We all go a little mad sometimes...

Today was a "crazy" day.

You know how that sense of proper judgment and deciding which behaviors are right and which are wrong sometimes disappear when you've been drinking?

Yeah. I did that today sober.

We had an argument at lunchtime about single life. Jokes and comments were made and I blew up. I was livid and I turned on her quickly. I yelled and I screamed. She needed to go to work so she tuned me out. I yelled louder and screamed louder. She headed out of the apartment. I chased her. She told me not to make a scene in the hallway. I said that I won't be living in this apartment anymore, why should I care what the neighbors think. I followed her down the stairs and to the car. I blocked her car door so she couldn't get it. I asked her to listen to me. She said she couldn't breathe. She went around to the passenger side. I sat in the driver seat. She got out. She climbed in the back. I sat in the driver seat. She got out. I let her in to the front seat but wouldn't close the door. She started the car and backed up, me running along with the car. She began to pull forward and I slammed her door. I ran upstairs and called her. She hung up. Repeat. repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. She picked up and told me she didn't have time for this. She hung up. repeat. Repeat. Repeat. She wouldn't answer. wouldn't listen to me. I left a voicemail and then had a genius plan. I would look up the phone number to the apartment complex where she was working today. Eventually she answered. I asked her not to hang up. She shouted oh my god and did just that.

The remainder of the day went with me calling her and either getting no answer or her hanging up on me. I left voicemails and texts. I was out of my mind. I knew it, too. This is, by no means, typical behavior for me. My heart is destroyed and instead of trying to be civil, I am going to war.

Eventually she responded to my texts.

"You are a crazy person!"

Probably not the best thing to say to me in my current, insane state of mind.

I called again. She said she wasn't home but when she got there, she would call. She did. She told me she didn't want to see me right now and that I shouldn't blame her. I really don't. Deep down, my mind knows that she shouldn't want anything to do with me at all. A part of it is still desperately clinging on. I won't get her back but my brain won't let me give up yet.

I scheduled my first therapy session ever for next week.

Sunday is our last day hanging out. She leaves on Monday. She returns the 22nd. Papers will probably be filed on the 24th. I move out into my new place on September 4th. September 5th, I cry. A lot.

Mixed emotions...

Today was one of those roller coaster type of days. I woke up fine, but was kind of sour after seeing her in the morning. I didn't want to pick a fight but I'm having a hard time accepting the newly established boundaries. That's my thing. I'm causing the tension there. I don't want those boundaries in place until paperwork has been signed. Nobody really understands this. Why would I just prolong what is inevitable? My answer is simple: so I can have some sense of control over something. I know the relationship is over, but I want to feel like I have some hold on things up until she goes because when she comes back, we will be like two ships just passing really close to each other in the same waters. We're no longer one unit. There will be no notifications of comings or goings. I can't ask where she is going or if she knows an estimate of when she'll be back. If I don't hear from her and get worried, I can't check up on her. I will be an island.

The good of the day all came when I was hanging out with one of my best friends. He was in town for the day just for me. He wanted to spend all day with me just to keep my mind off of things and to keep me busy and comforted. It was great and it felt like old times. Overall, I did have an excellent and enjoyable day.

The bad came when I found my new apartment. There is this surreal feeling you get when you go from a couple to a single. Everything feels like it moves in a blur. Today, I looked at apartments, found one I liked, and turned in my security deposit all over the course of five hours. A sense of finality in five hours. All of it... a blur. When I left the office after submitting my check, I broke down. This is not supposed to be my life. This is not the way things were supposed to happen. I don't deserve this. That last thought actually gave me hope. I don't deserve it. That is a shred of self-confidence. I can work with that.

Some people think I am giving up. That this relationship can be rescued. I am not giving up. I am putting up as much fight as I have left. The problem is that this relationship cannot be rescued. She has no desire to save it. We've run our course. I am playing catch up to a situation that really ended a year ago. I die a little inside everytime I look at a picture of us. Problem is, they are still plastered everywhere in this apartment. Those two people smiling and kissing while they were dating, engaged, getting married, partying, honeymooning, and relaxing, those two people are dead. That relationship is dead.

It is hard to grieve the dead right away.

Like I said, though, there was good to this day. The beginning of the movie CYRUS inspired some hope. The fictional characters in the film's first few minutes prove that some sort of caring relationship can occur after a divorce. Sure, it ain't real life, but I am in the marker to take whatever hope I can get.

It was a good day

Today was a good day. Yesterday was a bad day, so it is nice to have these days. Hung out with a friend all day. Bought a couple of books. THE FILM CLUB by David Gilmour looked really good. Movies are one of my passions so this may be an excellent story.

I also got something else that sounded appealing.

THINGS I'VE LEARNED FROM WOMEN WHO'VE DUMPED ME

This a collection of essays from various comics. I was looking for something that would help and this was the best I could find. I will read and give a full report.

I hope that everyone who reads this blog realizes that this is super-therapeutic for me. I need a place to vent and I need people to hear me. Maybe I will avoid great detail. Some things should just be mine to know, but my emotions, well, this can be on display. Maybe someone will stumble upon this when they are faced with the same situation. Maybe the way I handle it will be inspirational and relate able. I'm not doing it for that reason. I am doing it for me. Because I need to. But who knows?

You gotta have friends...

One thing I am learning is how important friends are. This is all much easier when I am hanging out with or talking to people. It seems much more difficult, right now, at least, when I am alone with my thoughts.

I have this horrible habit of putting my friends on the back burner when I meet a girl and fall for her. Since I do, eventually, hope to move past this (because I am a pretty decent fella with a lot to give), I need to make that change and keep my friends close. Even if I find a girl, my friends need to stay on an equal level of importance.

