I’m not what you think…

As it turns out, none of us are.

I’m sitting in my office, mother to a beautiful 3.5 year old child, wife to a not very grateful husband. I’m sure the average passerby would look at my life and want to trade with me in a nanosecond. From the perspective of an outsider, I shouldn’t be writing this, let alone feeling this. This inner monster that constantly tells me to do myself in.

My childhood was dreadful, unending cycle of abuse from four parents. Two of them physically harmed me, one tried to kill me, three thrived in psychological abuse and one ignored me entirely. Once I made it to college, I found myself drinking quite a bit. My mother and stepfather (who, btw, has his PhD in education) told me repeatedly that I did not belong at the university level. That I was stupid, a waste of humanity and that community college would be a lofty aspiration. Three years into my four year program, I proved them correct by dropping out.

I bounced around, found myself in a relationship with a pretty lack luster guy for all the wrong reasons. I confused the need for love and security with being controlled like a stepford wife. I was young and didn’t have enough life experience to know that I deserve better.

I ended up married, worked really hard and have a fantastic career, a very nice home, my beautiful, beautiful son and the ambivalent to pain/instigator husband. After years of trying to make my marriage work, I have given up. I know I’m a good mother which pains me because here I am, contemplating binning the whole thing and becoming the worst mother on the planet.

There are days when I feel like taking my own life and I logically know it’s a cry for help from someone. Just trying to get someone to listen. Then there are days like today when I know there is no one listening.

Earlier, on my knees in the kitchen, crying because my husband dumps too much responsibility on me, begging for relief, he mocked my mental illness with his hyperbolic imitations of me, failure to accept responsibility for his actions and…the piece de la resistance…intentionally farting as I cried for help.

My darling 3.5 year old, seeing the world through those innocent eyes, says “Mommy – be nice to my father.” He hears me raise my voice while my husband slings vitriol in an even tone and I’m the demon. If that doesn’t break a human, I’m not sure what does.

My best friend died of drug overdose in late 2010. Since she lived in a different city, none of us were aware of the fact that she had been experimenting with meth and had become addicted. In spite of my many attempts to move on, I find myself completely lost. She is the sister I never had.

My stepfather has been indicted on child endangerment charges. The trial is pending. I don’t know what to think, knowing my own experiences but reading the charges, I cannot reconcile that he would go to those lengths with a child.

Maybe I am what you think. Maybe I’m just another unhinged moron looking for someone to yell at me and tell me that I’m a coward, a fool, a loser and a horrible mother for wanting to end it all. Maybe I’m just really tired of 41 years of unnecessary and overwhelming strife.

When my child takes umbrage with me, evaluates a situation and determines I’m the problem, I hardly see how staying around would make his life better. What exactly am I offering if I’m so mean?

So – here I sit with a belly full of pills which I know won’t work. There’s a gun in the other room and I cannot figure out if it’s worth fiddling with it. If I knew I could remove myself from the world and stop the misery I inflict on it without terminally damaging my child, I would do so in a nanosecond. Instead, I engage in this and hope that there is someone out there who remotely understands how helpless and lost I feel. How much I feel I have failed my kid and myself.

My mother and stepfather were right. I am a loser. My perception of reality is so ridiculously foggy that I’m internalizing the commentary of a three year old. I may be able to shrug it off but my husband doesn’t seem to disagree (he rather delights in this). To him, I’m his babysitter when he travels for work, his bank (I make more than he does), his financial planner, housekeeper and cook.

I want it to get better. I know it won’t.