You can only tolerate so much...and yet there still is a struggle to shut the door

My heart still aches...it's a soft ache. It's one that accepts that there might not be a "next time" in terms of this relationship. These flash points are why I ended up leaving and choosing to stay in SC (for now at least).

I left because:

  • I can only tolerate being told "Fuck you" or "Fuck off" only so much by one who supposedly professes to love me.

  • There is never any repair when their is a wrong that occurs. In other words, when he shoved the table one time and the dishes came crashing down...his "apology" was that he was "sorry" and that he was so angry he could have gone after me and chose the table. Gee, thanks...

  • I shouldn't have to feel a sigh of relief when we avoid conflict...or carefully choose how to plan my words to avoid an explosion.

  • I should not have to be lectured at or talked down to on a regular basis

  • he demanded apologies from me without really giving or repairing his own behavior... we fought over a parking ticket once. I said "X, it was an accident and I didn't mean to." His response: "You never mean to...why can't you just say you're sorry."

  • any time I bring up a problem it gets blamed back at me.
    •  "X, you don't respect me. I don't like your behavior because it deeply hurts me." To which X responds: "Well, you don't respect me!"  
      • He didn't ask what I was having a problem with or how the behavior made me feel. He didn't seem concerned that the behavior was the root cause of my decision to stay.
  • I scored a 6 out of 10 on the Mosaic Threat Assessment. I told him what it was and the score concerned me. X said: "Of course you got that score because we don't have a diagnosis of Autism." This is not autism.

  • I dropped my car keys with a friend here in SC. X wasn't there to yell or shout at me for making such a mistake. It was an accident. We fixed it and moved on.

And yet, I still struggle to close the door on him because:
  • my heart wants to believe that he is capable of making changes to improve the relationship
  • there is a familiarity that we have with each other
  • it wasn't all bad all the time...and yet all those "bad times" left me emotionally exhausted at the end 

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