keep f**king going…

I am here, my love.  I am sitting next to you as you lie motionless in your hospital bed.  Tomorrow will officially be two weeks that you have been in a medically induced coma on a breathing tube.  I keep thinking to myself, “but we were supposed to go to the mall and get dinner.”  You always hear about people’s lives changing overnight, you just never expect it to happen to you.  I am listening to the steady breathing coming from your lungs, but I know it is a machine doing the work for you.  I am wearing a plastic gown that has become a part of my daily wardrobe.  The sounds of the ICU has become just background noise.  The first few days I would jump every time an alarm went off.  Now, I can identify which IV drip is running low and I know medical terms that are 15 letters long (and can pronounce them).  I have a newfound respect for nurses, who have treated your body with such respect and have treated my broken heart with such kindness.

An hour ago, you opened your eyes, staring at nothing.  I tried to make eye contact, but you are so sedated, I doubt you are seeing anything.  I put on a latex glove and held your hand.  I asked you to squeeze it and you did.  But like a baby who smiles when they have gas, I wonder if it was just a reflex or if you could really feel me touching you.  I hate not being able to touch your skin without plastic between us.

I miss you so much, but you are right here.  I go through so many emotions every day, I feel like a crazy person sometimes.  When I am home, I feel guilty that I am not with you.  When I leave the hospital, I feel guilty to feel relief.  Why do I feel so much guilt? I didn’t do anything wrong.  I have always tried not to play the victim card when it came to my dad’s alcoholism, but I was a victim of it, just like I was a victim of yours.  I have to take responsibility, though, because I didn’t have a choice with my father.  I did have a choice when it came to you.  But, honestly, given another chance, I would still choose you.  You were worth the risk.  I saw all the good in you…so much good.  People always say they have no regrets and wouldn’t change things in their lives because they learned from mistakes.  I have regrets- I regret marrying my exhusband…I would have preferred to miss those hard lessons.  I will never regret you, though, my love.

I tried to pour my heart out to your mother.  I’m sure you can guess how that went.  One thing I tried to explain to her is that when all of this is over, she will still have you as her son.  When this is all over, I lose you.  I will have to start picking up the pieces and find a new life for myself.  I know it is the right thing to do, though.  We could not have continued living the way we were.  Well, I couldn’t.  I just would not be able to see you do this to yourself again.  Please don’t let this be in vain.  I wish I believed in god so I could pray for you to survive, to get better, to get sober, to be happy.  Other people who are religious are praying for you- that makes me grateful.  I have asked my Mama for help.  I talk to her and ask her to watch over you and to protect you.  She was the toughest woman I know, but she had the biggest heart.  She would say to you, “oh phooey- you wake up and get off those machines!”.

I wonder how long it will be before I stop loving you?  Maybe never.  Maybe it will just be a part of who I am.  Right now it is hard to be angry with you for your lies and your betrayal because you look so weak, so helpless.  But it’s not fair- I have a right to be angry with you.  It has to wait.  I feel like all I have been doing for the past two weeks is waiting (and you know I am not the most patient person).  But I need to see this through- for you and for myself.  Jess bought me a bangle bracelet as a gift that is just silver on the outside but on the inside it says, “keep fucking going…” And that is what I am going to do.

You may never know…

My love,

It’s been ten days that you have been in a coma.  Ten days that I haven’t heard your voice, that we haven’t slept together in our bed.  Ten days that I have had a broken heart with so many unanswered questions.  The doctors keep telling me YOU won’t remember this.  I am glad for that, there has been so much suffering.  However, I will not ever forget this and it has changed me permanently and forever.

Let me start from the beginning.  I knew since you got laid off, you have been drinking more.  I know you gave yourself permission to do so and I really tried to understand how hard it was for you.  I also knew the problems you have had with alcohol that have affected our relationship were going on far before you lost your job.  I gave you time.  I tried to give you space.  Finally, it became too much for me.  I never knew what I was coming home to…would you be drunk? sleeping all day? going to a meeting? I was scared to come home, anxious all the time.

Once I told you I couldn’t do it anymore, you made more promises.  I asked you about rehab.  You said no.  You could do it on your own.  I told you that you couldn’t.  You said you would go to more meetings.  I know you wanted to stop, I believed you, I believed IN you.  You did start going to more meetings.  I encouraged them and the relationships you created there.  I felt the more sober people in your network, the better.  You had met Mary and she became your unofficial sponsor.  You would pick her up and take her to meetings.  I thought that was a good thing- it gave you someone else to be responsible for getting to them.

