Get this…I’m thinking that I can come to an understanding of things between my husband and myself. that I’m at least half responsible for things going bad between us…that it can be fixed, that we/I can find a way to salvage things and make them right…or at least bearable so we can continue the family.Friday was a huge double psyched out day for me. Due to the holiday both my therapy sessions..Indiviual and couples were scheduled back to back on the same day! Thought it was odd but also thought it might be interesting!
So I go to my therapist first. I’m feeling good and was almost on time! We got into some serious stuff and she brought me through this ah…”trauma busting” technique having me imagine a tough event in my life and so in the middle of it I yelled out, “I don’t want to stay here anymore!” I was thinking of an incident in my childhood when I was beaten and held down…but it became mixed up with my house that I’m living in now…and being held down (sex etc.) with my husband. Just images flipping back and forth. After that I was to meet my husband for couples therapy, but had a minute so returned a call from my “ex girlfriend” just to be kind. I was in a garden center walking around searching for items for my new summertime project…a Zen / Italian inspired Garden for my backyard. we spoke the usual” hi, how are you what have you been doing”…she asked me if I was seeing anyone, told her I was dating, then she tells me she is seeing someone…younger, taller, slimmer, with curlier hair than me. OK , that’s nice I’m truly happy, and relieved…but still it was like she just had to tell me, and in the meantime she was pumping me for information about when and where I was going to be performing so she could come and see me and bring this Julie. So ok a bit weird.
Then the couple’s therapy… my husband on one couch, me on the other, nice older lady trying to guide us. Midway though she tells my husband that I’m trying to find my way back to him, but that he is not listening! He starts raising his voice…”I’m listening!” …she says” you don’t hear her- what she is saying to you…she wants you to do things with her…you are stuck in a rut…she wants to spend time with you, if you want sex, then it has to begin with “Good Morning” it just can’t come out of no where.” He’s defensive…”I don’t force myself on her!” Her: “But she needs you to pay some attention to her, haven’t for 12 years. she is trying to find a way to you” Him:” I don’t’ want to go out, I don’t want to do to nightclubs and dance” Her:” Is she saying that? She isn’t saying that” Me: “you’re not interested in being with me! Ok! Get a blow up doll and fuck her!” this went on for awhile and all the time my husband being so DENSE! “I’m happy reading and watching Law and Order or channel 13 or writing…”I was repelled and disgusted by his self-centeredness….and WANTED TO FLY!!!! A really nice woman asked me down to a club at the shore…I was dressed, had gas in my new car and I was ready to just go! but we had spoken of going out to eat…at the only restaurant my husband can stand, so I thought I should go through with that…but I wanted to text this new friend, and I knew he would flip if he saw me on the phone…Last week when we went to this same restaurant, a local place filled with my paesani who all get a kick out of me…I wanted to text Uno, so went into the ladies room and was on the phone when I heard a knock…thinking it was a woman wanting to get in I opened the door it was him! He saw I had the phone and went bonkers…yelling at me in front of the entire restaurant and walking so fast back to our table he lost his balance and went careening into a table of six! Crash! Down he went! Chairs and dishes flying! Very funny…thankfully I was able to keep from laughing! But everyone there knew he was mad at me.
So this time I’m trying my best to be nice and polite and get through the dinner in a nice way…but I know what’s no his mind…he figures, well he’s spending time with me so there will be a payoff…I’ll sleep with him. I want to get in the car and go!!!!! Or I want to at least call Uno who will understand. But he’s there hovering!!! We finish dinner, and then he wants to dance with me…ok so we try to dance. Him with his cane! ok, then he starts as he always has for years and years and years…he tries to lead me! Forcing me around the floor, trying to make me spin, when I don’t want to. and move his way, in his time! Well I could NEVER do that! Ever! But I try, all the time trying not to trip over his cane! God! What a dense dope he is, I’m thinking! So into himself all the time! Always and for years!!!! And years and his body are hulking and hot! And I know he wants to penenatrate me! And I don’t want to! Don’t’ want do! But still I’m trying to be nice! Finally despite my good intentions I say….”well you’ve finished dinner and I want to stay a little longer with Angelo, (my pal, and musician …an even older guy than my husband.) My husband gets the hint, I guess that I’ve had it with him, and stomps out of the restaurant! Leaving me with the check!
