangement." And I did promise to do a travel thing I said I'd honor regardless, although I'm secretly hoping he won't hold me to it. 

But it's over, baby. Whether HE knows it or not. 


THE HOW

Okay. Summer of 1986. The Challenger and Chernobyl still big in everyone's brains. Oprah Winfrey had JUST shifted from Chicago to national, Phantom of the Opera debuted as a musical, Mir (the one that crashed but 9/11 blew its doors off) launched and I had seen Halley's Comet. 

I had also in a surprising burst of independence, switched majors from microbiology to psychology and was taking second summer session second-semester psych to catch up. Because I HAD to be on the IUPUI campus for second semester and you paid by the whole summer (even then, price-gouging) I took a drafting class [CAD/CAM was brand new people mostly DREW blueprints] and had scored a job DOING it so I had money. Drafting paid 3x per hour more than any job I'd had to that point and it was inside, sitting down in air conditioning. Color ME hooked on higher education. 

I also had That Fucking Guy starting up the letters again (no, not email, actual pen/paper/envelope/stamp) writing all witty and nominally sorry and such. He was definitely the most interesting guy in my life even if he HAD shit all over me twice for Thanksgiving, second time worse. Also, despite climbing hard almost every day for two solid years, I still had below-zero self-esteem. So instead of "you asshole" I thought "hm." I was already looking toward pairbonding and knew the one thing I would NOT be able to handle was "bored." Yes, you may laugh freely now. 

Anyhow because of the HUGE "interesting" factor outweighing all others, he moved higher in the (really dismal) ranks. But I knew (not in these words of course; language has improved) that he was presenting me a hugely curated version of himself. Ferpitysake I hadn't even met his parents and the guy whom I blew to avoid being date-raped had taken me to his grandmother's house months prior. I knew a chunk of that nice summer job had to go toward plane tickets so I could see TFGuy in his Native Habitat before deciding if I really DID want one. 

I also knew that my mother would Have A FIT over that so in another surprising burst of independence I maneuvered around her. First, I secured a ride to/from airport with my four-years younger BFF at the time.  Back then, you bought airline tickets either from a travel agent or at the airport or the airline mailed them to your home address in advance. WAY advance. Travel agents took a cut big enough to rent office space, so I secured a second ride right away to/from same airport for tickets. On way home from airport I had BFF drive me to my mother's place of employment for a surprise visit. I'd done that once in a while over the years infrequently and it was always well-received. Told her there and got out fast. By the time she got home some 5-6 hours later she'd calmed down enough we could be polite about "...well you're marrying Princess Lucky so you better get used to it" despite how much she wanted to effing sing at me. Evening ended with her asking me if she could, possibly, drive me to the airport instead of BFF. Please. She would really like to. Yeah, fine I let her; I didn't really wanna pay for another round of gas money ($0.89/gal, btw.)

"Skip a bit, Father"

So. Brick apartment complex, concrete flooring, first-floor doorway. Door opens inward to my left, hinges on my right. Standing within and then aside to let us pass is RoomMate. Let me now describe to the best of my ability and memory. My eyes downcast, I saw bottom of a dirty white door expanding onto filthy tan shag carpeting and feet.

Feet in shiny black boots with a heel and zippers up the sides I haven't seen those since my father got divorced wow I didn't know anyone even still wore them. Tucked under hem of black polyester doubleknit pants like male teachers and office workers wear shit that's dressy am I gonna be okay here probably I am because he's wearing a long sleeved crew neck black T-shirt knit pullover (no chest pocket) and that's when I see oval face long gold hair to his shoulders exact same style as mine but damn his is way thicker. When I was busy falling in love with him I said Cary Elwes but I saw a picture of the young David Gilmour in Rolling Stone well before movie and it was a far better fit. First time I saw cover of Excitable Boy (Warren Zevon) I about dropped the glass I was holding; did rattle the ice. [Just looked at that cover again and the double-take still holds scary-well; NOT gonna play title track.] Wide-mouthed smile like Tim Curry but not showing any teeth whatsoever THAT I can get behind..."Hello." 

First thing he says after "here she is" from my driver is an apology for TFGuy not being there with genuine disgust/scorn/negativeanyhow that he wasn't. I respond "Hey, I freely admit I invited myself out here so I deserve whatever I get." Would like to say between previous "I" and "invited" I added "committed a big social faux pas and" because I know I did OFTEN when retelling but I might've embellished it in afterwards. Yes, a world in which I told stories, fancy that. He clearly thought that was still no excuse or validation for TFGuy's behavior. Interesting at the time; never even considered that perspective. File THAT away to ponder. Anyway the second thing very close on heels of first is "please don't touch that light switch; it's keeping that computer running." I glance down, see a TRS80 model 4 exactly like the one my mother's first good boss sent home with each of his employees to learn how to use at night so they could use the one he'd just had installed in the office. She was second after his Number One; I thought that was cool beans at the time and meant she rated. As I'm writing today I'm wondering if maybe he knew her smart bored kid would like it too. RIP Harvey. Anyway.

