On Friday we went to GSP. I didn't want to go. I didn't want to go anywhere. I wanted to lie in my bed all weekend and cry. I didn't want to be near you. You had been hurting me so much without seeming to care. It was more than I could stand. I felt far from you, alienated from you, and you didn't seem to want to deal with the problem. Everything in my body hurt, I felt very sick. If you don't stop being like this to me, I will die.

You convinced me to go to gsp though. You asked me very gently and very kindly. I went although I felt really sick all over. I'd had a headache for two days and my joints hurt.

We drove to Goshen to get the kids without talking much. You asked if I wanted to talk about the problem but it was hard to talk in the car. It was hot out and we had the windows down, the wind was noisy. After we picked up the kids we stopped at Wendys to get food. I felt like an outsider intruding on your family at Wendys and much of the evening. You didn't seem to like me, I haven't seemed to make you happy, although you asked me to marry you, you've merely mumbled once in a month anything about a marriage, a wedding.

We were in the gsp kitchen when crazy cavers came up and I asked Dalene if she knew Kevin Downs. We were talking about bad cave leaders, she lives in Louisville and is a Louisville grotto member and I thought I might be able to get her opinion about him. As I was talking about him and my roppel experience, you started walking out of the room. I could tell by the way you walked, the set of your shoulders, that you had shut me out again. Because I mentioned Kevin Downs in an appropriate conversation so I could complain about him. What little progress we had made, you shut down and backed figuratively away from me again. I saw what you were doing. I thought I could stop it before it started, so I called you over so I could show you I love you even when you do this crap to me. You finally walked over and stood there for a second before leaving me again. You stopped looking at me and talking to me. I felt really terrible again. We went to the cabin to get ready for bed. You were outside and I tried to talk to you. I asked you what was up. You wouldn't talk to me, you barely looked at me. It made me so upset. The little hope I had built up that you were beginning to understand was gone.

I felt lonely, an outsider to you and your kids, unloved, I started to cry so I begain walking to the showerhouse in the dark. I didn't know what I would do after that. I just knew I couldn't let the kids see me like that and I felt really bad. I sat down in the showerhouse, feeling that there was no way we were going to work. I felt like you didn't like me enough to tolerate anything you wouldn't do or say. This attitude freaks me out. To think that anyone on earth would believe that everytime another person does or says something you wouldn't do or say. The only way you would be happy is a planet full of Jerrys.

You seem to tolerate all kinds of things from other people but if I say "let's order", if I allow the kids to do something I find acceptable with pizza, if I walk upstairs without your permission, if my opinion about multi-piece rims is different than yours, if I look at you funny, if I am passionate in my dislike of Walmart, if I am anything different, you become sullen and withdrawn, hostile, silent, and I become desperately lonely and sad. It feels like you only love me when I am robotically like you.

Friday, October 5

You actually are blaming me outwardly for your two days of hostility and disrespect toward me. Jerry, you can't possibly love, like, care for me and treat me like that. Do you honestly think a 5 minute conversation about cave smell is worth treating somebody like that?

I have begged you and begged you not to shut me off, stop loving me, stop giving me the cold shoulder and stop making me cry just because I do one little thing you don't like. You don't have the right to treat me like this.

I can't take this anymore. If I don't keep my mouth shut and don't look at you, you don't love me.

I think maybe we made a mistake. You just don't love or like or respect me enough to treat me like you love me. You can't seem to let me be a person. If I do something, however slight, that you don't like, I get days and days of hostility. I can't feel unloved like this all the time. I am very unhappy. I am pretty sure you can't possibly really want a relationship with me and treat me like this. I know you can't possibly love me that much and treat me like this.

You just keep hurting me and don't care one bit.

Thursday, Oct. 4

Today was very strained. I have felt ill on and off the last few weeks, particularly the last few days. I feel very sick right now. We went out to dinner for my dad's birthday and we were able to pretend, if only for a bit, that things were ok. But once we got home, you pretty much went back to your distant self. I sat down by you a couple of times. You kept your arms tightly folded over your chest. I reached out to touch your hand and you seemed uninterested in my touch.