I know you were drunk Tuesday, but I do believe you that you stopped on Wednesday.  But you started acting so strangely- you were disoriented, shaking.  I told you it was withdrawal.  You said no, something else had to be wrong.  You had a physical appointment on Friday.  I was so relieved you were finally going to the doctor for a check up.

Friday, 8th period. I got a call from the doctor’s office.  I stepped out of my classroom to answer it.  They said you were VERY ill and that they tried to convince you to go to the emergency room in an ambulance.  You pushed the doctor out of the way and ran out of the office barefoot.  I panicked.  I called you and you answered as if nothing was wrong. I told you if you didn’t go to the emergency room, we were finished forever.  You finally agreed, reluctantly.

When we got to the ER, you were confused, sweating, couldn’t follow directions.  They right away knew it was withdrawal.  You told the doctor you drank up to two pints of vodka a day.  You told him you would try to drink in the morning and vomit.  How did I not know how bad it was? Was I in denial? Did I not want to know? Were you just that good of a liar?  You started to become incoherent.  You began hallucinating.  I was so scared.

They got you admitted into a room.  They said it would be a couple of days and they would help you go through withdrawal safely.  At first you did not want to stay, thank god you did.  Within an hour, you were trying to pull out the IVs they put in your arms.  You were talking and making no sense.  An alarm would go off in the hospital and you thought you were at a high school sports game.  Once in a while you would seem normal, but then the hallucinations would begin again.  They tried to get you to stop touching your IVs, you started to shake uncontrollably and the nurse yelled you were having a seizure.  The rapid response team was called and within minutes 15 nurses and doctors were crammed into your small hospital room.  In the hall, I watched with disbelief that this was happening.  I was so terrified.

They rushed you to ICU, just down the hall.  I ran after you, but the doctor said to wait in the waiting room.  Thankfully, your best friend was there and my sister was about to arrive. I felt so helpless.  The doctor finally called me out into the hall.  He said they gauge alcohol withdrawal on a scale called CIWA.  6 is uncomfortable, 12 needs medical attention, 20 can be life threatening.  You were a 45.  The doctor looked at me and said that I saved your life.  I broke down.  He said you would have most likely had a major seizure if they didn’t start you on the medications when they did.  Then, we heard security being paged and guards running to your room.  You had to be strapped down, restrained so they could put the IVs in to save your life.  The doctor said he would be back to talk to us.

He did.  He said they put you in a medically induced coma.  No other patient had ever needed more sedatives before.  The inserted a breathing tube and you were on a ventilator.  Life support one doctor called it.  The first time I saw you strapped down with all of those machines, my heart broke into 100 pieces.  I couldn’t stop crying, we called your parents.  At first it didn’t seem like they were going to come.  I wanted to scream, “YOUR SON IS IN A COMA”. I let your friend talk to them.  They said they would “decide” in the morning.

I sat next to you and cried and cried.  How could it have gotten this bad? We were supposed to go to the mall and get dinner.  How could you be in a coma?  Finally, after being at the hospital for nine hours, the nurses told us to all go home.  You were sedated and I had to come home and take care of the dog.  You had accidentally left her outside.  You’ve never done that before.

At 1 am, I got into the guest room bed.  I couldn’t sleep without you in our bed.  I still haven’t.  I took your phone to look up some phone numbers of people to contact in the morning.  The first person I though of was Mary.  You two had become so close and she was such a support system for you, almost like a mother figure, considering she was almost 20 years older than you.

NOTHING could have prepared me for the texts I saw.  I read them over and over.  I felt like vomiting.  I was shaking so hard, I could hardly hold the phone.  I called my sister and read them all to her.  She said she was going to be sick.  I kept saying, “how could he do this to me? how could he do this to me?” I never ever suspected you of being unfaithful.  I never doubted you.  I trusted you with every fiber of my being.  I thought we were in love, even with the problems we have been having.  I devoted almost 10 years of my life to our relationship.  Besides all of the very sexually explicit texts, you told her SHE was the reason you were staying sober (which you weren’t), that SHE was the most interesting person you ever met, that HER support was helping you, that you thought about her A LOT.  I felt my already broken heart splinter into 1,000 more pieces.  I felt like a fool.  I encouraged you to see her, thinking she was helping you.  You told me Wednesday night you would go to a meeting with her and then come get in bed with me.  You never did- you slept in the basement.  How could I have been so blind.  I was texting you that I loved you and believed in you and on the same day you were texting her about wanting to fuck her.  I will never know if you did.  It doesn’t even matter.

