Love, My Way (or, An Exercise in Futility)

You all have heard the cliche: you’ve got to learn to crawl before you can learn to walk.

I’m learning to crawl right now. I’m trying to move on with my life without Seamus.

It’s now been 5 months since the night I beat the crap out of Seamus in the middle of a crowded restaurant when I couldn’t take any more verbal abuse from him. In that 5 months, I’ve experienced agonizing despair, suicidal thoughts, righteously indignant anger, and a whole lot of tears. Seamus “appeared” to me everywhere. I’d catch a glimpse of similar looking people and thought it was him for a split second. I’d “see” him everywhere. Most social situations I found myself in would remind me of our time together. Driving at night, I’d remember places we’d stopped at. Going out with friends, I’d remember being out with Seamus and sharing a laugh. Walking by his empty cubicle, I’d visualize him slouched in his chair, beckoning me over. He wasn’t dead, but he may as well have been dead to me, and his “ghost” haunts me everywhere.

This past month or so, though, a little has changed. I’ve had a few good days now. I don’t automatically cry as soon as I hear a song that’s meaningful to either us as a couple or meaningful to me personally. The really painful yearning seems like it’s subsiding a little bit. I haven’t cried for him at night for several weeks. And there are some days that I only think about him once or twice.

Don’t get me wrong. It still hurts. It hurts even more because I still have very powerful feelings for him, despite his abusiveness, and it kills me that someone I love hates me so much. I keep trying to figure out a way back into his good graces, then I remember that I’m not sure I really want to do that.

His “ghost” haunts me in not-so-pleasant ways, too. When I’m with someone who happens to be white, I think “He’d so hate this person that I like so much, he’d give me grief if he knew.” Or, “he’d hate this kind of music”, or “he’d never have agreed to come to this show with me, he’d hate every second”, or “he’d tear the mickey out of me if he knew I was talking to one of his ‘enemies’”.  I wouldn’t be able to travel to places I enjoyed because first, he’s cheap, and second, everyplace is filled with the same “vile human beings” you’d find elsewhere. I wouldn’t be able to hang out with just anyone, or I’d risk being called a racist and a bigot, or a sports-addled cretin who only cares about cars and glossy fashion magazine. I wouldn’t be able to play the video games I like so much because I’d be branded a mindless tw*t who’s devoted herself to games and not reading scores of books on esoteric subjects. My taste in music would be criticized, my purchases would be criticized, my friends and family would be criticized, and I would be criticized. And badgered. And insulted. And humiliated.

What a strange tug of war, between missing someone so much, and knowing that they are the worst thing to ever happen to you. Seamus is the worst possible thing that could have happened to me, plain and simple. The beautiful aspects of his intelligence and humor sucked me in, and his abuse just kept me subjugated. My time spent with him has destroyed the deepest foundations of my being. I’m not sure who I am or what my purpose is, and if I’m not really as horrible as he says.