You mess with all of us...

Obama has done himself in on this one.

I'm not going to pretend you don't know about the whole disgraceful attack on conscience issue that's come up. If you don't know about it, go to usccb.org. Even the most liberal of Bishops are speaking out against it.

When Obama does something to get Cardinal Mahoney (the former Arch Bishop of Los Angeles that Benedict couldn't wait the normal five years to replace) to say something like "My vote on November 6 will be for the candidate for President of the United States and members of Congress who intend to recognize the full spectrum of rights under the many conscience clauses of morality and public policy. If any candidate refuses to acknowledge and to promote those rights, then that candidate will not receive my vote." on his January 20th post to his blog listed here,  you know he's gone and done it.

Not gonna lie, it freaks me out that for ONCE I agree with Mahoney, AND Diocese of Rochester, AND The National Catholic Reporter (one of the worst claiming-to-be-Catholic publications EVER) (here and here).

I did check the Women's  Ordination Conference to see if they said anything. Nadda as of yet. If THEY would have put up something on their website against this, I may have died of happiness right here and now.

Napoleon once said that he was going to try and destroy the Catholic Church. Someone responded to him with, "But the Clergy has been trying to do that for centuries!"

Never before in my short (7 year) Catholic lifespan have I ever seen so many Catholics so united. While some may see this as kind of pathetic... I'll just be happy with what we have right now.

Because I'm stupid.

So, I started getting ready to take a second nap yesterday, and grumpily told James that I was doing so and not to bother me. He comes in and asks if I'm just tired or if I'm upset. I reluctantly told him the frustrations I expressed in my last post. He goes, "Oh, what do you want me to make you?" I told him that there wasn't anything in the house that would be quick and easy enough (grumpily, of course) he looked all over and made me some canned chili that was actually rather decent. He even grated the cheese for me.

"Why can't you just tell me you're upset instead of just huffing about it?"
"I don't know... because I'm stupid."

I didn't tell him that I blogged about it first. Apparently I can tell everyone in the world before I can tell him I"m upset with him.

He was wonderful. We made a plan for Sunday meals and we're both quite happy with it.

...still working on the naping thing.

The Sunday Ritual

Quick wedding update: We have officially reached the less than 3 months category. The only things we don't have right now are plans for the engagement shoot (which we want to do mid-late March anyway), flowers (ya, I'm bad), or a DJ. I'll get these taken care of... you know, at some point. And if not... oh well.

We're well beyond starting to learn the things that drive the other crazy. We both knew it would happen. I mean, I came from a politically correct Baptist upbringing (and was rather liberal growing up until high school, a couple of years before becoming Catholic), and he has always been a nerdy intellectual and coming from at least a cultural Catholic family. My family heritage/traditions can best be described as American because much of my ancestry was involved in the American Revolt in the 1770's (I'm not Americanist, can you tell?), and no one has been here less than 100 years. In other words, we're rather Protestant in upbringing and hold no cultural ties outside of America. However, if I had to point to a My family is more German in their traditions than anything else. James is Italian. Is there anything else that needs to be said?

On a typical Sunday when I was growing up, my family would go to church, come home, change out of our good clothes (it would be better if more Catholics had good clothes to change out of), and eat. We eat a rather large meal after church. Usually, my Daddy would go to the earlier service, so that dinner (the only day of the week dinner is for lunch... my family was raised in Texas) was ready when my mom and I got back from church. We would have a large meal that would almost always sit at the table for. The exceptions would be if we all sat at the TV to watch a game or just plan didn't feel up to the task of clearing off the table. This meal would be rather large. After dinner we'd do whatever we wanted, usually in seclusion. Later, we would one by one trickle off to bed for our afternoon nap. While someone else is napping, everyone else in the house talk at a whisper. The TV is down several notches, even if people are sleeping on a different floor. I don't know why this was an unspoken tradition. It just was. I rarely nap, but I do on Sundays more than any other day.  Perhaps it's because it's the whole day of rest thing.  For dinner dinner we would eat leftovers from the earlier meal if we ate at all. We'd eat separately, of course.