In response to my curious look, he said "It's running a program to see how long it will take monkeys to write Shakespeare."

He couldn't have had me at "hello," but after "eare" it was definitely up for grabs. 

And that is how we met.  


THE WHEN

Saturday February 26, 2022, 12:30.

He called to tell me that Eldest had just left on her way up to NY. Solo. This was 24 hours earlier and one person less than I expected -- as of late Friday night 2/25 she and her husband were both coming up on Sunday afternoon/evening. But I said "okay, that's fine" and rolled with it. He was cheerful. No, _chipper_. As in Top o' the mornin' to you because I topped up IN the morning...ah, fuck the cute; he was audibly inebriated but not yet shitty. 

So we chitchat a bit about this and that including what he'd been eating and him being down there where the good food was and that's how I slid into talking about two houses. 

He said something snarky about not wanting to come up and I said without even missing a beat that was fine I didn't want to have him which from the depth of the silence through the phone meant that I'd made my point even though he just came right back with one of his stock "let's verbally argue" phrases like "oh...you want to PLAY" or "oh here it comes" or somedamnedthing.

But just said quite calmly:

No. You came up here and I thought your behavior was sh--- Well, no. [anecdote about my own bad drunken behavior in the past with punchline of his beloved grandmother saying to me "Wash your face; you're too pretty to hide." ]

"Oh. Okay, fine I know hate when I hear it."

"This isn't hate."

"OH yes it is whether -you- know it or not." 

[cross now but patiently cross like a tired kindergarten teacher] "No. This is anger and disgust and contempt but those are three completely DIFFERENT emotions from hate."

"Oooh. 'disgust.'" [quiet, seemingly snarky but I'm thinking "I sank your battleship." Yes with just a period, no joy in Mudville.] 

"...and despite all the love under there I still think you made a really shameful showing these past three weeks and I don't want any part of it." [words about you do your thing I'll do mine nothing changing for at least next 6 months but no more  living together long term.]

R: "Okay, ENDORA" [clearly trying to be humorous] [I paused a minute then the lightbulb went on and I said, with a noticeable bit of her accent]

Oh EXCELLENT, Maurice! I am so glad we have come to this Fine Arrangement! 

After that he wanted off the phone in a fair hurry. So fine, I don't mind. I'm still happy I got it out in the open so easily and quickly. Go out in hall, start telling Youngest what happened. Then the TEXTing starts. He's using Siri so I know this is because he is planning to get Way More Drunk but wants a written record so that when he DOES eventually sober up he can see what the fuck his dumb drunk ass did. 

13:01 pm EST: 

R: Why so nasty? I am sober, you know. Eldest can confirm for you since the pint was still in the freezer before she left. I'm only now opening it.

[I'm standing there thinking and then saying out loud "yeah that's because you already had some stashed elsewhere earlier I heard it in your voice" but what I text back is]

I was not nasty at all. Merely truthful. 

Ouch. I understand now. 

Even if you ARE sober I still don't want to live with you right now. Let's see what things are like in 6 months. I have finance and taxes so nothing needs to change at all except that. Told you I would honor Monterrey and I will. 

R: What about finance and taxes I did not understand that last sentence

I meant that I will do the taxes - probably tomorrow, definitely this week - so that refund comes. And that I will continue to do Finance as I have been doing. My hope is that with time and space  you can figure out who it is you are now that you were given 2nd chance. Past 2.5 years ain't it. Became painfully obvious over past 30 days.

R: How noble of you.

It isn't noble. It is "put your own oxygen mask on first." for both of us.

R: Well, here's hoping.

Yes. The love is all still there but I can't keep doing this live under same roof thing. Sorry. 

That was at just past 13:00 EST on Saturday 2/26 and he has been in radio silence ever since. That's fine. I have no idea what his next move will be but my money is on "knowing a good deal when he sees it" so I expect a lot of snark but actual acceptance of my terms. I could be wildly wrong, of course. Either way, the First Emotional Bank of Samantha has cut off his credit and called in the slips. 

I also, this morning, heard a live cover of "Daydream Believer" by the author which included a spin on the refrain that had me laughing out loud. The Universe is larger than we know or can know. 

Don't be sad! I feel better than in ages!!!

I told someone "I would rather live as a hermit or in an Amish community forever more than under the same roof with him and all his tech." 

And that can finally happen. Now I'm working on who in the heck it is ** I ** am after all this time. 







Wednesday, October 14, 2020

Day 1608

 Hello, everybody!

