Well That Was An Interesting Turn Of Events

So….in an interesting turn of events;

I'm pregnant.

Just kidding.

Haha. Did anyone's heart stop a little bit? Was that mean? I kinda thought it was funny.

No, I am most definitely not pregnant, not unless I am birthing a sibling for Jesus, in which case no angels have ascended upon me and told me of this glorious news....so I'll feel a little bit cheated out of the experience if that's the case. I am however, so very proud of myself.

Here, allow me to explain.

So, Piano Man and I, well… you guys….

As I told you in the post "I Just Don't Even Know Where To Start," Piano Man was trying so hard to get to know me and I, I just kept backing away. The more he did for me, the higher my wall went up. The closer he tried to get, the further I ran away. Well it didn't get any better. In fact, it got to the point where he would just ask me a question and I would burst into tears.

Exhibit #1

The story behind that text was that I had decided to let him drive me somewhere. I know that sounds like no big deal, but to me it is. I’m very weird about getting in the car with men that I don’t completely trust. I think that once you have a man enact the child safety locks and burn the crap out of your leg with his cigarette, you become a bit paranoid of something like that happening again. Either way, this particular morning I decided to put on my big girl panties and let him drive us to a breakfast place before we both went to work. We were on our way home and I was trying to take my mind off of the fact that I would rather be anywhere but in that car and so naturally I convinced him that we needed to have a sing-a-long to the radio. It seemed like the best way to stop thinking about how uncomfortable I was and so there we were, singing along to the radio at the top of our lungs, when he asked me a question about my past and I BURST in tears. Like I couldn't even help it, tears were just pouring from my eyes and sliding down my face like a snowman taking a walk through the desert.

I felt scared.

No, not scared, I felt terrified.

For some reason a feeling of panic overwhelmed me and for a minute I debated if jumping out of the car at the next stoplight was a feasible option.

I felt so stupid.

Eventually I managed to pull myself together and he drove me home. He felt terrible and I felt worse.

Despite his sweet text we never talked about it but I made a vow to myself to act like the grown-up that I am the next time I saw him. I really liked this guy and I needed him to know that I was not completely crazy.

Over the next couple of days we saw each other quite often and yet something, something just didn’t feel right. I felt myself becoming increasingly nervous around him and I couldn’t figure out why because he treated me like an absolute princess. One night we were sitting outside of my house, having a drink under the stars, he was talking about nothing in particular, and before I knew it I was crying again.

What the hell is wrong with me? Like seriously, I’m a girl and yes, I am a crier, but not ALL THE TIME! Not all the time for no obvious reason other than irrational panic.

This guy has absolutely got to think that I am not only completely nuts, but that I should probably be medicated or something.

He noticed my tears, put an arm around me, and said “Baby, what’s wrong? Just tell me what’s bothering you? I hate seeing you like this. I hate that I’m doing it and I don’t even know what it is that I’m doing.”

You guys, I didn’t say a word. I tried, I really did, but as hard as I fought to open my mouth and make something, anything, come out, I got nothing. I felt my entire body stiffen against the gentleness of his hug and suddenly I found myself staring at the floor where the only thing that I could do was watch the tears splashing down onto my feet, hitting my pink nail polish, and sliding down between my toes.

How long did we sit there? I don’t know. Five minutes? Ten minutes? Twenty minutes? I really have no idea.

At some point I was finally able to get a sentence out; “I think maybe you should go.”

I hated myself right then, I really did. I hated that he was trying so hard and that I felt so damaged. Gosh I felt so incredibly damaged.

He left and I cried harder, still unsure of why I was even upset in the first place and angry at myself for being such a disaster.

The next day I tried to just move on as if it hadn't happened, but he was still clearly unsettled by my ever present tears.

Exhibit #2

For a while, I sort of just checked out, masking my ever growing confusion with the facade of a full schedule. We kept talking, but the rift that was developing between us was obvious. I felt horrible. He had done nothing wrong and I felt like an absolute jerk.

“I’m going to do this. I’m going to call him and talk. I don’t know what I’m going to talk about, but at least I can tell him the truth. He deserves the truth” was the pep talk I gave myself on the day that I finally convinced myself to pick up the phone.

I’m going to call him and tell him that I’m scared.

When the ringing stopped, interrupted by his sweet voice on the other end, I told him that we needed to talk, and then I told him the only truth that I knew; “I’m scared.”

What he said next was beyond what I could have imagined in my wildest dreams... and then some.

“I know. I should have talked to you sooner. I thought they were bound by doctor-patient confidentiality laws but I should have figured that being your friends and all that they would have told you.”

What. On. Earth. Is this guy talking about?

What do you even do in this situation?

You pretend like you know exactly what he is talking about and you see how much information you can pull out of him without letting him catch on to the fact that you have absolutely no idea what he is talking about.

“Well, how did you even figure out that I knew them?” was the only logical thing that I could think of to say.

He bought it hook, line, and sinker, and then proceeded to explain. “When I looked at your nonprofit website and I saw that she worked for you as a counselor, I knew that I needed to talk to you. What exactly did she tell you? Did she tell you that I’m a lot better, that I’ve come a long way? Whatever she told you, I promise you, that’s not me anymore.”

About the only thing I can think at this point is “what the hell?” but if I was going to figure out what on earth he was talking about, I needed to hold it together.

“It doesn’t matter what she told me babe, I’d like to hear straight from you everything that you should have told me in the first place.”

I heard him take a deep breath before he jumped right into it; Anger management classes, drugs, addictions, alcoholism, rehab, medications, counseling; all services provided to him by one of the counselors that works with my nonprofit.

What on earth are the odds!?