We went to bed. You said to me "I don't understand how my compliment turned into all of this." I said, I did something that you don't like and you again stopped loving me. You said "Oh god, give me a break". I started crying again. You said "I concede, I retreat, I concede I retreat".

Your lack of respect for me, lack of consideration, lack of compassion hurts me so. I began to cry hard and got ahold of myself before I embarrassed myself, shamed myself, in front of you again. You have so little compassion for me, are so cold toward me when I am sorrowful, it's like you are ashamed of me.

You said you liked what Thor wrote. You were reading what I wrote. I was commenting on the film, on what I wrote. The whole reason I blogged about movie was that I thought it odd that the writers found a cave devoid of smell when it is something I always found particularly fragrant. We talked about it a little. I stopped talking. You got the last word but had to again comment by saying "like I said, I was just giving you a compliment and it turned horribly bad". I am not sure where your compliment was supposed to lie. I was merely discussing what I had written (what you claim that you liked, I guess) and you ended up saying it had all gone horribly wrong. This entire exchange lasted only about 5 minutes.

I sat by you and held your hand, rubbed and massaged your arm and hand lovingly. Something about how I was talking about what I had written made you stop loving me and disrespecting me again.

Where is the love you are supposed to have for me? I've only seen it in fairly brief glimpses the last few weeks. As long as I stand in a corner and don't talk or look at you, you love me. If I do anything else, you act as if I've caused all these terrible things, causing you to have to withdraw, to withhold any love you claim you have for me. You act though all of this like your incredible disrespect for me, your lack of compassion and emotion toward me are all my fault. I gave you that look or said "let's order" or had a difference of opinion about cameras or reminded you it was my jewelry or ............. and you had to teach me a lesson, you had to punish me by withholding all positive emotions toward me. You claim its me because I was stubborn or obstinate by having that different than you.

You will never be happy with me until you make me into you or into a statue.

Thursday, September 27

B.A. came to visit. I was very tired after Tammy Jo's but talked with you two, waited on you, fixed you chili. In front of B.A. you started talking about all the Walmarts you have been to and how Ashland's was the worst. You said how you there must be something bad in the water of the people of Ashland. I said nothing bu surely you could tell on those several occasions before when you have talked badly about the town I am from that I don't care for it. Don't you respect me enough to stop putting down in a very graphic way the group of which I am a member? I said nothing nevertheless. B.A. wasn't looking at me but I looked at you to show you I didn't care for the conversation. You gave me a look of hostility back - "how dare I show you with my face I didn't want you saying the people of Ashland are mutants".

Later when I was doing my work in the living room and you and B.A. were talking about the cave pearls, you omitted any reference to my participation, to my being in the cave, to the fact that I actually was there and selected it. Then you said that you charged Jarrett with returning them to the cave after you were gone. Whether you meant after you were gone and Jarrett would take them from me or after we both were gone and Jarrett would take them from my children, you were commanding Jarrett to do something, to take back the silver wrapping of my gift. As to the cave pearls themselves - Yes, you babied me in order for me to get there. Yes, I would not have been there if not for you. But does that mean that you have the right to tell Jarrett to take something back from me or my children? It felt like you have such little respect for me that you could take any property you wanted from me because I wasn't a person.

You and I talked about that before and I told you it made feel feel uncomfortable. Jarrett comes to my children after I have died and says "My dad told me I had to take them away from you because my dad helped your mom get there and paid to have silver wire around them for your mom's birthday. He told me I had to take them away from you and put them back in the cave. I don't care if they are special to you because you saw your mom wearing them all the time. I don't care how it makes you feel for me to pry the out of your hands. I don't care that they don't belong to my dad or to me. My dad told me to take them from you and I am going to do it."

The implications of what you keep saying made me feel insignificant, unimportant, disrespected. I felt compelled to remind you that I was there, that one of the pearls for the earrings and the big pearl I had selected, I had chosen, I was there. I reminded you that it was my jewelry.