Still sober. Continuously. Usually I don’t even think about it; that’s why I don’t blog. 

Lately it’s been harder; not gonna lie. I don’t think I’m -seriously- tempted — not if it means giving up four _years_ — but boy I’ve felt the pull more in recent days. 

I think it’s just cumulative: COVID, major corporate re-org at work, winter coming...so I’m doing even more self care. You all do some too; it never hurts. 

Peace out,

S



Thursday, May 21, 2020

Four Years -- For Real!

It's my soberversary!  1462 days. 

Wow.

Back when I first started my current job, so probably more than 15 years ago now, a co-worker was quietly celebrating HER four-year soberversary and I remember thinking that was both impressive and stunningly unattainable.

Yet here I am.

Me, of all people...someone who started thinking "gee I ought to quit drinking; it would probably be really good for me" back in my twenties.  Yeah, well, it took a couple decades but I got here and it's a good place to be.

It's hard at first - really hard, not gonna lie - but every passing day makes it that much easier to keep going. Now it's just part of who I am rather than A Big Thing.

In fact, it's so much a part of the background that I'm not doing that much to celebrate: grocery-store bakery cake because of tradition.  Thanks to COVID even though I shopped fancy cakes and Jeni ice cream and a couple online clothing stores I just didn't feel comfortable dropping much coin during a time of such economic uncertainty.  My job itself is safe - praise be - but the possibility of pay cut is always still a thing so it feels more wrong to spend money than to save it and quietly enjoy this major milestone on my own.

Because really, it's all about the struggle in my head just like it's all about the struggle in your head(s.)

For sure this is the best thing I've done for my physical and emotional well-being ever. Hands down. No contest. Everything else pales beside it.

I do have one nice treat:  my dear friend - the one so dear I call her my sister - sent me a top I thought for sure would be way too small and not only does it fit but it looks fantastic on me so I'm wearing that today.  Still shut up in my office most of the time same as every other day but knowing I look great is the perfect accent for this day, I think.

For my handful of regular followers, the Zoloft is doing its job. Everything is still just as grim as it was but I'm not crying or raging over it any more and seem to be much closer to what I consider my emotional baseline. The increasingly complicated things my healthcare system in general and my department in particular are having to do for Covid are annoying but tolerable as opposed to devastatingly upsetting and that's a major win.

Wherever you are on your own journey, keep at it. Eventually it sticks.

Love to all.

Tuesday, April 21, 2020

Day 1432


1432 saw birth of the Ghent Altarpiece and death of a Cypriot king. It's also a month to the day till my four-year soberversary.

Blogfriends it's been rough. Not the sobriety; all the rest of it. This virus has brought out the "People Gonna People" in everybody and I'm too emotionally fragile from the year I just had to be very good at dealing with any of it. Which is why I electronically asked my primary care doc about a referral to a head doc. I kinda knew I needed help getting to a better place but the final trigger was one of those dumb online quizzes where I scored an eight of eight and thought "maybe I should stop waiting to see if it gets better on its own." Rest of family visibly relieved; that was interesting. So now I'm waiting to hear back which can take up to three days which tomorrow will be so I will re-send or something on Thursday if I haven't heard.

I'm still mostly functional just not very happy. But I'm working on changing that.

I'm so glad I got sober first. And until I typed it for you guys up there it didn't even register that today was the one-month-before...so it's good I wrote a blog post.  I remember when each month was a huge milestone and I just couldn't even think of being where I am right now. The idea that the whole front-and-center of it all would just....go away...would have blown my mind. Completely.  And that's totally okay because we can only do what we can do right now.

It gets better but it takes a while to get really good. Keep chipping away at it. All of it is a learning experience. And times like right now? It's really sucking but damn at least I know it's not really sucking because of the booze, y'know? And I know how much -worse- it would suck with booze on board along with everything else. So there's that. Even now, feeling pretty crap, it's absolutely a given that sober crap is better.

Early bedtime always helps. Peace out, y'all. 

Saturday, April 11, 2020

Day Fourteen Something

...hang on, I'm looking: Day 1422. Another couple months and it will be Columbus Year. 

The actual year 1422 was pretty weird too - Hundred Years War and Crusades still in play but at the end of August King Henry 5th of England died then on my mother's birthday King Charles 6th of France died.

And I'm totally distracting myself from the issue at hand which is namely I feel miserable. Time of Pandemic was one too many things in my already full life. I find myself full of rage with sadness stuffed in the chinks. For days on end. It's like this virus has ripped the thin veneer of "nice; mostly civilized" off of -everything- and left all the ugly open to air out. I see it catalyzing pre-existing dividing lines and creating new ones and it's just so TIRESOME as in soul-grindingly wearying. People keep debating what is or isn't best and this is just at my micro level; I stopped watching television generally and TV news specifically years ago.

