My brain has been my enemy for almost half my life at this point.  There were a few years there (in very recent times) when it actually wasn't, but it has since become my enemy again.  And I've been thinking lately.  Too much.  But it happens nonetheless, and so I suffer the consequences.

I've had this blog for so many years, I don't recall if I've talked about the fact that I hate my birthday.  Or if I have talked about that, if I've talked about why I hate my birthday.  But, as it occasionally does, the subject has surfaced again in my brain, with additional realisations.  (After all, with everything in my life, every single thing is analyzed, over and over and over again, trying to make sense of why and how and what could have been done differently, what can be done differently to not have a repeat in the future, etc. etc. etc.)

I hate my birthday.  Anyone who knows me well will know this.  Although I think only a handful of people know why.  It took me a while to figure it out for myself, and this was after going to therapy, then not going to therapy anymore (due to moving), and somehow the residual effects of therapy lingered in my brain long enough for me to make the connection.

I grew up in a household of 8 people.  I'm the youngest of 6 kids.  The children outnumbered the parents, and for a lot of reasons, there wasn't enough attention to go around for everyone.  (Positive attention, I should say.)  From my perspective now, as an adult, thinking about the things I remember from my childhood, it seems like if us kids behaved/were good, we were otherwise ignored, because we were doing what was expected.  Good behaviour, doing the right thing, did not guarantee positive attention or affection.  (Negative/bad behaviour, on the other hand, definitely guaranteed attention, but not of the positive kind.  Ask me how I know.)  Because I was a temperamental child (I used to joke I should have been born with red hair), I got quite a bit of attention.  But not the good kind.  The kind that was a response to inflict disciplinary correction, as a way of making me behave (spoiler alert: it didn't work).  I think I fall into the cliche of the youngest child syndrome, which I absolutely hate, but here we are.  I didn't get enough attention or affection, so my subconscious child brain drew the conclusion that if I did bad, at least I would garner some kind of attention, albeit negative attention.  Et voila.

Until my birthday came around.

On my birthday, that glorious one day out of 365 days, the day was mine.  Parents and siblings alike acknowledged that I existed.  The attention I got was good and happy.  I was celebrated.  People expressed love.
And then the day was over.
And I crashed and burned.

I think I started hating my birthday when I was in middle school/high school.
Because it became too much.  The emotional toll of having one good day, just one, of people in my family paying attention to me, celebrating me, and then to have the very next day return back to "normal" where I was otherwise ignored (more or less), was such a hardcore crash and burn emotionally, that it became too much.  I hated that feeling on the day after my birthday that always came.  Always.  Without a doubt, the day after I would wake up and feel so...I don't know.  Empty?  Lost?  Unwanted?

This is what made me start hating my birthday.

And in thinking about it again recently, that's when I realised it.  My childhood consisted of this: 1 day out of the 365 days that exist in the year, I felt seen.  I felt wanted.  I felt welcome.  I felt celebrated.  Once that magical day ended, and reality came back like a punch to the face, I went back to being just another child in a big family, who really only got specific attention if I misbehaved.
Don't get me wrong.  There were other moments, I'm sure (I can remember just a handful, but maybe there were more that I don't remember), where I did actually get positive attention.  But those moments felt few and far between.  They did not outweigh or outnumber the negative attention, or the most common scenario of simply existing and not really being acknowledged one way or another.  Of course, there were also other moments where, while I was too young for my brain to consciously make the connection, where things happened that communicated to me that I wasn't welcome or wanted.  I'm sure those situations that happened were not the intentions of my parents.  I'm confident they did not mean to have their actions communicate to my small child brain that I was too much, or not wanted; intentions aside though, actions always speak louder than words, and the actions told me that I was too much, and that I wasn't wanted.

There is a reason (multiple reasons, actually, but I digress) that I'm not really close to my immediate family.

I have hardly felt seen in my life.

From not really having attention or affection growing up, or having too many people in the house that I was just another body/face that existed, or whatever the case was, who I was, my likes, dislikes, things I cared about, friends, whatever...those things were not paid attention to.  And it's funny, because I suppose people who experience this can react one of two ways.  The first type of person would experience this, and take that to mean it doesn't matter, and live their life in that same way: not paying attention to the people around them, not bothering to get to know them, to show that they care.  The second type of person would respond the opposite: they did not get the attention they needed, and so they made up their mind that the people in their life would not go through the same experience.  Instead, they would make sure to know the people around them, know their likes and dislikes, their favourite colour, what makes them happy, how to comfort them when they're sad...
I am the second person.

There have been a few moments in my life, however, where I have felt seen by my family.  By the people in my life.  And I have not forgotten those moments.