James and I came to my apartment after Mass today and he had told me that he was making the rest of the ravioli with sauce for dinner. I'm like, yay. I come into the kitchen to see him frying up bacon. "I thought you said we were having ravioli!" I said. "Ya, for dinner!" Ugh. So I told him I can't eat any more bacon because my stomach has been sensitive to fats lately, and he said he was making eggs, too. I don't like eggs. So I'm not eating until he makes dinner dinner. I'm rather hungry now. He says he wont start dinner until he's hungry... I'm about to die. I had nothing but carbs and fats this morning (bagel with cream cheese) and I'm dying. I explained to him that we're both going to need to give a little with this because I can't handle something like this happening every week. This is the third week in a row that something has happened like this, and I finally realized that it's because of my upbringing that I think it's INSANE to cook two meals on a Sunday. Why don't I just make myself a snack? Well, I'm trying to be more health conscious and all the snacks I could eat are empty carbs which make me feel awful later (I've also officially reached the 'overweight'category for the first time in my life and I think I'm going to die). I absolutely refuse to put the effort of cooking meat (which I really need right now), and I'm tired and grumpy at James.

Speaking of grumpy at James, he tells me that I'm not allowed to have my Sunday nap. And I'm like, say what now? I'm gonna take a nap whenever I feel like I need one which is going to be most Sundays. He says it's not leisurely enough, and I think he's full of sh*t (to those of you who are offended with VERY occasional language... you really shouldn't be reading my blog). I mean, seriously, how can you be doing LESS than when you're sleeping? I mean, duh. And today I took a nap, which he KNEW I didn't get much sleep last night, and he start yelling at his mother on the phone (he thinks that's a normal tone for phone conversations... or often in regular ones) in the other room. I'm so irritated about this. HE KNOWS I WAKE UP TO EVERYTHING! He should know that I get deeply offended when people wake me up due to lack of courtesy. I'm actually about to cry because of this. In college I would wake up sometimes by people walking down the hall outside of my room... I had to switch from a conventional alarm clock to my cell phone because everything else is too loud and shocks my nerves when it goes off (I get physically sick from that shock, btw). I told James that when he comes in my room to wake me up from a nap, he has to turn the doorknob gentler because it is loud and shocks me awake. And he thinks he can just go on shouting in the other room??? Man, he's so oblivious sometimes.

I think I'm going to try and go back to sleep because I'm tired and hungry, but too tired and hungry to make something for myself.

Pre Cana

I have just returned from our day at Pre Cana. Somehow, we survived. I was more concerned about James surviving at first (he doesn't do well with fluff), but after the second presentation, I was afraid I'd go ballistic on someone.

First session: This guy talked to us about Myers Briggs. This was basically the most enjoyable part of the day. It turns out (if his descriptions are accurate) that I am an ENFJ, and James is an ISTP... so basically we are COMPLETE opposites. I basically knew that we were rather different, but what's funny, is that in some ways I display some minor introvert tendencies... which are the tendencies in which James is not introverted. I mean, people, we are exactly opposites personality-wise. We were circling which letter best corresponded to our personalities and when it came up to thinking/feeling (T/F), he had barely gotten past what the letters stand for when we both had ours circled. Best believe that there was a lot of nudging him when the guy  said things that I've been saying to James for months. 

