Highs and Lows

Phew. I’ve been super busy, and have only just now slowed down to appreciate the highs and lows that washed over me like waves all week long.

The lows have been…low. Shitty. Embarassing. Broke down on Tuesday leaving my parents house (a-fucking-gain, I know), was almost pulled back together from blaring the radio but got home to a house torn up by the dogs and just collapsed in a puddle of awfulness on the floor. Decided to give Matthew one more chance to answer his phone and be there for me as a friend (since he’s been notably sucky at that lately), and he did. We talked for an hour and a half. About my problems. About his. About the scary future. About how we are going to cope. We won’t be getting together anytime soon, which is good. I couldn’t see it before (because I didn’t want to, obviously), but he’s just as broken as I am. Needs to rebuild himself. As do I. This totally doesn’t kill my sexual attraction to him, or my annoying desire to run to him when I’m lonely, but we live a ways apart, and that should fade over time, so I’ll just keep telling myself to chill out, and maybe I’ll get there.

On Wednesday morning I hugged John’s mom goodbye (she was heading back to Arkansas, and that is likely the last time I’m going to see her). I almost starting crying right there, but got in my car and went to work. Unfortunately, work was slow, and I started to lose it there. Grabbed my supervisors to talk about it (they are awesome), and had a really good talk about everything. They are super supportive, as is everyone I work with. We’re actually a pretty close group. I’m very thankful to have that job and to have those people. It’s very surprising to be in a professional environment and for them to say, "It’s okay if you’re not at 100%, we just want to keep you. You have a lot of potential. So whatever we need to do to help you get through this and keep you here, we’re on board." My past experience is that employers just expect you to show up and do your job, and an off day is fine, but an off month(or potentially longer) is unacceptable. Hopefully this doesn’t go on for too long, and I can get back out of my head and engaged in my job, but it’s good to know where I stand with them in the meantime.

Then, later in the day while I’m at work, I’m looking at our accounts and notice that John had withdrawn $1000 from our savings. I was so freakin pissed. Of course he didn’t answer his phone when I called, and texted me that he would get back to me in an hour, so I lost my mind for an hour trying to figure out if he just took the money to another bank or if he decided to get a lawyer, or if he decided to blow it on something. Agony. He called back while I was working and left a message. Just a new bank account at another bank, was going to tell me that night (we had a "date" scheduled to talk about our finances). That’s fine. What wasn’t fine was his high horse speech that went along with all of that, about how everything is 50/50, and he needed to have security because he couldn’t trust me (gag). So I got home from work, called him about it, fought and yelled with him about it, and then hung up and went into yet another hyperventilating spiral to horrible overwhelming sobs. I called my parents (Matthew was at work most likely and I’m trying to distance myself, so go me). My mom answered and told me she would send dad (I only live a couple miles away from them). I started stuffing food in my face, which stopped the tears pretty well actually, and both my parents showed up and talked to me about it for an hour or so. Mom went through a divorce at about my age, and dad was involved in it, so they both know a lot about it and how it works. I was calmer when they left, but still exhausted and mindblown and shitty. So I laid down with a movie on the tv and just fell asleep. 

We talked briefly Thursday morning and agreed to have the finance talk that night instead. I got off work, started playing with Quicken and trying to divide up our bills and figure how we would manage having seperate accounts. It was overwhelming, so I quit and went to my workout (kicked my ass as usual). Got back home, showered, and sat down and looked at it some more. I won’t bore you with the details of the actual finances, but we do own a house, have lived here less than a year, and there’s a lot of stress as far as what to do with it. We can’t afford to sell it, because we wouldn’t be able to break even. So yeah, it’s a mess. I started collapsing mentally, feeling like I couldn’t leave him, like we wouldn’t be able to get a divorce because we couldn’t afford it. Like maybe we should stay together and pay everything off and save up money. Like maybe as a part of that process we could even rebuild our marriage.

Told you it was a spiral. Wrong fucking direction, Katie, pull it together. Luckily, John showed up about then, and we talked, and that cured me of the "maybe we can work this out" temporary insanity. We *so* cannot work this out.

Anyway we made it through the conversation, and we’re definitely going to have to both get our heads out of the clouds. He thought he could just go and get an apartment (and somehow afford it, and somehow I would be fine with him spending money on rent instead of paying down our joint debt. Especially stupid considering it’s all community property, so he would essentially be spending *my* money on his rent. Not fucking happening unless we get this house rented out to someone else and we aren’t having to worry about the mortgage and bills for this place). And I’m sure there were some lessons I should’ve learned from our conversation too, but I can’t remember them.

Made it through work yesterday, and hung out at home until 9 when I headed to go hang out with my girlfriends April and Tricia to celebrate Christmas (late, yes). We got smashed, like, all night smashed. It was 6am when we got back to their place and I went to sleep on the couch (yes, btw, my head itches today. She swears the lice have been gone for weeks, but just being back there gave my scalp the creepy crawlies. Yuck). Woke up around noon, got my shit together, took a shower, grabbed some Chipotle and came home. John had pulled down all of the Christmas decorations. And all of the pictures of us/anything that reminded him of our marriage. He didn’t actually put it all up, just had it piled in the office. So after he left for work I started sorting through everything and packing it up, and…you guessed it….crying. Fuck me.

I let it take over for a few minutes, and then gave myself a pep talk via an internet search on grieving during divorce. Totally fucking normal. I’m feeling everything I’m supposed to be feeling apparently. So I went back to work putting up the stuff and tried to think about the positives. Tomorrow is a new year. I will actually have a new year’s resolution for the first time in years and years. This is my year, and I will put working on myself and my own issues ahead of everything else. I won’t date, or try to bury my issues in men. I will make new friends. I will volunteer for something charitable. I will remind myself that I can actually be exactly who I want to be now. I can dream anything, plan for it, and make it happen. That’s an intoxicating thought. Everything is wide open. Yes, I have to get through the divorce first, and heal myself and deal with my issues. But in

2013, who knows how far I will have gotten? I get to figure out what the rest of my life will be. And that’s exciting.

Happy New Years.