Dear JC

I am writing this because I am wishing you well, I am letting go of the hurt, and I will no longer let you determine my value. I no longer care where you feel my faults are in the demise of our relationship.

I am not perfect and in any other relationship I would willingly take my share of the responsibility for it ending but I can not take blame for this one ending, only for it continuing far too long.

How did I contribute to it going on far too long? By listening to your lies and not listening to my gut that was telling me you were lying, and not believing what I saw with my own eyes. By forgiving you time after time and believing that if I changed this or that, if I worked harder, praised you more, was less sensitive, more patient, anticipated your every need, was sexier, was less needy, or less demanding you would love me back.

I allowed you to convince me that you loved me even though you talked to me like I was your worst enemy, treated me like dirt under your feet and didn’t give me the respect of accepting me the way I was or leaving me alone. You demanded I change for you but what you wanted changed almost daily and I became so wrapped up in trying to figure out what you wanted I failed to realize you weren’t anything close to what I wanted.

I allowed you to ignore every boundary I have; the “deal breakers” I have always adhered to, like; faithfulness, honesty, law abiding, respect for others like neighbors, friends and family.

I compromised my values by accepting illegal activity like stealing, driving without insurance, physically abusing your son, me and my son, even though I talked to you about it and gave you ultimatums I should not have ever had to convince you what was right. The first time I witnessed you break the law I should have walked away. It was not my responsibility to teach you right from wrong; that is what a parent does with a child not what an adult woman does with her 40 something partner. If a person doesn’t respect the law by the time they are adults it is unlikely they will change.

When we met I was confident in my sexual abilities and attractiveness to the opposite sex and had a fulfilling sex life with any man I had been involved with. I should have never let your addiction to porn, personal ads and blatant disregard for my needs in bed make me think there was something wrong with me. No woman can compete with that and no woman can cure that for you.

When I went back to you and everyone who knew us warned me to not let you work on my truck and I knew you had sabotaged my vehicle in the past; I should have walked away from the relationship. How could I expect a normal relationship when I knew you were capable of sabotaging me?

Why on earth did I stay with you when time after time you were fired for stealing, what 40 + person hasn’t learned that if you take something that doesn’t belong to you people get angry and employers will fire you. No one is “falsely” accused that many times and if they are they would be very concerned about why people thought they were stealing and figure out what they were doing and stop doing it.

There is no excuse for having hundreds of women on your Facebook, communicating with women from sex sites, and I should not have been crying alone in my bed; I should have been packing. When you were living with me, especially when I was paying the rent I should not have had to tell you I expected you to respect me and not go into dating sites while you were there. When I discovered you were, there should have been no discussion about it, denying it, or blame placed on me; it was wrong, it happened more than once and I should have put your stuff on the street and never answered the door again.

I have never felt the need to beg a man, I always knew I deserved respect and I got it but I had never been with a psychopath before, somehow you convinced me that everything I had always known to be healthy was unreasonable and demanding.

I look back and I can’t believe a man I was with would not come home all night, not answer his phone even when his son or sister were at the house waiting for him and then come home the next day as if nothing happened and I was afraid to say something and be accused of causing conflict, time after time! How bizarre is that?

I allowed you to make me feel that traits like being sensitive, trusting, honest, giving, hard working, forgiving and loving were bad things. I allowed you to ignore my most basic requests like call if you are late, be honest with me, that I am the only woman you are having sex with, come to bed to sleep and hold me at night.

Why on earth did I allow you to badger me about money and feel I had to pay you what ever sum you deemed I owed you and I can’t believe you hit me because I couldn’t comply with your demands for money “right now” and I didn’t charge you with abuse. Did I actually think you would appreciate the fact that when the cops came to the house and asked me if you had hit me and I looked them in the eye and said you hadn’t? All I did was show you that you could get away with it and I would lie for you.

Like you said yourself, “what did you do?”
And I said, “I stayed”
And you looked at me over your glasses and said, “EXACTLY”.

You said that the problems we had were my own fault for not telling you to fuck off. I agree whole heartedly, I never should have let you con your way back. But I must point out I DID kick you to the curb, at times even put your stuff out at the curb and you totally ignored me and moved your stuff back in; to argue with you meant I would get hit, or something of mine would be destroyed. Either you just ignored the fact that I told you it was over or you injured yourself or got sick and I would take care of you, (once again my own fault) or my truck would break down and you would have to rescue me.

You were right, it was my fault; I did stay. I believed the lie that was you and I perpetuated the lie by covering for you just like your mother has for years.