The next morning I went to see you in the hospital with my sister.  I kissed you 20 times.  I held your hand for an hour.  I told you I loved you over and over and over. I cried and cried and cried.  I left the hospital and went directly to a storage unit and rented one.  By the end of the day Saturday, all of your belongings were in it.  While taking your furniture out of the basement, we found 21 pints of vodka.  I told your parents the truth.  That regardless of what happened to you in the hospital, you no longer lived with me.  Part of that was pure betrayal and if you were not sick, our relationship would have ended anyway due to your infidelity.  The other, bigger, part was that I could not have you come back here and act like you didn’t almost die and just continue drinking.  I did it for me, but for you too.  Rehab had to be the only option.

For the past ten days, I have woken up and gone to the hospital.  I have kissed your face next to your breathing tube.  I have held your hand, still bound to the bed.  When you have opened your eyes, I have reassured you I am there and I love you.  I hung up a collage of pictures of the dog and our nieces and nephew.  I made a playlist on my phone of your favorite songs and I sit next to you and play them.  When your parents arrived, I still was the one who had to tell the doctors everything about you.  In some ways, I know you inside and out.  In other ways, I feel like you have lied about everything. I spoke with your therapist and meeting facilitator, both of whom thought you were maintaining sobriety with “occasional” relapses.  You even lied to them.  You must have been lying to yourself.  I did your unemployment paperwork, your COBRA, paid your bills.  You will probably never even know these things.  I have done everything I can to help you and support you and love you and take care of you during this time.

I get home late at night and I get in bed and I read, over and over, the text messages you sent to her.  I cry myself to sleep, wiping my eyes on your sweatshirt.  I sleep with your deodorant open on the pillow next to me to smell you.  I feel so alone.

But then the next day I wake up, and I go to the hospital and do it all again.  The nurses tell me I am strong.  They are shocked at your parent’s disconnect.  You will most likely never know, or believe, how truly and deeply I love you.  You are still in a coma, there have been a lot of setbacks.  Your kidneys weren’t working, to the point they were talking about dialysis.  You had a 103 fever for 60 hours.  You have pneumonia and two other infections.  I thought at one point you would die.  I agonize over the last thing I said to you.  Did we sleep together on Thursday night?  Did I kiss you goodbye when I left for work on Friday?

I took FMLA at work- I have missed more day of school in these two weeks than I did the whole school year last year.  Your dad introduced me at first as your girlfriend to each new doctor who came in to see you.  I was the only one who could answer their questions about your history and your health.  By midweek, he casually nodded towards me and said we “live together”…I was downgraded to just being your roommate.  Today, he didn’t even bother to even introduce me.  I sat on the couch by myself, huddled in the corner, feeling like I didn’t belong there.  But I refuse to leave.  I don’t care how awkward it is.  While you are in the coma, you still feel like mine.  Once you wake up, everything is going to change.  I don’t know how you will react.  I don’t know if you will agree to rehab or if you will refuse.  Your parents want you to go down by them.  My body physically aches when I think of what you will go through and knowing I will most likely not be a part of it.

I feel like I have lost so much.  Sometimes I am so angry, other times I feel so sad it’s overwhelming.  I have lost weight because I can’t eat.  I do laundry and organize closets at 3 am because I can’t sleep.  My friends and family and coworkers and students have all been so incredibly supportive.  I appreciate it more than I will ever be able to express to them.

But right now, all I want is you,

and I will always love you,

and you may never know any of this.

 

Love you more.