You withdrew from me. I was feeling very needy of you that night. I was feeling nervous and upset about work and I needed to be touched. I needed you. I needed tlc. But because I acted like a human being and looked at you and said the jewelry was mine, you withdrew from me. Stopped looking at me, stopped interacting with me, closed yourself off to me. It upset me so bad. I felt terrible. You stayed in the kids room at the computer. I came after you, thinking that maybe I could talk you into touching me. You were looking at the gsp pictures with what other people have found had witty labels. You had no expression on your face but disgust. I touched your shoulder. You didn't respond. I saw the look on your face. My very presence was disgusting you. I felt a lump in my throat and felt tears in my eyes so I went back in the living room. I worked some more. You stayed away. After quite some time, you came out, avoided looking me in the eye. You brushed your lips against the top of my head and said you were going to bed.

I didn't know what to think. I worked about another half hour but felt so sad, unhappy and tired, thought I would go sleep for a few hours and then get up very early. When I went to bed though, you were snoring loudly and consistently. I knew I only had about 4 hours before I got up and thought I would go sleep in the couch for a bit. You came out there and made me cry. You made me sob hard and stood over me saying "is this how it's gonna be?" "What do you mean"?, I asked, "how what's gonna be?" "You know what I mean", you said, how this is gonna be." I cried hard, confused and upset, by you wouldn't stop saying it. You were mean and angry and wouldn't stop. It hurt me so. I still don't understand.

Saturday, September 29

I felt really weird and strange about Thursday night for a couple of days. You just said, "let's just forget about it, ok?" I was shocked that you would just forget about it after how you treated me but I wanted so badly for you to stop being so far away from me, I wanted so badly not to feel desperately sad, I agreed. Little by little I forgot about it even though I knew better than to let myself be vulnerable again.

I was feeling close to you as we watched movies late Saturday night. All the while I felt close to you, warning lights were flashing, reminding me that I shouldn't let my love for you make me vulnerable.

{Memories of how mad you got at me when I gave you a look of disapproval when you said all of us Ashland people are mutants and then told you the jewelry was mine when B.A. was visiting were still with me. The way you acted that night. How terrible you treated me when I let myself have some personhood status. I can't even believe that one who claims to love another could care so little for her that when she gives him a look of disapproval and reminds you that she is a person, you feel justified in standing over her as she sobs pitifully and saying "Is this how it's gonna be?" repeatedly. You never explained yourself. You never apologized. You treated me like this and then withdrew and stopped talking to me. I could not shake the feeling that you will never be happy with me unless I stand in a corner, don't look at you and keep my mouth shut. You never addressed anything that happened that night, never said a word about it, still haven't. The problem is that these things happen far too often. Every few days, I will be feeling optimistic about us and give you a look, say something, move my right pinkie when you think I shouldn't and the next thing you know, you hate me again. You say you never hate me, that you always love me. Whether that is true or not, if you don't treat me with love and respect then it doesn't matter, does it?

Since you never addressed what happened that night and it was
Telling me to go back to guarded status. These thoughts were with me much of Saturday. It was why I got so upset when my vertical fear wouldn't let me rappel. It upset me that I let my fear win but mostly because I was afraid you would be disappointed in me or get mad at me. When I was at the lip, you were not your usual warm, "talk you over" self. You just stood there waiting for me. You said very little and would barely even look at me. I felt so upset.

You asked me Saturday night what was on my mind. I was troubled and have been at how easily you get mad at me and act hostile and withdrawn toward me. Maybe you love me but you either don't like me or respect me enough to let me have my own personality. I can't relax and be myself for fear of making you mad at me again.

When we talked about this, instead of you thinking about what I was saying and caring enough about me, about our relationship to realize this destructive pattern, you just blamed me. You said I was this and that, that I was the same..etc. You became withdrawn again because I had brought it up.


As soon as it seems things are great between us, I do the smallest thing and you treat me with hostility and disrespect. You tell me I do the same to you. I have never treated you with hostility and disrespect


Sunday, September 30

Bill sent the kids home in slippers. You said I should call him right away about it. It was 9:15 p.m., he had just left. He wasn't about to bring the shoes right back. Calling him would do nothing but make me feel more upset. I felt stressed and hormonal. I said I would call him but not right then. You kept saying I should call him, over and over. I said I didn't want to. You kept telling me to call him over and over. "Please", I said, "I don't want to right now". You wouldn't stop demanding that I call, just because you wanted me to. "Jerry", I said "I am a person."