Second session: I have never come so close to screaming at a man in a public setting before in my life. He starts off the day with "I've been married ___ years and we have seven kids. I know that most of you are thinking, 'he's either really Catholic, or really horny...I'm not really Catholic-just kidding!" I made up my mind not to pay attention to the talk any longer. I started texting my friend Tahlia about how awful this guy was just to keep myself from making a scene (though I wonder if I should have to make a point that this shouldn't have been tolerated). If there is one thing I cannot tolerate, it's sex jokes. He made a few comments throughout the talk that were sexual in nature, one of which being that his wife said she didn't want to come to the talk because she didn't like social events. He responded, "Good, then I can talk dirty about us..." Ugh, such an ass (at some point I will explain my belief in appropriate uses of profanity)

I'm going to say this once. Sex is a wonderful and beautiful thing between spouses. I will never talk about my sex life to anyone other than my husband or a doctor (or a priest in very specific and rare settings). I don't even like the idea about hinting at it. I think it is downright horrible and nothing other than blatant sacrilege will get more of a rise out of me. My parents have a neighbor who is a complete ass about this topic, making sexual jokes frequently, ect. I don't feel it's my place to say anything. He was asking me some questions once about basically whether or not James and I have engaged in certain activities (in front of my parents, mind you). Obviously, this is a question you can't ignore or say, "it's none of your business" without people suspecting the worst, so I answered it honestly, and he makes fun of me. This was Christmas dinner. I explain that this is not an appropriate topic of conversation and he says that James thinks otherwise. This, of course made me start to yell "No, James thinks this is just as abhorrent as I do!" He yelled (as I stormed away) "Wait till you're married! Then see how much he doesn't like this!" I realized then that he had misunderstood me to say that I thought sex was abhorrent. No. I believe sex to be such a beautiful thing that it is to be kept exclusively within marriage... including (basically) talking about it. I'm not talking about  abstractly referring to the concept (as I am in this post). But talking about the specifics of marital relations (aside from certain medical situations), including joking about it includes other people into that sphere that is supposed to only involve the couple, and is downright awkward to us. So not talking about it DOES NOT EQUAL thinking it's taboo or intrinsically sinful or whatever... I just think that private things should be kept private. I strongly dislike crude speech and I believe that it especially has no place in a public setting...LET ALONE A CATHOLIC ONE. Best believe I wrote a nasty evaluation saying specifically he should be fired on the evaluation. 

Back to the day. 

The next talk was about Catholic Spirituality. This man had very good things to say but did not present it very well. I appreciated his emphasis that he had to work hard in his marriage to make it happy again. Unfortunately, he basically ended up having his talk be a narrative about his life with a little bit of theology thrown in instead of the other way around. 

The next talk was about sexuality and intimacy in marriage. 

First, I can't stand "couple talks." Usually, one person just stands there and interjects annoying personal details about leaving the toilet seat up while the other one gives the content (this was actually acknowledged by the wife in their talk.). They had a weird slide show presentation with random quotes from movies as the main content (okay, there was one from Blessed JPII, which would be hard to be a bad thing). They were basically your typical NFP/Theology of the Body couple that overemphasizes the (please change your mental voice to high pitched and overly optimistic) absolutely wonderful aspects of marriage and love and babies and love and... and MUCUS! I much prefer these people to the second presenter, however, they did start to annoy me toward the end. They clearly didn't agree with living with each other before marriage or contraception, but instead of explaining that it damages your relationship because it's a sin and sin will kill anything living with its stench, they explain the practical benefits of not. Get. Real. I'm sorry, but if we're going to go with the practical benefits alone, most people would agree that it's practically more rewarding to have sex before marriage. Now this couple obviously knows this because they admitted that they lived together before marriage and implied regretting it later. I personally don't really believe that was the best way to go about it. If you want to inspire people, prove to them that this is possible, believe in them, and don't say "it was too hard for me... but you guys can do it easily!" 

