Caught In a Bad Romance

“My threshold for, like, bullshit with men is just…I don’t have one anymore.  I just don’t care.”

“In relationships, you have to…I don’t know…you’ve got to move together, I guess, as much as you can.”

-        Lady Gaga, from the documentary, “Gaga: Five Foot Two”

My fellow Monsters, I have been struggling so hard for the past few weeks to complete this post.  It’s probably the most difficult piece I’ve written in my entire life.  It’s not a happy post; I just don’t have one of those in me right now.  I’m not sure when I will have one.

The most challenging part of sharing what I’m feeling compelled to say is being entirely honest with you, my Little Monster family.  I think maybe it’s part of human nature to want to make yourself look as good as possible when you’re telling your side of a story like this one, where there are (at least) two sides, and those who are hearing or reading it will form their opinions of your part in it as they follow along.  It’s true that I hope your opinion of me will not be damaged by what I have to say.  I hope that you will understand.  But if I tried to make myself look good—or innocent, or whatever you want to call it—in all this mess, I would be lying to you and myself, and then what would even be the point of writing this blog at all?  It’s not about getting anyone to take my side, especially because I’m not even certain that I believe my side is the “right” one, if such a thing exists.  It’s all about trying to figure out the twisted-up shit in my head by putting it down in words.

I am standing at one of those proverbial crossroads in my life, and I need to decide which path to take.  They all suck in their own ways, and I’m not sure that happiness or even contentment lies at the end of any of them.  All I know is that standing still, staying just where I have been for years, is no longer possible for me.

Monsters, I am seriously considering walking away from my marriage.  In fact, at this point, it has become less a question of “if” than of “when” and “how”.  Fear of the unknown and uncertainty about my own strength and ability to stand on my own seem to be the only things preventing me from acting.

Here’s the part where I can’t make myself look good: Non-Monster isn’t a monster.  He’s no more perfect than I am, but he’s not a bad guy.  He isn’t unfaithful.  He isn’t abusive.  He doesn’t have a gambling, drinking, or drug problem.  He works, and he works hard.  As I’ve mentioned in my previous posts, we’ve been married for nearly 23 years, and to all outward appearances, happily so.

But appearances, as we all know, can be deceiving.

On the inside, I am not happy and haven’t been for a very long time.  Inside, I am suffocating.  I feel like whatever is “me” has been slowly disappearing under layers of dust for years.  Every fear or worry dismissed as unimportant, every unmet need, every unshared passion or interest, every disregarded or disdained emotion, every opportunity to spend time together passed up, every spoken or written word ignored, every promise made and believed and then broken—it has all been pushed down and hidden away in the shadowy parts of my soul.  Never thrown away; always saved in the hope that things would change someday.

Except “someday” never seems to come, does it?  “Someday” is a myth.

I have tried many, many times to talk this out with Non-Monster, only to be told that I simply shouldn’t be feeling what I am feeling, because my feelings are wrong.  I have tried ignoring it.  I have tried to be OK with things staying the way they have always been.  I have tried suffering and sacrificing in silence.  I have been as patient about it as I can be.

We are no longer “moving together” in this relationship, if we ever really were, and I have reached the end of my patience.  I have discovered that there is a limit to what I am willing to accept and continue living with, and I am standing at the very edge of it.

What, you might be wondering right about now, connects any of this with Lady Gaga?  It’s a very thin, fine thread, but there is a connection.  Through her music and her words, by following her example of strength and bravery and self-acceptance, I am finally—after 44 years of life—starting to learn how to love and appreciate myself just as I am, faults and flaws and all.  I’m more or less OK with myself these days.  That is, when I am not with Non-Monster.  I do not like who I am anymore when we are together.

Again, I cannot make myself look good here.  I have come to realize that I will always either become a lesser version of myself when I am with him, or I will have to struggle and fight to maintain my hold on the “me” I am finally becoming and want so desperately to be.  The struggle is exhausting, and I simply can’t bear to continue.  If this is me being selfish, I suppose I will have to learn to live with that.

Naturally, I must also consider Mini Monster in all of this.  Please don’t think I haven’t been.  Her happiness and well-being are the most important things in the world to me, far above any consideration of my own comfort.  But I have also come to realize that she is far too much like me for me to stay in this relationship, where she is watching and learning how to handle her own in the future.

I’ve seen her face when she speaks to him, maybe trying to tell him something about her day or to ask him a question, and he huffs out a heavy sigh and snaps at her because she’s interrupted his TV show or the game he’s playing on his phone—when she’s “bothering” him and he’s just not interested.  I’ve seen the way she deflates, the way her eyes drop to the floor, the way the spark of excitement about whatever it was she was going to tell him just…flickers and goes out like snuffing a candle.  Sometimes, she flares up right back at him, but she never comes out of those moments with the spark intact and no tears in her eyes.

She is becoming me, and I can’t let her go on any longer thinking that hiding your light—dimming your shine—because the other half of your relationship doesn’t think it’s worth their time and attention is normal or even acceptable.  I have no intention of keeping them apart if I take that final step, but me and him together is not the example she needs.

I don’t know how to end this post.  I have no clever wrap-up.  I can write no words to convey confidence or suggest that I already know everything will be fine.  I don’t know how this is all going to turn out.  But I do know this: if I haven’t lost you because of what I’ve just shared, Little Monsters, I am going to need you behind me as I try to figure out what happens next.  I will need your love and support, and maybe even a loving kick in the ass or two to keep me moving forward, because I’m afraid that I’m very much prone to indecision and second-guessing myself.

Love and Paws Up Always, my Little Monster family…I hope you are still with me.