You stayed away from me the rest of the evening, withdrawn, not talking to me. You were mad at me. Why? I don't know. I don't know if you were ultimately mad because I reminded you I am a person or because I would not do what you wanted. It hurt me.

Monday, October 1 and Tuesday, October 2

I still feel weird about how you treated me on Sunday night. I feel alienated from you. I don't feel close to you. You say you love me.

I fainted at Tammy Jos in a very embarrassing way Tuesday night and felt terrible, physically and emotionally.

Wednesday, October 3

I stayed home from work because I felt bad. I felt upset, physically ill, fatigured. You came home and handed me an email from Thor. You said you were proud to know us but you never said why you were proud about me. We were discussing what I wrote and I told you that I believed the book or screen writers of Perfume had little if any cave experience because caves are not absent of smell like dead stone. On the contrary, they were pungent, filled with the strong smells of fertile earth, mud, dampness. A cave has a very distinctive smell, so much that soap is made to remind cavers of the smell. You told me how stupid the soap was. I said nothing else. You said, "like I said, I was trying to give you a compliment and it went horribly wrong". I said nothing else. I just looked at you with confusion. You went in the living room. I went and sat by you. I held your hands, rubbed them, loved on them. You got up and then turned on the dryer. Just as we were about to try to shower together (I was willing to even though my body was a wreck), the dryer buzzed and I had to deal with the clothes. You went ahead and showered without me while I dealt with the clothes. I showered and then went in the living room. You didn't talk to me, look at me, address me, anything. You were withdrawn and gone from me again "still loving me" like you claim although I couldn't find any traces of it. You came out to the living room and said you were thinking of eating, was I interested or anything. You refused to look at me. I asked what you had in mind, what you were thinking of. You respected me so little, you didn't even acknowledge my question. You left the room.

I sat there feeling lonely, said, unwanted, unloved. It has become a very familiar feeling. I was in the living room alone for an hour or so. I came several times to the room and stood in the doorway. You would not look at me. I said "I thought you were getting something to eat". You said "you didn't take me up on it" or something like that. I said "I asked you what you had in mind". You didn't respond. I went back in the living room. After about a half hour I came back to the room and looked in. You weren't using the computer, just sitting there. You loathed me so much you would rather just sit in front of an inactive computer screen than be in the same room. You were waiting until I vacated the living room, apparently, so you could watch tv. I went to the bedroom. Sure enough, you went in the living room and watched tv. I felt terrible. I read for awhile in bed and turned out the light. You came in the room a couple of times but did not speak to me.

I fixed myself a pbj and ate it in the floor of Camille's room since I knew if I stayed in the room with you, in the kitchen, you would feel like I drove you out of the room. I was so sick to my stomach, I had such a dry mouth and big knot in my throat, I could barely swallow. I felt ugly, fat, sick, unloved, unwanted.

Finally I fell asleep. You told me you loved me this morning when you left. I told you back. It's the first words you had spoken to me in 12 hours. How can you tell me you love me when you purposefully and repeatedly withhold love everytime I do something you don't like?

You don't have to like everything I do, but it is important that you love who I am. For example, you may not like what I do, but that is simply my behavior. We might disagree about my decisions or my actions, but if your heart is open, you cannot dump your own values, beliefs and especially your fear, onto me. What you I do or don't do may not make you want to be close to me right then, but you should still be compassionate toward me.

Love is not something you do, Love is a way of being. And more than that. It is simply being, Being with another person, however they may be. Holding no judgments, having no agendas, No desire to control, No need to prove your love, No intrusion upon their soul. Nothing but a total acceptance of their being, Born of your acceptance of yours.

Withholding love can be almost as bad as not loving someone, for anyone, but especially for sensitive or insecure individuals or those who haven't known much love. In such a case, a willingness to ignore your mate's tears over a foolish mistake in order to punish her can make her feel unloved. Expressing unconditional love includes reassurance. Another example is forgiving hurts. If your spouse has hurt your feelings, you don't instantly stop loving him or her, so you shouldn't try to make your mate feel that way.