I sat there for a minute, half waiting to see if he was done talking and half because I didn’t even know how to absorb all of that information.

Now anyone who has read this blog knows that my ex was an addict with major anger issues. I don’t talk much about the details of his addiction, but I enabled him for years and years because I thought that if I couldn’t get away from him, I at least needed to hold him together for the sake of me and my kids. I never enabled his habit directly, but it was me that covered for him every time he messed up. It was me that repeatedly mended the tattered fabric of his life because I knew that if he went down, he was going to end up taking us all down with him.

After he disappeared and I found myself abandoned a second time by a guy who turned out to be very much like him, I decided that something needed to change. I worked my way through a 12 step program for enablers.Yep, that’s right. I went every week, stood in front of a group, and said “My name is Eden Strong, adult child of a mentally ill mother, abusive parents, and the ex wife of an addict." I worked my way through the 12 steps of recovery, serenity prayer and all.

I worked the program hard because I needed to learn where I had gone wrong. I’ve had no one in my life that has ever given me any constructive direction and so I knew that if I didn’t want to continue going down the clearly broken path that I was on, that I needed to learn what was causing me to choose to walk such a rough road.

The program helped me a lot, more than I could have ever imagined, but never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined it helping me in this way.

Eventually I start talking.

“Wow hun, I had no idea. I’m proud of you, I really am. I am so proud that you are taking the steps necessary in getting your life together and I can tell that you are trying really hard, but I have to be honest with you; I’m not in the position to be who you would need me to be right now. You are a recovering addict and I’m a recovering enabler, this relationship would not be healthy for either of us. You, as well as I, know very well that addictions tend to stem from certain personality types and enablers are born from equally defective personality types. Your past and mine might actually be what initially drew us together; we may have been subconsciously attracted to something that was familiar to us in our past. The two of us together would be a disaster and I don't think it's really fair to either of us to subject ourselves to something that might not be in the best interest of our continuing recoveries. Please don’t think that I’m looking down on you because I know how hard it is to overcome an addiction and I really am proud of you, but I’m not in the position to be supportive of your recovery right now.”

I felt awful. I felt awful for about 23 seconds until he EXPLODED into a rage filled tangent that I could barely follow. There was quite a bit of swearing, screaming, it sounded like he was pounding on or throwing things, calling me names, and basically just losing his freaking mind.

What I did make out was “you are such a bitch! You think I’m just some loser who isn’t good enough for you! You just think that you are better than me and that because I work some crap job that you can do better! You’re probably fucking guys left and right and you know what? Screw you! Who the hell do you really think you are treating me like shit? Oh sure, Eden can do better than the loser that I am, which is pretty ironic because I'm overlooking the fact that you have two kids!”

I didn’t say a word.

Finally he said “Oh, so what now? You have nothing to say now?”

I simply replied “I've said my piece already, I don’t have anything more to add.”

“So you think I’m a loser than huh? You think you can do better than me? You're just a bitch who wants someone with a better job and a perfect life!”

Now let me just interject for a minute and explain that I am the best/worst person to argue with. Argue- I just don’t do it. I’ll say what I have to say and you are welcome to take it or leave it but I won’t go around in circles to defend my position and I certainly don’t engage myself in screaming matches. I've done it in the past and I refuse to continue living that way. When I get into a difference of opinion with someone, I'll say what I need to, I'll hear what you have to say, I’ll reflect on it, and then we can discuss it later when we are both a little bit more rational. For some reason that seems to drive people INSANE. People tend to get angrier just because I refuse to argue with them. I think that they are expecting me to engage in the conversation more so that they can prove me wrong and then I’ll see their point of view, but I just won’t do that and so it frustrates them even more. I've learned that when people are heated up and angry that it's really hard to have quality communication and so I would rather just discuss it later, yet because they are all fired up and have no one to argue with, quite often they just become enraged.

This time was no exception. 

“I’M TALKING TO YOU EDEN, SO DO YOU THINK THAT YOU CAN JUST THROW ME AWAY BECAUSE I’M SOME PIECE OF TRASH ADDICT AND YOU CAN FIND SOMEONE WHO MAKES MORE MONEY THAN ME?!”

“Listen, Piano Man, I didn’t say any of that and I refuse to waste my time defending myself over something I never said. I told you what my reasoning was and it’s your choice to either take it at face value or fabricate your own version. I will not however be staying on the phone just so you can scream at me.”

With that I heard a flurry of ear piercing adult language, something about his dick, more adult language, and then I hung up the phone.

Needless to say, things with Piano Man and I are over. I think that he still needs to work on his recovery a bit more, but me?

I’m feeling pretty damn proud of myself.

For the FIRST time in my life I think I sensed danger in someone BEFORE they actually hurt me. A year ago I would have just been going along my merry way with this guy until he really hurt me and yet this time, I sensed that something was wrong.

I'm so glad that happened over the phone and not face to face!

Yes, I still have major trust issues that I need to work on with men and by no means am I going to start accommodating every fear that I have, but something about this guy was different than the rest. In every other relationship that I’ve had, I’ve been afraid to open up but have been working towards it. With this guy, the one that seemed on the surface like the “best fit,” I wasn't just scared, I was having a visceral reaction to letting him get to close.

I HAD INSTINCTS BABY!!!

I guess the program worked!

In other news, brought on by the disaster who was Piano Man, I finally talked to the Detective Whose Name I Do Not Like about my past. I realized that while I have been scared to talk to him, I don't have the same panic attack feeling when I'm close to him like I had with Piano Man. So in an effort to continue the healing process, I took a few bricks out of my wall and I let the detective peek in.

His reaction?

Perfect.