So there are these “regulars” at the restaurant who are getting to know me…two elderly ladies one quite large, divorced, and another a sweet-faced, widow both rather outspoken and fun…we always talk a bit then make a little contest out of playing “name that tune” with Angelo. I notice them shaking their heads at my husband’s behavior. They say to me out right; “what are you doing with him? He’s so domineering! Why do you let him treat you like that?” Dah…I didn’t think other people noticed…keep trying to make things right and adjusting myself to fit him…but even these strangers see something else.
The next day my darling Aunt comes to visit with my mother, I’ve offered to drive them to the city to see my sister in the hospital. As we are pulling away my husband is talking to them near the car then sticks his head in the window and makes a crack about me…the usual teasing he does. Put- downs of me…a dopey joke at my expense…I don’t quite catch it, they give him an uncomfortable laugh. I’m thinking SEE! He just keeps doing it! I’ve told him a million times for years, and so has our counselor…It’s not funny! He says “Oh you can’t take a joke! “ It’s not a joke if I don’t think it’s funny! He always does this in front of company! Like I’m some nit- wit wife like Gracie Allen to be made small, to be diminished! But this is not a comedy act, this is my life! Whatever… If a person doesn’t like something then stop it!!!! But no he can’t! Ever! EGO!!!! He’s the only thing that matters! His feelings no one else’s.
So in the car I begin to confide in my darling Aunt and mom about what’s been happening and my aunt and mom, in typical older lady Italian style, have always placated men…living under the wire…managing, making do, to survive. but then my Aunt, who lived with us a few days every week years ago when my kids were babies so that I could work part time…well she starts to say..” Yeah well he is domineering. He never paid any attention to you, he never said anything nice, or did anything with you or the kids…he kept to himself, or yelled at you and made you do things you didn’t want I always saw that” Huh? My aunt even! My sweet get-along-with-everyone aunt noticed it and years ago and I didn’t! And the ladies at the restaurant too! ” you are so good and try to be nice but he only wants his way” Ha!
But my mommy well she, very tellingly, says nothing!….no, because she let my dad domineer her for years and years, suffocating us all, beating us, and verbally abusing us, and her letting him make us miserable in our tiny house …not living, afraid to live, because he was afraid to live.
When my dad was my age. MY AGE! he was laid off from his job in construction…he worked so hard all of his life 6 sometimes 7 days a week, but was uneducated and there was a huge slump in construction, so he couldn’t get another job…he was also so filled with pride he wouldn’t take a lesser job…so he just gave up! He almost never went out after that…he had heart problems…but I think he exaggerated them so that he’d have an excuse to give up on the world… the rest of this life another 15 years or so he did nothing! Drive my mother around… he cooked! meatballs, gravy, and fabulous fancy cheesecakes and helped to raise my niece, who my equally cut off brother was supposed to have visitation with on weekends, but my jerky brother “didn’t know what to do with a little girl” My Dad mellowed took my niece and my mother to amusement parks and went to all of her school events all the stuff he never would do with us!
So! Epiphany! My husband male supremacist! Egoist! Just like my DAD! Crushing my spirit for years and me letting it happen! Why? For love! That’s why…. love? Or what I thought was love: substituting marital status, a roof over my head, the association of being with an extraordinary man, and not alone instead of some thing real. It’s male entitlement! Always! not that I never acknowledged it but felt I had to put up with it in order to survive in the world…have children, a decent place to live, had to compromise but it’s killing me now…all he wants is to posses me… after not paying me any attention for years and years, he is obsessed with literally penetrating me… I have to lie on my back and let him pin me down with his conquering dick!
But now! What??? I’m stuck, my kids are still young…and to break up the family would be horrendous! What to do?
Dream… visualize….a more peaceful life…quieter, more music, drawing, dancing, love…I can do that!