Then we had lunch. We shared a table with this fun couple that was originally from Atlanta. We all talked about the differences of our childhood locations to Cincinnati, but then I decided to be adventurous... I mean, hey I'm never going to see these people again. "So what do you think of everything today?" I asked. They gave some polite comments at first, with a few descriptions of things they would have preferred differently. I agreed and said, "But that second guy I just couldn't stand. His sense of humor was awful." I don't normally do things like that... I usually like to avoid making my strong opinions known to complete strangers, but perhaps James is rubbing off on me a bit. Luckily the girl  said that she didn't appreciate that humor either, and she had even mentioned that to her fiance at the time. I also liked them because their wedding was sooner than ours. The fact that they had Pre Cana so close implied to me that they had a short engagement, which I believe to be a good sign. With the exception of elopement, I've found that people with shorter engagements tend to better understand what commitment is truly required with marriage. I tend to have more respect for people who don't want needless delays (actually is Church teaching that it's better to get married faster) (for obvious reasons). 

We then went to what may have been the more thought provoking talk of the day: conflict resolution. There, she had us fill out a worksheet that had two boxes: one with things that help us communicate better, and another with barriers to communication. The bottom box was too small.  We realized more about how different we are in regard to communication, and it made us laugh... and have a mini fight about it right then and there. I looked down and the next question was: How long ago was your last disagreement? Ugh... 30 seconds... There was a bit of pop psychology in it, but it did give us some "conversation fodder" (quoted by friends who went to the same talk months ago). 

Finally... finances. This is a source of disagreement among James and me, though we basically agree in theory, just not always in application. I generally enjoy thinking about money and planning and such. He literally despises it. But I want to involve him in money matters so that I'm not going behind his back about things. Well he prefers I don't bother him about it but I feel like that would be dishonest for me to make money decisions without consulting him.  Well, the guy who led the talk was kind of annoying when he implied that things would be easier if we were living together now. But then, he goes, "Who is living together now, raise your hand." I wanted to throw up. I buried my head in James' arm because I couldn't look at these people and not judge them. Luckily, I only caught glimpse of one couple before I closed me eyes. 

My overall evaluation of the day:

James and I basically realized that this was not going to be something we enjoyed. We were really bothered by the lack of blatant stating of the rules. James puts it: "You should do A, and not do B. If you do B, you better enjoy burning... a lot." Admittedly I think his approach could use a bit of pastoral work, but I greatly prefer his to this "It's better for your marriage not to sleep together first, but I'm not going to point out that it's actually WRONG to do it in the first place," "you shouldn't do this because you might end in divorce (how about pointing out that divorce is NOT ALLOWED)," and "I'm so okay with the normality of people living together before marriage, I'm going to have you publicly declare it and not shame you!" 

If they catered this more toward the people who take their faith seriously, I think they'd end up with more people who take their faith seriously. James pointed out that the reason that the divorce rate is so high is because it is a generally accepted fact of society. If it was culturally unacceptable, then it wouldn't happen nearly as often. The only thing we can do to lower the divorce rate, is stress that it's not an option in the first place. 

I'm planning on writing a letter to the diocese in 17  years when I have some time...

Who I'm really marrying...

I came to a frightening realization today.

I had another one of those "you need to learn how to comfort me when I'm upset" discussions today. It's amusing how he and I work so differently. When someone is upset, my first inclination (which I've learned to hold back on for some people) is to hug, comfort, stroke their head, say soothing things to them... James' is to explain to them why they are being irrational . He told me that he thinks that by explaining to them where their thinking is flawed that will make someone feel better... okay, I'm actually not kidding,he really told me this. 

So he asked me for suggestions to help him be more comforting and consoling...

...I'm at a loss. 

What is it that people do that makes them good to talk to when you're upset? Before we were dating, James was always the friend I could go to when I needed a reality check and a good slap upside the back of the head (actually, several of my friends were good at that, but none got to the point quite as quickly or ruthlessly as he did). I went to the girls when I needed real comfort (my girls have always been good at acknowledging my failings, too, but they usually comforted me first). But now that James and I are together (and there is a very small number of good friends around, none of which are available on a regular or on call basis) (one of the few things I miss about college) it's getting harder and harder for him not to be my emotional support. I've studied psychology, I realize that the dangers of finding an emotional outlet outside of your marriage can be devastating to the relationship (particularly because I'm the type that tends to bond better with males) and I don't want to do that.