There have been some really nice phone calls and a few messages here and there that really have meant a lot to me. I am learning so much from this. It isn't all bad. Even the bad, if we work through it, may not be THAT bad. It is tough. Yesterday was a really bad day. But not every day will be like that. This support system, even if it isn't 24-7, is going to be enough to help me bounce back. I am sure of it.

Lest there be any confusion:

I still love her.

I am still in love with her.

A little more than three years ago, I was just coming out of a relationship that ended poorly. I met her and it changed everything. I found someone I was so compatible with and everything was just so easy. We liked indies and prematurely canceled TV shows. We shared a similar sense of humor. She was beautiful and she talked to shlubby me.

I can tell you anything you need to know about her. I have her facts memorized. She is everything to me. I love her more than anything else in the world. Still. This is not a past thing. This is a right now.

Do not think my willing to try giving up means I don't love her. I love her so much.

But why keep fighting if she has already given up? Why if she has given up a long time ago?

Unfair perceptions...

Looking through a used book store today, I saw quite a few divorce books in the self-help section. Sadly, they are all from the female perspective.

"Your man cheated? Leave him. Find out how."

What about a book for the guy being left? I didn't cheat. I didn't abuse her, verbally or physically. I didn't have any illegal or costly vices. I was good to her. I treated her like a queen. I loved her every second of every day. Where's my self-help book?

Maybe that's what this is. Me writing the self-help book as it happens to maybe help some other chap dust himself off after his wife falls out of love.

Resentment and disgust

She and I are still sleeping in the same room and in the same bed. We have decided that we will do this until she returns from her out of town excursion. This, of course, does not make things any easier. I would say that waking up next to her, once one of my favorite parts of the day, is now the hardest. When she returns, I probably will have an easier time getting out of bed knowing that we haven't been sharing the same space.

Waking up with feelings of resentment is not the best start to a day.

I am to be moved into the guest room by August 22. I will walk you through the moving process as it happens.

Please don't think that I want to be out of the bed already. I don't. In fact, I would prefer never to leave. It just hurts. It is a pain I am willing to deal with so that I can be prepared for that one last time of waking up next to her.

Day Seven, Entry One

A week ago, my wife proposed a fear:

What if, when she is out of town for the next month, she doesn't miss me romantically? What if she doesn't miss me at all?

"Well... I would guess that means that something is wrong."

A week ago, discussion started between the two of us, discussing plans for separation. She has been unhappy in our relationship for about a year. She's not herself anymore. This isn't what she wanted. She doesn't know what she wanted.

She loves me... but she's not IN LOVE with me. Not anymore.

"I feel like we've become really great friends and awesome roommates."

The words that stabbed me in our two viewings of DATE NIGHT have come back to haunt me. This time, they are stabbing me directly.

It is an odd feeling to feel your heart break. There were cracks all along. Why doesn't she do this? Why won't she feel this way? Why is she leaving? What are we fighting for now? Those cracks, though, go unnoticed until it all just hits the ground and shatters.

My wife and I are separating.

We are separating and I am still in love.

As the week has gone by, I have gone through a roller coaster of emotions from the obvious hurt, sadness, depression, anger, pain, rage, guilt, self-loathing, to the odd occasional senses of relief and satisfaction and acceptance. Those three are fleeting. Soon they are swept away in the self-loathing tidal wave again.

Initially, she had expressed the possibility (small as it was) of reconciliation. Say she does miss me. Why separate if she misses me? That sentiment turned into one of self-awareness.

"I know myself and it's just not --- I don't think it is going to happen."
"Would you say that I even have a 1% chance of that?"
"No."

There is an odd sense of support, though. She is coaching me through this with the hopes that we will be friends. A Demi Moore-Bruce Willis kind of divorce. Right now, I'm feeling more of the Alec Baldwin-Kim Basinger vibe... mixed with my being a pussy.

As mad as I am with her, I do not want to know what my life is like without her in it in some capacity. Because of that, I am setting myself up for nothing but pain.

One day at a time. That's how people get through their problems. That's what my plan is. I am starting this blog as a record of my shattering and my eventual rebirth. I will discuss whatever is on my mind with no fear of who reads it. I will paint an honest portrait of what this is like for me. At times, I will probably describe my ex in harsh terms. At other times, I know I will do nothing but sing her praises. There really is a wonderful woman in there. She can't help that her feelings for me changed. I did all that I could and I know I am not the cause for this.

There will be times where I paint myself in both sympathetic and unsympathetic lights. This is my voice. I can do what I want with it. If there is a day in which I particularly hate myself, I will speak of it here. My hope is that by the end of the entry, I can come to terms with the emotion and get it out.

Most of all, this is my point of view. I am a man. Men, I feel, are unfairly vilified in life. We are chauvinists only after one thing. We move from girl to girl never taking feelings into account. A relationship ends with us probably because we did something wrong.

I am not a chauvinist. I want more than just one thing. I have had three girlfriends (five if we stretch terminology a little) in my whole life. I have loved seven women in my life. Five of them, the way an adolescent boy thinks he loves women, one love for convenience of companionship, and one love, the way you think you are supposed to love. That, lose-my-breath, heart-beats-faster, give-it-all-and-do-anything-for-her feeling of love that makes you want to believe in romance of all kinds. That kind of love I have found only once.

That kind of love is sleeping in the other bedroom while I finish up my first blog at 4:30 AM. That kind of love is helping me find the best deal on my own apartment. That kind of love doesn't live around here anymore. Instead, it's just me: a boy with a crush.

Same as I have always been.