I assigned you feelings that you didn’t have, like guilt, a conscience, love, compassion and honesty because that is what I would have been feeling.

You have memorized and imitated appropriate emotions for certain situations but I learned to see through the act but when my stomach flipped and told me it was all an act I didn’t say anything I played my part like a dutiful puppet, because it was easier than fighting.

You knew you had me beaten down when I wouldn’t challenge even your most transparent excuses and at that point I gave away my self respect.

From day one I asked for; honesty, faithfulness, and fairness. That was all; I was willing to compromise on anything else. I communicated openly with you about my expectations. I told you I didn’t judge you for looking at porn or for needing more than one woman in your life I even offered to watch porn with you but other women I could not accept and if you wanted to be with me I expected faithfulness. I think it was the only deal breaker wasn’t it? I compromised on everything else, I “picked my battle” and it was the one thing I could not accept. I convinced myself that the ads were just an ego boost for you; then you had to take it a step further and actually meet them, then it was sending love letters and before I knew it I was being unreasonable for being upset you were telling other women you loved them and wanted to spend the rest of your life with them. What did I do? I stayed, I cried, I died inside, I made myself believe you when you said you had an epiphany and you loved me and we could work it out.

Now you come to me and say you always loved me, didn’t want to lose me, you have apologized but for nothing specific, you’ve given a generic I am sorry I was wrong, it wasn’t your fault. You say you have had an epiphany, I think this is the same epiphany you’ve had a dozen times in the past.

As a matter of fact you had a much clearer epiphany when you found out you had 6 months to live. When you came to me with your revelation I asked you, what if we get back together and we have tough times, what if something happens and I am dependent on you for a while? And you had said, “it will be different this time,baby, this time you meant it, this time there is no doubt in your mind’. And you know what? My gut was saying, “Run!” but you cried, you made love to me and wouldn’t let me orgasm until I had repeated over and over that I knew you loved me. And now you say it is my own fault for believing you and taking you back, it was I know that, especially now, especially after I found your blog that was public domain and you talked openly about the other women. When I found out you had only hidden you profile on POF and you blamed me because I could have any man I wanted any day of the week. The difference was I could have, but I didn’t want to because I was so in love with you.

You have said you have changed, you aren’t on the internet any more, have given up personal ads because all the people on those sites have major problems, you have said that you have told M you refuse to cut me out of your life and I am your “people” and you want to “help” me. When I turned your friendship down you told me to just let it ride out; we aren’t done yet.

I remember a long time ago; we had been arguing for days again and you were standing at the patio door looking at the bell tower of the monastery on the hill. You called me over and put your arm around me, you held me tight and said, “Its going to be ok, I love you” and I looked you in the eye, started to cry and said, “I love you so much but I am afraid I am going to be a lesson for you. Please don’t let me be a lesson”. I knew back then, almost 10 years ago that there was something preventing you from having a truly loving committed relationship but I just could not bring myself to walk away.

Loving you has been the biggest challenge I have ever faced, I have analyzed every aspect of myself, my traits, desires, dreams, values, expectations, boundaries, beliefs, I have questioned my sanity, stability, intelligence and attractiveness, my abilities as a lover, friend, partner and wife. There was never a day I wasn’t happy to see you come home, never a night I didn’t want you in bed with me or to have you inside me. I would have gone any where and I lived in places no human should live. I quietly watched you working, playing your guitar, or just walking past and felt the love swell in my heart and I would pray to God that you would stop fighting whatever demons you seemed to be constantly battling and open your heart to love.

Maybe you have, maybe you learned your “lesson”, and if that is the case I wish you well. I am afraid I can’t be your friend or believe your apology although I do accept it because you have said yourself that I caused my own pain by not telling you to fuck off. I would be crazy to believe you now, to trust you with my bruised and battered heart. Why would I want a front row seat to watch you give M more than I ever asked of you?

I can even understand the attraction, I know you well enough for it to make sense, and I don’t think it is right but we never did agree on how a relationship should work.

In a practical sense it makes perfect sense. You knew you were fired, you knew you had to get away from the farm and the infestation of mice, you weren’t taking care of yourself and your finances were in a horrible mess, you hadn’t been taking care of business, you needed credibility.
Our problems always started with you sabotaging my vehicle because you didn’t like me having that freedom, then I couldn’t make money and you resented me for that, perhaps your male ego was bothered that you couldn’t support me so you had to seek other women to prove to yourself you still had it. Or maybe being in a committed relationship made you feel vulnerable, maybe it gave me too much power to hurt you. I don’t know the reasons I only know the facts. You resented the attention I gave my son, resented me not being home waiting for you and you resented paying for me in anyway.

