Friday, February 13, 2015

When Confusion Becomes a Way of Life

First and foremost, I have to say, I thought I was DONE with the shit my husband would pull because he was relapsing and drinking which lead him to act like a complete asshole. Apparently he's on a "dry-drunk" as those familiar with Alanon lingo will recognize, because he's not drinking but he's still acting like a complete and utter asshole.
I hate this part of our relationship. I've been here before: he's been sober before and acted like a total dick head. Beyond all the shit that his alcoholism brings to our relationship, he's also being treated for depression and anxiety. As I have suffered the depths of depression to the point where I engaged in 12 sessions of ECT (electro-convulsion therapy; "shock therapy") as a potential resource for relief, I can empathize with his behaviors based on depression and anxiety. By the way, the ECT was very effective in treating my depression. There are gaps in my memory, especially while I was undergoing ECT, but overall the benefits outweighed the risks for me. Unfortunately I don't remember one of my best friend's wedding, but I have pictures and details provided by others to help fill in the gaps. I also continue to experience aphasia, the loss of words on the tip of my tongue, which really pisses me off because I had a memory, especially for dates and times, like a steel trap. The friend whose wedding I can't remember used to refer to my memory as something similar to Dustin Hoffman's character in the movie Rainman. The fact that I now struggle to recall those dates that used to be right there for me to grab out of the blue is a continued source of frustration. Although I do find solace in the fact that I'm not put on the spot to recall certain dates and times all that often. In fact, it's pretty rare for anyone to ask me the date I graduated from high school or the week a bunch of us saw both The Who and The Grateful Dead at Alpine Valley. My memory used to be a twisted sort of party trick which I happily participated in.
Regardless of all of that, the point is that I'm back in a situation where I don't know what to expect when I walk in the door after coming home from work. Today I attended an ethics training in Green Bay until about 12:30pm so after a coworker and I went out for lunch afterwards, I got home at around 2pm. Apparently I came home "in a mood" which I was not aware of. My "beloved" accused me of "having an attitude" when I walked in the door. Our memories of whatever took place this afternoon will always vary wildly, so it's not worth trying to argue my case. My concern is questioning bigger, existential questions.
Why have three out of the four major romantic relationships in my life involved an addict or an alcoholic? Do I think I can "fix" them? Is it because, as a recovering addict myself, those are the people I meet and hang with? Do I psychologically need the chaos living with an addict/alcoholic brings? Good God I hope the last question is not true. In my mind I'm totally fucked if that's the case because altering that pattern will take enough therapy to bankrupt me. Seriously. As a counselor, I have enough information about the entire billing process to know that if I begin addressing this issue at age 43, I'll likely be 53 by the time that entire web is unweaved and I don't have that kind of time, money or patience to unweave it and then rebuild a major portion of my personality. As much as my Freudian psychiatrist would like to hear that I need to schedule two-hour sessions twice a week for the next two to ten years, I'm not really up for it. Mostly because I don't think I'm the one who is being unreasonable here. Perhaps I'm rationalizing, but I'm not the one who recently spent five days in an inpatient mental health unit. Ok, that's a version of throwing stones from a glass house, but what the hell? This is MY blog, right?