Like the time where my brother was dating someone, and he kept pushing me to try to talk to her.  And our dad warned him to stop pushing, because I wouldn't react well.  And dad was right.
Or the time when I was visiting family in the Midwest, and my sister-in-law told me that my brother had told her that I'm an extremely loyal person.  The fact that he knew that about me shocked me, because I don't think my family knows me very well at all.  But he was right.  And in that moment, I felt seen.
Then there was the time I was visiting home back in California, and I was with my parents, and we were trying to find a local coffee shop to go to (the one I initially was trying to take them to had closed sometime after I moved away).  And my mom suggested a place, and my dad shot down the idea, stating their coffee wasn't very good, and I wouldn't like that.
Or on that very same trip, my dad broke out the grill and made hamburgers, because my parents know that's my favourite type of food.
The time years and years ago when I had wanted to visit a friend I made from summer camp, to be at her high school graduation, but didn't have money and gave up on the idea, and my sister, out of nowhere, surprised me with a plane ticket to make the trip.  I don't even remember talking to her about wanting to do that, but somehow she knew, and she made it happen for me.
And the most recent time was a couple years ago now.  We were still living in upstate New York, and there was a specific place my husband had went for work.  He noticed the architecture in the area was beautiful, and knew that I loved architecture, and so one weekend made it a point to drive me out there, just to show me the beautiful homes.  I felt so loved and so seen in that moment.

Those moments in my life have been few and far between.
But I remember them.
Because it is not often in my life that I feel seen.
That I feel like I'm wanted, or that I matter.
And so I treasure those memories, those moments, for what they were.  Because it showed me, that against all odds (or so it feels), somehow people still paid attention to me, and saw me, and knew me, in some way.

And that means more than they will ever know.

 It's been a long time since I woke myself up in the middle of the night from hyperventilating due to a dream.  But it happened again last night.  All the times it's happened in the past year have been because of dreams with him in them.

The one last night involved me seeing him again.  I can't remember if other people were around; I think they were.  And he was talking as if we were just two old friends catching up.  Completely ignoring the history we have together.  And he started talking about the last girl he fucked, about how he was banging it out with her, and how it seemed like she was getting attached and wanted an actual relationship with him...I cut him off.  I don't remember what I said, but I think I just wanted him to stop.  I didn't want to hear how he moved on to fucking other women, just like he did before we were together.  And I couldn't just pretend like everything was okay, like hearing the man I would die for casually talk about his sex life outside of our no-longer-existent marriage.

I think in my dream I started crying.  I didn't wake myself up by crying (although that happened the last time), but I did wake myself up by hyperventilating.

...

I don't know how to not be married to him.

I don't know how to carry on with life, where everything about my life currently is not at all what I ever dreamed or imagined it would be.

I thought I found the man I loved.  The man who loved me.  Who called me the love of his life.  Who reassured me over and over and over again that he wasn't going anywhere...only to abandon me.

It's like no one understands how deeply and severely that absolutely fucks up your mind.

I only ever wanted a future with him.
To create memories.  To travel.  To take pictures together of the things we saw, of each other.  To have a happy, safe, loving home, filled with the babies he dreamed about wanting us to have.

And now I will never get to experience that future.

I have no future now.

I know he's no longer mine.
I know that whatever he does is no longer my business, and I have no say in it.
I know that.

And yet the thought of him being with someone else makes me feel sick to my stomach.
Even though I know I have no right or say in the matter.

How do people do this.
How do they love and allow that love to be torn out of their hands and carry on?  How do they pretend as if a limb that was part of their body wasn't ripped away, and the bleeding goes on and on and on and on, because that wound will never, ever heal?
Even worse, how do they put themselves through it again?

I cannot.
For several reasons.
Most of which have been laid out in previous posts.

I have been damned to grow old (if I actually do grow old) and to grow old alone.

If I were to ever have children, I would tell them to never, ever, ever give their heart away to someone else.  I would tell them that it's not worth it.  Because it's true: love equals pain.  

And the pain is too much to bear.

 It's been over two months since I've cried.
That's a record.  For recent years, at least.

2017 B.C.E. (Before Carlos Existed), I only ever cried once every year/once every two years.
Then I met a man who I decided was worth feeling things for.  Which made me realise that I'm a hyper sensitive person, and I cried a lot (compared to my whole life before him), because when you let yourself feel things and let yourself be vulnerable for a person in your life, turns out they have a lot of power and influence over you, and can do a lot of damage with their words and actions.

But I am recovering.
I have decided that my decision to feel things for the man that I loved was a bad one, and I am working on reversing that.
I am working on not feeling things again.
On not crying over anything again; just like I did before I met him.

Because feeling things is not worth it.
Love is not worth it.
And I will never love again as long as I live (which, hopefully, is a short time, and not elongated).

I am confident I can write whatever I want on here.

You know why?
Because I always have.  I have never been one to beat around the bush.  I have always been honest about how I feel, about my thoughts, about, well, everything.

Years ago I shared my blogs with him.
Back in the early years when we were dating.
Because I trusted him.  And I wanted to share with him the real me.  The me I didn't really let anyone else see (including my family).