However, I have no idea how to tell him he can fix it. I know that he's more of a words person. He needs a step by step analysis of how to do something. He's the type that always reads the directions when putting something together (I can't stand doing so until I'm completely lost). He does not -I repeat- does NOT do well with learning by example. There may be a few exceptions to this, but I can't think of them now. 

How do I help him help me?

I went online to look up websites that had this kind of information to perhaps get me better at explaining it in words rather than by example. That's where the frightening realization came in. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtUVmx5VXR4&feature=related

I'm marrying Sheldon. Now, I would never advocate this show to anyone due to its vastly inappropriate content. However, I must admit that at times it can be ridiculously funny, particularly Sheldon.

That scene reminds me of the time that James took me to the hospital because I was having trouble breathing (it happened several times in that location, but not once since I've moved from there... coincidence?). AS HE WAS DRIVING ME TO THE HOSPITAL, he kept going on and on and on about his problems, including his concern for how a situation was going to affect a friend of his (I later told him, "you can be so selfish when you're being selfless!"). I was to exasperated to scream at him, though I wanted to desperately. Although that night actually brings to mind fond memories. I was visibly annoyed with him and he asked what it was. I told him nothing and tried to go on but he wouldn't budge. And, for the first time, someone made me confront what was bothering me right then and there and clear it up. He admitted where he was wrong and pointed out where I may have exaggerated the problem. We consented and our friendship was strengthened by it. It was our first real conflict. And then... it was done. I didn't develop any deep embitterment, I didn't hold it against him (though I obviously still make fun of his oblivion). And that moment helped me grow in respect for the fact that he's a whole lot more humble than he looks.

I still want to know, does ANYONE have any advice on what I can tell him??? Anyone have any words about how to be comforting, reassuring, caring?

Meanwhile, I'll try not to be too hard on him. He really is a great person. 

3 and a half...

(I forgot to post this yesterday, so it's one day off)

So today marks exactly 3 months and 15 days until the big day. Le sigh.

Normally, I'm bouncing off the walls when I talk about this, but right now a wonderful calm has come over me. Perhaps it's because I am reflecting on what will in fact be the blissful aspects of marriage... but more than likely it's the wine that I had a few minutes ago. Mmm.

I talk about wedding planning all the time at work. There is a wide variety of people at my workplace, but there are only three reactions. 1) "Well... good luck with that" This is from the significant minority of individuals at the office are basically afraid of commitment. One woman tells us constantly how she's trying to fend off her boyfriend from proposing with her life. Another coworker mentioned that he and his girlfriend are taking things slow so as not to have any unrealistic expectations. While I understand the second coworker's thoughts (I just don't get the first one at all...), I still get a bit annoyed by it.

2) The people who get amusingly sarcastic. This is the majority of the people at my work. They remind me that "there's still time to save yourself" and other sarcastic remarks. I don't mind these because these are usually from people who are basically sarcastic in everything they do, and I can tell that they are happy in their marriages.

3) Then there are the people who stand up to those sarcastic remarks with sweet comments about how happy I'm gonna be and how wonderful marriage is. It was uber sweet today when this one guy who was married just this past summer replied "It's worth all of it" when I was complaining  expressing dissatisfaction about the planning. The only thing that confused me today was that one of the people who usually says those kinds of sweet things said that I'll miss this time in my life. Umm... heh... not really on my radar at the moment.  Not one of my Catholic married friends has said that they miss ANYTHING about their engagement. We seem to have most of the disadvantages of being married: petty fights about what gets cleaned by whom (we spend most of our free time together at my place after I get off work), financial discrepancies, fighting over the kitchen, ect. And we don't even get to have any of the advantages! I don't get to wake up and see him (though even after we're married I'm getting up so much earlier than him on a regular basis that I'll never get to talk to him and I'll have to tiptoe around anyway... but I would love to wake up and just know that he's there). Whenever he leaves at night it's a mild torture for me. I'm constantly yelling at him as he leaves, "Don't die!!!" I don't know why I bother telling him that... he knows it's against the rules. But ya, many disadvantages, none of the advantages.

