The next thing

You first got angry when you saw me emailing Camille's teacher, like I promised her I would. Her teacher asked me if I could swing a day to assist in a field trip to help her class learn about Kentucky, Carter Caves, bats, caves. I was very pleased that she asked me and that the kids were excited about what I told them the day I visited.

You sat by me while I wrote the email to Ms. Williams. I promised her I would send her possible dates and it took me from Thursday last week until now to think about it.

I thought about it and decided that the day would be pretty important to the teacher, the classroom and mostly, to my daughter. It would be a day she would remember forever. She may not even go to that school with her pals next year.

So I sent her a few possible dates. I told her at the time that I would send dates, we could schedule it and I would try to come but there would be a possibility with the short allowable time frame, that something in my work would prevent my attendance. She wanted to press on.

You assumed I haven't a brain in my head, any morals, that I don't do anything all day. You decided that you had to save me from myself. Only you know what's best. I am too stupid to know.

You said that you know how I am, that I will overschedule things and then get harried and.....then you implied that I might ask for your help with something. And, I guess, that is the worse thing that could happen to you, that you might have to get involved a little more or do something for me.

I know now why you refused (despite my begging, despite me telling you it was important to me, despite me asking you to please please please do this for me) to use that pain patch last night, even when it would have provided you significant relief. You were afraid, either consciously or subconsciously, that if you took the patch and it provided you with relief...., when I had some kind of pain or problem, I might then seek your help.

It upset me very much how you kept on and on tonight, trying to tell me what to do. You couldn't stop with telling me what to do before I emailed her. You couldn't stop after we went into the bedroom either.

It upset me also earlier when I told you how I am feeling about my jealously that Bill and Kathy get a long honeymoon at a Jamaican resort while we got a very short one in Ky. Who in the world wouldn't at least think about and have feelings about that? I told you how I was feeling in one small sentence and you became upset, saying it was wrong toward you, unfair to you.

I recoiled, knowing we don't have the kind of relationship where I could explain to you how I was feeling because you either don't or don't listen. I knew that in you mood all you were going to do was jab, not listen. I couldn't bare the stress. I just couldn't. I asked you to leave me alone and you didn't have anything to do with me for days.

Now, you think you can order me like I am some child.

I was and am very disturbed by the things you have been saying to me lately: how you said that thing about the phases, how you said "no wonder nobody likes you" or something like that, and then worse of all how you said that you have eyes and you can see that it is not at all like I think, about how much I do, how tired I am, how I am always doing things for others, not me. I reminded you about the 4 a.m. night, that night (very recently) I worked from 10 a.m. to 4 a.m. (18 hr day) I went to bed at 5 a.m. then went to work at 10:30 again. Every time someone else picks the kids up from dance, I work late. The week before the dance competition I worked late several nights. I worked very late on Friday night that weekend, getting home just before you got there with your kids. I spent all weekend going to the store, getting ready for Charleston without rest, went to the competition (slept very little at the hotel) got back into Catlettsburg at 8:30 p.m. and then dragged all the kids into the office so I could get files to work into the night. I got the stuff into the house, got the kids to bed and then worked on my file beginning at 11. I worked until 2 then went to bed. I got up at 5:45 and worked on the case again I had to take the kids to school.

All of that plus getting a cold brought me down myself and I felt pretty bad Thurs and Friday. You think you are entitled to have an entire day to yourself, day after day and when the most you do is spend a hour cleaning up the kitchen, and another hour maybe doing other domestic things, you think you are seriously put out but you see me on the go from 7 a.m. to midnight, trying to keep all the parts of my life together and you say to me "I see what's going on". If you really did, you would never have said that to me.

With these trials coming up, particularly Jeff Fields, I will be extremely tired. I will be extremely stressed. I will have hour after hour, day after day of nothing but stress. I thought and knew that having a day with Camille and her class, in which they would be happy and learn a great deal, would be something I could actually look forward to, when there is little else. It would get me through it all, a bright spot in a dark period.

Then after everything else, I had to deal with your commands, with your superior attitude like you can tell me what to do, like you know more about things than me.

I know you are telling yourself for the 50th time again, you did nothing wrong, you are not always wrong, you are doing everything you can, ......

I'm sorry, but when I try to carve out a little thing for myself and yet have you act like you have the right to override my personal decision and tell me what to do, it was just too much.

I couldn't lie down after that happened. I could hear my pulse in my ear. My chest felt tight. I paced the floor for about 10 minutes and then I came into the bedroom to explain why it was wrong for you to be that way and why it was right that I gave Camille's teacher dates. You were asleep so I talked to the computer instead.