Back then he told me he read the entirety of my blog.
But knowing what I know now, I bet that was a lie.  He didn't actually read every single post.  Maybe just skimmed all of them, or only read the ones that interested him.  But definitely didn't read every single one, word for word.
That probably didn't matter to him, and he probably thought it was an "innocent" lie.

There were a lot of those, I think.

That's why I know I can write whatever on here.
Not just because that's what I've always done.
But also because I know he doesn't read this/absolutely doesn't care about me.

I'm not an idiot.  At least, not when it comes to this.
(I was, however, an idiot on the day we married, believing he meant the vows he made, that only death would tear us apart.)
I know he doesn't read this.  I know he never did after I initially sent it to him.

How do I know?
Easy. 
He was never curious about me after we married.

Before, when we were dating, I wouldn't say he was "curious."
More so toxic and possibly narcissistic on how he treated me, and approached things.  Like me wearing makeup.  Or even me wearing dresses for work (or outside of work).

And then we married.
And while the toxicity was still there, somehow it changed.
He still wanted to know if I talked to guys, if they seemed to flirt with me (and I felt compelled to share with him every single interaction I had with the opposite sex - if only to be transparent, but also so he wouldn't get mad at me).
But it also seemed, after a year or so, he didn't care.

Maybe it was because we were finally together again, and I didn't have any friends in the area in which we were living, so to him no one was a threat.  (Until they were, by how I was acting, somehow.) 
But also because we were together and I had no friends, he probably didn't feel much need to be curious about me.  Or check up on me.  Because I was isolated.  I had no one outside of him; in the immediate area, at least.

So why would he be curious?

He wasn't.
His only "curiosity" came out when we weren't getting along, and he accused me of cheating on him.  When he had absolutely no basis to do so, because he knew I didn't know anyone in the area, and didn't have any friends.
(Psychologically speaking, his accusations were definitely projections, which means his accusations of me cheating means he was cheating on me.  Which I will never not be convinced he didn't cheat on me.  His accusations were pretty clear evidence he did, if nothing else.)

Apart from that, though, he didn't care about me.
Didn't continue to try to get to know me.  Didn't show any interest in the things I cared about (outside of the things he cared about, at least)

So why the fuck would he read my blog?

He wouldn't.
Because he didn't care about me.

And he definitely doesn't care about me now.
After all, he abandoned me.
He left me.
We were married, and he decided he wanted to move to a different place without me, which is absolutely fucked up, and not at all what a husband should do in a marriage.

And yet, he did.

And it was only a matter of time before he decided he didn't want to be married to me, after all the years of lying, of telling me he loved me, of telling me he cared about me, of telling me things were going to get better, that he was going to get better, that we were going to get better and be better, and be stronger...

All of that was a load of bullshit.

So it makes sense why my brain is so fucked up.
Why I feel like I'm going insane.
Why all the years I spent with him were years filled with lies.

Because that's what betrayal trauma does.

A person makes promises to you, makes vows to you, then turns around and breaks them.
The very person who was terrified when you first got together of you leaving him, of saying that you deserved someone better...that's the person who finally calls it quits.
Who abandons you.
Who leaves you and breaks his word to you and repeats the exact same pattern his own father pulled on his family (albeit a different way, but still abandonment, although two very different examples).

And what's worse?

He has ruined your entire life.
Your entire future.
All your hopes and dreams of the future you would share with him.  All the talk (that he started) of the babies you would have some day, the grandchildren you would have someday.  The found family both of you chose.

All of that crushed.

And his delusion that you'll find someone "better."

Which is absolute bullshit.

Because even if you found someone "better," even though you haven't called yourself a "Christian" in over 7 years, if you were to believe the Bible, if you were to turn around and call yourself a Christian, you would be damned.
Because the bible states that even though God hates divorce, it is permitted if the unbelieving spouse walks away.
But to get remarried is a sin, it is to commit adultery, because so long as there's any hope of reconciliation, it is not okay to get remarried.

So his decision to leave you, to abandon you, has robbed you.
Of everything.
Of a future.  Of love.  Of starting a family with the man you chose.

Of all of it.

So what is the point?
What is the point to continue to try?
To continue to live?
To continue to do anything?

There is no point.

You found the man you love.
Against all odds, against a lot of things, you still chose him.  Regardless of the differences.  Regardless of the toxicity of your relationship.
You saw him, you chose him, and you rose up in love.

And he abandoned you.

So there is no point.
There is no future.
All hopes and dreams have been robbed of you.

He robbed you, when he made his life-altering decision that impacted you, too, even though he refused to acknowledge the fact.

So you are left with nothing.
No hope.
No future.
No love.

We all die, someday.
Might as well make it sooner rather than later.
Especially when the man you loved robbed you of all the hopes and dreams you built of a future life with him.