I love my boyfriend.  I can’t imagine life without him.  But I will have to because I just broke up with him.  I love the movie, “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” and there’s a scene where Kristen Bell is explaining to her ex why she ended things and she says, “Oh, I tried. You have no idea how hard I tried. I talked to a therapist, I talked to my mother, I read every book possible…None of it worked. None of it made a difference to you and I couldn’t drown in you anymore.”  That’s how I feel.  My boyfriend’s problem with alcohol was drowning me.  I was nervous to come home from work at 2:45 in the afternoon because I knew he would most likely be sleeping or drunk.  For SO long, I justified his behavior by telling myself, “he isn’t mean.”  That became my only criteria.  My dad is a VERY mean drunk.  My exhusband was a mean person.  My boyfriend is not mean- sober or drunk.  But that doesn’t make living with him any easier and it doesn’t make his alcoholism any more tolerable.  What finally broke me was the lying.  The constant lies about not drinking, when all I ever asked of him was to be honest.  If he drank and told me the truth, I would not get mad or reprimand him- I would talk to him about what made him do it and why he did.  I don’t understand why he just. kept. lying.  I found bottles of half empty vodka in his car, crumpled bags from the liquor store in his filing cabinet and he so, so often smelled of alcohol, but would deny drinking.

I love my boyfriend.  Right now (and probably our whole eight years together), I loved him more than he loved himself.  He has a very low self-worth, which is probably part of the reason he drinks.  I wish he could see himself the way I see him.  If I made a pro/con list about him, there would be two pages of “pros”.  But under “cons”, in thick Sharpie marker, would simply be the word “alcoholic”.  And all the positive qualities in the world cannot cancel out an addition.  I love him so much that I cannot stand to watch him self-destruct before my eyes.  He sinks lower and lower and I feel like he is quicksand and I only have a short window to step out of it before I get sucked down forever.  I love him, but I love myself, too.  I had no choice in who my father was- I had to live with an abusive alcoholic for my childhood and teenage years.  I am an adult now and I do have a choice in this.

I love my boyfriend, but I honestly can say that I have done everything I can to support him in his desire for sobriety.  I have made sacrifices and protected him and probably enabled him, too.  I have felt like his caretaker for so long, I don’t even feel like a girlfriend.  I feel so alone, so often.  I thought because he wanted to change, he would.  And I truly believe he doesn’t want to be the way he is, but I also know that he cannot stop on his own and he refuses to get the help he needs.

I love my boyfriend, but there isn’t enough love in the world to love him out of this addiction.  He will have to learn to love himself first and I am scared for what is going to happen to him.  I feel responsible for him, but I also know I cannot change him.  I have always still loved my father, but it’s never been enough.

I love my boyfriend and I am heartbroken and we are living together still and it is awful and awkward and depressing and I get a stomachache every day and my anxiety is off the charts and he is angry and drinking more and I just need it all to stop.  And the only way I can do that is to stay committed to making him my ex-boyfriend.

From Meh to Ugh.

I have been hanging on by a thread in my relationship.  Our dog has been very sick and I think her time left is limited.  She was originally my boyfriend’s dog and she was four years old when we got together.  She was eight years old when they moved in with me and she’s twelve now.  My boyfriend has been a complete mess over it, which I understand because I have two cats that are the loves of my life and obviously I feel like the dog is mine as well (I have been her mom for eight years).  My boyfriend has been using her illness as an excuse to drink more…because, you know, alcoholics look for ANY excuse to drink.  In the back of my mind, I have been biding my time and plotting that once she is gone (my heart hurts to write that) and some time has passed to let him mourn, I was going to ask him to move out.  I just can’t live with him anymore if he is going to continue to drink.  He has been working on himself and going to a therapist and a meeting a week, but it isn’t fixing the problem.  I love him, but not enough to continue sacrificing my happiness.  But, I decided to be patient and wait for the right time.

And then he got fired yesterday.  Fuck.  Me.

Now I feel really trapped and I don’t know what is going to happen.  I suppose miracles happen and he might actually use this time to work on himself, his health, his problems and our relationship.  I don’t expect him to turn things around overnight and I am still willing to be patient, because I truly do care about his well-being.  However, if he spirals downwards and drinks more and sleeps more, I think I need to set a time and then give him an ultimatum of rehab or moving out (pretty much being certain he will not choose to go to rehab).

I don’t mean to make this about me, but well, I guess this blog IS about me…I understand he is going through a hard time with the dog and I have heard from other people how traumatic it is to be fired and I have anxiety, so I know him having depression is not his fault.  He truly is such a good person, but I am not sure how much longer I can wait for him to be a good person for ME.