You have found the perfect woman for you, no kidding, I am serious. You have managed to sweep her off her feet, something we all know you do well. You must have been exceptionally good this time to move in so quickly. For someone so frugal I would have expected her to be more cautious. But you know how to make a woman relax and trust you don’t you?

You borrow a little bit of money a couple of times and pay her right back, go on and on about how you hate to accept money from a woman and to close the deal you tell her how all your exs took advantage of you and the reason you don’t have anything now is because you weren’t strong enough to say no to them. Especially me, if it weren’t for me you could be semi retired but you know now that you are with her things will be different. You trust her to manage your money, you will pay her and she can pay all your bills and organize your life, you could never trust your ex’s to do that.

She looks at you and all your credentials and knows you have tons of potential, its just that no one appreciated you and encouraged you, or nurtured you; but that has changed now, with her help you will be successful.

She is widowed, perfect! She didn’t have to split any assets and even got life insurance so she is self supporting, plus has a home, and can you believe your good fortune? It has a shop!! Not as big as you are used to but it will do. It was like it was made just for you to walk in and take the place of her husband. She wasn’t used to being alone, married young, never worked except in their business, she was a house wife that needed a husband to take care of and there you were.

No I know you didn’t have anything in common but you never keep promises anyway, you can say you’ll quit drinking and smoking, stop seeing your ex’s, never do drugs again, and just because you’ve always believed in God doesn’t mean you can’t change your mind on that too.

She never had kids so no worries about them getting in the way like Kris did, you don’t have to share her with anyone. You don’t have to deal with an ex husband either. Beauty!!

As icing on the cake her folks are rich and old, someday she will get a nice inheritance and we all know if you are married that means you get an inheritance.

She doesn’t work so she is waiting at home for you every night with supper ready and if you are late and don’t answer your phone she just wraps it in plastic and leaves it out for you like any dutiful wife would. And you made sure she was waiting at home by driving her new Pilot. A new car came with the deal!! Really could you have planned it better? And there she is at home cheerfully getting your paperwork in order, taking messages for you from family and friend because you don’t have a phone. But it is better you don’t have a phone because then you won’t be tempted to fall back into your old habits.

It was so generous of you to come to me and offer to help me because you are doing so well now. You’ve really gotten your act together and want to share the wealth and help me be successful too.

As much as you know you need to marry her to really seal the deal it kind of put panic in your gut didn’t it? That’s why you needed to come running to me and make sure you still had me hooked. Just in case this all blows up in your face you have to have a place to land, just in case you get bored you need someone you can fuck with and if she gets too demanding you need her to know she can be replaced.

You have told her you thought you were in love before but that was before you met her, but you can’t let her get complacent and take your love for granted. You have to keep her on her toes, keep her feeling insecure so she will do anything to keep you happy because she just lost her husband to cancer and she can’t believe she had the good fortune to meet you! You filled that empty space in her heart and her home perfectly she can’t lose you now!!

Plus I really have to give you credit! Getting her to lend you $14,000, that was a good move on your part, she can’t kick you to the curb, she’ll never get her money back.

You have given me enough information I could be causing problems for you and that would really play into your whole orchestrated little game but unfortunately for you I am not playing a role in your life any more. You used your ex’s to cause problems between us and I am the ex that doesn’t play that game. I don’t want to hurt the one that follows me; she has enough on her hands.

I wish you well JC, it’s a match made in well…..not heaven….more like hell.

I thank you for finally being honest with me and telling me it was my own fault for believing you, it has released me.

You are not the man I fell in love with, but you are the man I lived with for 10 years and you know what? I don’t like you. You are a lie and a façade, a chameleon that changes with his environment, and the really sad thing is I don’t think you even know who you are or what you believe. I feel sorry for someone who has no deal breakers, nothing they would fight for, no values they hold dear, no promises they must keep, and no people they would die for. I walk away knowing I am capable of loving with every bit of my being, I loved for the sake of loving and as painful as it was I learned something about myself. I can be beaten down, verbally and physically have absolutely nothing and I still had my morals and values. I have come back because of my character and will to survive, an amazing ability to keep going against all odds and not once used someone or lied to get what I need. I have held my head high and not criticized you to friends and acquaintances, I have carried on struggling, doing my best and let everyone watch how we each handled our lives. It speaks volumes.

I am me because this is who I am at the core. You are you because of who you are with.

I will say good bye now.
Thank you for proving what you are made of and what I am capable of.

Carrie
the Lady Witha Truck

Posted by Carrie the Lady Witha Truck using WordPress for BlackBerry.