Oh yes, and let's not get into how other people stick their nose into our business and express dissatisfaction with the amount of time we spend together. Let's get this straight people: I. Don't. Care. There is nothing wrong with spending every WAKING hour with your fiance (never mind the fact that I spend 11 hours at/commuting-to work each day which is way more than I spend with James). The. End.

One thing James told me the other day was that he had a harder time with commitment until he realized something. There is no guarantee that he will be happy,  in fact we may (though unlikely) end up being miserable together. If that happens, he will have no way of getting out of it and will just have to suffer his way through the rest of life with me... somehow this made him a lot happier with our relationship. I'm still working on that one.

I have contacted (but am still waiting for responses from) the following: hairdresser/makeup, Schola, dress alterations lady. The hair place has been increasingly irritating me by their inability to communicate with me (I called them over a week and a half ago and they said they needed to talk to the women there and see if one of them is willing to condescend to get up that early and do my hair for one of the most important days of my life... sheesh) so I think I'm nixing them fairly soon.

Still have no idea what we're doing for reception music. We have basically reached a stalemate. A few coworkers suggested providing each gues a set of headphones with several different satellite radio capacities so that everyone can dance to whatever they want (this always produces the most amusing images of slow dancers, swing dancers, techno dancers, and... I don't even know what that is... together on the same dancefloor at the same time trying not to kill each other).

Trying to calm down...

I've been having a problem with my adrenal gland lately, and it's making dealing with any sort of stress rather difficult for me. Apparently it's been rather shot and I need more B vitamins. I've been taking a suppliment and it helps with the day-to-day stresses, but when I have a real conflict then I just end up shaking.

I'll be honest, the apartment was awful due to the holidays. The adrenal problem has caused me to be very tired when I get home at night (11 hours at work and commute does that to you alone, plus for other reasons I'm gone 12-13 hours out of the day). I wanted to rest when I got home which only left Saturdays for cleaning (James and I will NOT clean on a Sunday). Well, that would've been fine except for the fact that I was either traveling or ridiculously busy from Thanksgiving on, which means the apartment didn't even get routinely cleaned and it was a disaster. I mean, terribly awful. I had stuff all over the floor in the kitchen from a brownie package exploding, and a whole bunch of other issues that came up at once. James was going through his stuff so there were piles and what not everywhere (everytime I'd come home from when he'd been cleaning, it looked worse than I left... that did little to help my anxiety problem lately, but now that he actually made progress by getting rid of all the stuff it's a lot better). I hadn't taken out the recycling for 2 months so it was just collecting and collecting. Then, guess  what happens? The FIRST day I had in 6 weeks to clean, (right as I'm starting to clean of course) my landlord stops in to check out something. I profusely apologized for the status of the place, explaining that we were working on it that day, but he's kinda a person who only hears what he wants to sometimes and I think he was blocking out everything within him to keep from exploding.

I got a letter today (it was small so I don't know when he put it in the mailbox, could've been up to 2 days ago) explaining that the apartment was unacceptable and listing off a few other things. I'm just like... ugh, I WISH he had decided to come up today instead of last week. Between the past weekend and yesterday, I cleaned up the floor and the stove, James got literally a station wagon full of stuff out of the place, I took out the recycling (though there's more that needs to go out already), and you can actually see more than a narrow path on the floor (actually, James is really bad about making usable paths and rather just puts his stuff everywhere). In fact, the bunch of stuff that still needs to be put up is mainly just against the walls, so it's basically good. I got a vacuum for Christmas, and intend to use it immediately upon its arrival, I cleaned off the table... basically we got tons done. Ya, it's far from perfect (won't ever be the home of a neat freak while I'm there, let's be clear right now), but we got so much done that it's really good.