The trouble is, as I said last time, people gonna people....and now way too many everybodys have to jockey for position about what the right thing actually is, and what they should do to promote their OWN causes and the slope from noble to base just gets steeper every day. And yes of course we should do the things that keep the most people safe but even just what we've already -done- is going to make this year really freaking suck no matter how you look at it and I just got DONE with a year of more than my fair share of "suck" by any reasonable standards so I'm especially bitter and sad right now.  And the fact that so many people have called me their "rock" over the years, and the fact that I AM generally really emotionally strong, both make it that much more anger-inducing because nobody's used to ME being sad so they tend not to know what to do with it.

And that's fair since I don't know what to do with myself either. Going for a walk helped somewhat as at least I was a well-exercised depressive so I had a side of "accomplishment" with my sad; the other side of that was cleaning the bathroom.  However my Zoom-based knitgroup was a little more than I could handle so I bowed out after an hour. There's another Zoom-based social thing tonight I might try....or I might not. I"m having a super hard time with "cordial" just now.  Might do what I've -been- doing which is World of Warcraft Classic either with or without familiy members. And knitting. Virtual destruction and actual creation; I guess that's as good a way to maintain sanity - or attempt to do so - as any.  But I still cry seemingly out of the blue and my outlook is definitely way more Eeyore than Pooh for sure. 

Wednesday, April 1, 2020

Day 1412

Yes, Blogfriends I'm still here and still sober...but boy am I sick of 2020. Y'all are too, no doubt.

Anne Lamott often says "Grace bats last" and I sure hope she's right. Love is bigger than hate but chaos ultimately wins over order. In Time of Pandemic I have realized and keep realizing that people gonna people. BOY are people gonna people. It hasn't hit our area much yet - our first local positive case was on March 11 and we're still in the mid two-digit figures which means as of this writing nobody in my immediate circle -- family, friends, close co-workers -- has displayed symptoms of or tested positive for COVID19. I am, of course, grateful for this. Very.

However that doesn't knock a thing off the university. [family lexicon; source]

The whole rest of my life is full of stuff. Just full. It's been fucking hard as hell for a really long time and I'm really sick of it but there's nothing for it but to keep on living through it.  Which I am just so glad to be doing without having to think so much about booze the way I used to.

Oh which reminds me: "food and beverage" is the magic phrase keeping liquor stores open in my state. Convenience stores - where the nicotine products are sold - fall under "food" and often "gas" so they're okay too.  And praise be they are -- can you imagine the other way?!?  Oh. My. Not good.

But I am SOOOooooo grateful not to have to fuck around with any of that shit or especially its side effects. I'm sleeping poorly as-is; like I needed the three ayem dehydrated thing too?  This is better.

Stay strong...yes I'm telling myself as much as all you fine people.

Wednesday, February 5, 2020

Day 1356

Oh Blogfriends I know it's been quite a while because life just keeps coming at me hard.

But I've reached the number of sober days where it starts looking more recognizeably like a date-- I looked up the year 1356 and this is what we have:


Of those the Battle of Poitiers is the only one I'd ever even remotely heard of and that was pretty darned remotely.

Anyhow back to mememememe me. I'm tired. I have the day off because in a little while I'll be driving Spouse to his six-months-post-transplant visit three hours away and we both have come to dread the six hours of car time for at most ninety minutes of total non-car time and that's being very generous usually it's just under an hour. We've already had one episode of Youngest Duckling deciding to stop taking the med for a while and now that she's back on them she doesn't like her flat affect so there's angst there and I'm offering a therapist's ear....the problems are different for Eldest but more therapist ear there too and of course this is all while working full time.

And now that Spouse is in NY for this clinic visit we're back up to three dogs again. It's A Real Lot. Just all the time there's -something- y'know? I dunno how the fuck I could even dream of beginning to manage all of it if I were still drinking so I'm grateful all over again every day that I'm not.

And sure the thought has been there now and again but there's two things staying my hand: 1) It just doesn't fucking help. I've done that experiment a million times and although in the short term it's blissful "short term" is only about ninety minutes tops and then it's all downhill and 2) then I'd have shame on top of every OTHER problem. No thanks. Easier to just NOT do a thing. Well and now it's got momentum of its own.

Enough so that somehow I've become the family substance guru and my biggest advice is always this: I would never dream of telling anyone else how to handle their substances since I had such a terrible time with my own for so long. Also nobody will ever hear even the kindest words till they want to hear them.

I had a wonderful little overnight to meet a friend and visit the biggest yarn store in this part of my country Sunday into Monday. Bought a ton of yarn, almost all of it half off. That was great but also sadly brings into even sharper contrast just how Not Calm my regular life is. Theoretically things will get better and I hope that actually proves to be true.

Keep at it. Whatever it is.

Peace out.