December 13, 2010
Dear John
I rehearse these words in my head, and then I cancel them over and over. In fact, I have nothing left to say. But, I will anyway. Do not misunderstand these words for anything but what they are. I am not trying to do anything, change anything, or go back in time. I made the right decision in not returning to you, after you threw me out. It was a hard way to go. But, it was absolutely predictable. There is no other way our relationship could have ended. I always said, one day you will hit the off switch, and that was the day. Our time together was brief. Our marriage was unnecessary, but oh well. We made that choice, and so be it. It certainly did burn out any fairytales I had in my head that marriage meant love and safety and trust.
The one thing that doomed our marriage was your refusal to accept that you are bipolar. You need medication. As is typical in persons with bipolar disorder, you minimize it and seem to think you have very little behaviour actually associated with the disorder. When, in fact, almost everything you do is bipolar acting out. Your decision to marry me was manic, your constant fighting with me was manic, your demanding and impersonal sex with me was manic, your never ending criticism of me was manic, your belief that you are just fine is manic, your decision to ditch your meds was manic, your blaming me was manic, your perception that you are a victim is manic, your habit of re-writing history was manic, your lies were manic, your threats were manic, and finally your withholding your love from me was manic. I know you do not see this. I know these words fall on deaf ears. I know that you say you know yourself and that in fact, you do not. If you were on the outside looking in, you would see one un-well person in yourself.
I am certain this letter is pissing you off. It makes no difference to me. You tend to be pissed off, even when you smile your unreal smile. You are angry, even though you do not see it. You hide from the world. No one really knows you, because you keep your self locked away down deep inside. Some people think they know you, but truth is .. they do not.
Yes, our relationship hurt me very, very deeply. I feel abused on every level except physical. I admit, I am wounded. No, I do not want you back because that would only hurt me more. And I know I will heal from this all. Because, I am strong. I will heal and I will be stronger than I have ever been before. You already do not know me anymore. I am so changed by it all.
I have no idea what you tell yourself about this marriage, John. I do not want to know. I fell in love with a persona and not a real person. I was completely tricked. I had no idea you could be so cruel and so sick. I have to find a way to recover from that, and learn to trust myself again. But one thing for sure, I may have left in a firestorm, but I did leave.
If you have any conscience at all, please read more and find out how exactly you hurt me.
1. My sexuality got beat down to nothing. All of the sexual insults - threats you made to go to other women; how you compared me to everyone and told me all other women were superior to me; that any one would want you back and that you might even go back to them; your paranoid accusations that I had screwed other people; your arrogance that no one had ever left you and how you had dumped those women and you could dump me too; screaming at me to get out and calling me sexual insults because I could not have sex with you on demand; waking me up screaming at me that I was a lying Bitch and you had a right to sex while I lay sleeping after recovering from a bladder infection so severe I was peeing blood; constantly making fun of me for not being what you thought I should be; minimizing my pain when I tried to tell you to stop and that it hurt me; refusing to understand what happened and why I shut down .. This list is not complete. I hope you get a sense of how bad that was to treat me that way.
2. Trying to come between me and my son – I saw him maybe 4 days in an entire calendar year. But, you could not handle that. You were jealous like a child. You felt he was interfering in our marriage. How is that possible?? You took my precious vacation and my first ever visit to my son’s home and you smashed it to ruins. You saw him as taking over where you thought you belonged, when all he was doing was what he had done all his life. So what if he loaned me an arm on a slippery trail? Could you not step back for the sake of a couple of days and allow a mother and her son to bond and share their time together? Are you so insecure as a man, that my own son was a threat to your masculinity and your position as my husband? How selfish and how unsuccessful you were. I lost respect for you that day. I saw a very insecure man in you there that day .. and it was not normal.
3. You got diagnosed as bipolar. You never kept your agreement to take your meds and take enough meds. You played with the whole thing. You blamed me for the diagnoses that a doctor gave you. I do not have that kind of power, John. I cannot make a doctor say you are bipolar. You admitted you were bipolar and you believed it, and you begged me to stand by you and help you and not leave you. But, as soon as you thought you had me, you ditched the whole plan. You wasted my precious time. You lied to me.
4. You lied to your brother and daughters about me. You talked shit behind my back to your so called friends. You had no respect for me.
5. You said everything was 50/50 , then you took as much back as you possibly could. You made every effort to make sure I suffered and had nothing when I had to leave. You had this idea that you own everything, including me. You lied.
6 You sabatoged every effort at counseling we made. You told me that each and every counselor had said negative things about me, and then expected me to go and trust these people. The only one I was able to trust after all, was Dianne, and that was because she saw through your game. Of course, you did not like her, because she was too smart to be manipulated by your games.
7 You twisted everything to suit your view of things. You played passive aggressive games, deliberate manipulations, overt verbal abuse and cruelty, abandonment, and more.
Well, John .. I doubt you read all this. I expect you are storming around (at least inside your head) and saying none of this is true. You are already saying it is all my fault and you are probably looking for ways to make my life difficult. Whatever .. I know for a fact what happened in that stupid joke of a marriage.
It was all a waste of time. Knowing you was a waste of my precious time.
I do not need or want your understanding anymore. I do not care what you believe. I know you are sick. I know you will never take your meds or try to make your life ok. I believe you will storm through this world screwing women over. I believe you hate women.
I no longer know you, like you, or trust you.
Good bye John.