Of course, when the landlord comes again he's gong to think that this was all only a response to his implied threat of kicking me out if I didn't shape up (although I did all of this before I got the letter today). That's frustrating. I have to get the landlord to come down and look at the front door because it's stuck (thankfully, stuck closed and locked). I've been using the back door to get in and out which is more than mildly annoying because of the scarey dog that lives across the street. My and my landlord's work schedules have us basically never in the house at the same time except on weekends (he works late, I work early), so I don't want to fiddle with the door until Saturday when I could get him if I can't fix it (or worse, get it stuck open...)

Anyway, after that happened, James and I had a little bit of a fight... and I'm just trying to calm down from that. I don't know if it's the fight, the cold, or some combination, but I'm shaking really badly right now. I sent an email to James, and then he called almost right after I sent it. He kept asking if I was okay, and I insisted that I basically was. At the end of the short call he said, "You still sound a bit annoyed" and I replied, "Well, if I am than I'm not able to talk about it now." I've been getting a bit tired of how he's always insisting I talk about what's bothering me RIGHT NOW. I can't. I just can't. I don't mind sucking it up every now and then and talking about it when I'd rather not but with the anxiety at it's high right now, I simply refuse... especially when most of the reason I'm angry is because he's constantly insisting that I talk about a problem before I'm emotionally equipped.

Plenty more to say, no time to say it. I hope everyone had a great Christmas season and New Year.

Well, I need to go

Why can't I let go of resentment?

I am unable to sleep tonight, which has brought out a terrible battle within me.  Deep sorrow claws at me on nights like this. Thoughts of regret, anger, resentment and hostility are all hovering around me as an aura. 

I still am harboring all sorts of negative emotions towards a certain ex of mine. I was with him years and years ago, and still I feel all the pain he inflicted on me like it was yesterday. I was no saint with him, in fact, he brought out the worst aspects of me that I still cringe at the thought of. He always believed me when I was lying and pressed me hard for the truth when I was genuine. He pushed when I needed tenderness, and was tender when I needed firm. He never could read one page of me without seeing only what he wanted. He saw me as a saint where I was a sinner, and he saw only strength in my weakness. He was as un-genuine as they come, always rattling out stupid phrases of love and sentiment when he didn't understand the words at all. When I truly needed him, he would leave. When I needed to be alone, he would insist upon staying close to me. He had no regard for his appearance, both physical and impressionable, leaving me at many times to apologize for him in public.  He could rarely be serious, the sole exception his frequent anger, portrayed in a most frightening display of cold silence. He tried to buy forgiveness for his wrongdoings, which I often pointed out and he would deny to this day. One day, he literally left me out in the cold for hours with no one to help me (there's obviously more to the story which I wont get into). And finally, there was one day where he hurt me the most. It was such a tragic incident that I cannot bear to make it so public as online. The pain from that day haunts me like the hour it happened. James tries so hard to console me to little help. Whenever I remember it I fall into such terrible heartbreak and despair that the only solace is a deep sleep which takes my mind away long enough to temporarily forget... until a long night like tonight where I'm bewildered with emotion. .I started this blog post being angry at a different man (not James), but as I wrote about different aspects of my anger toward him, I realize that the level of my emotion at his failings are only because he reminds me to a degree of this man. It seems that my ex is a model of disdain I have toward men. 

Whenever James has a flaw that reminds me of my ex, I basically completely lose it. If he goes too long without washing his hair, I freak out. Any flaw that resembles my ex flings me into this whirlwind of emotions. Why? Why can't I let go after so many years? I am safely with the man I love now, no fear of this other one ever appearing in my life. I'm so frightened by even the idea of seeing him again that I imagine seeing him everywhere. I'm terrified and angered and... everything by his existence. I fear that I am on the verge of hating him sometimes. 

Please pray for me! And for him. Please pray that I'm not too dead at work in the morning...