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Messages - sanmagic7

#6901
keep talking to your brain, and it will.  mind over brain, like in the movie 'a beautiful mind'.  i've been doing it, it's been working.  i'm glad you found that place - it is a good feeling, isn't it!  you go!    :hug:
#6902
ya know, candid, i'm sorry it isn't what i initially thought it was, either.  alone all this time?  maybe you're right.  my d said something to me about having no community here, altho i used to belong to a few support groups, both amer. and mex., but they both turned out to be unhelpful, even after sticking with them for over a year each.   she also said that i used to love to go to classes and such (i actually took up basket weaving, loved it!) and i haven't had the chance for that here.  i also miss libraries very much.  such small things that played a huge part in my life.  i'll be without a car, but i'll get strong enough to walk, find a place near a grocery store.  it'll be nice to have beautiful produce to pick from again as well.

the last couple of years i've been missing all that american stuff so very much.  it's gotten to me, i guess, and i'm really looking forward to it again.  i know about the gov't, the healthcare system, all that is crappy up there, but it's all crappy down here as well.  trade one devil for another, i guess. 

yeah, it sounds like i've pretty much made up my mind, doesn't it.  the trust is broken, has basically never been there, but i've ignored it, put up with it.  this is just the straw.  just putting in time now.  so very sad.   i dread the thought of actually doing it.  don't know how or when to tell him.  i guess god will show me the way.
#6903
hey, radical.  thank you.  actually, i don't think a lawyer will be necessary.  when i go, i'll take my belongings, leave my home behind.  it's on his family's property, so i have no claim to it anyway.  the family doesn't even have the correct papers for it and half of them live in the states.  nothing could ever be settled.  like i told my d, this will be the third home i've left, one for every marriage.  that's sad to me.  3 homes, and nothing to show for them.  my nc d lives in the second one, and my ex gave me an advance on what the home might be worth to build this one. 

my d has been so very supportive.  i started looking for apts. where she lives, she said she'll help.  she has always really liked my hub, but she totally understands why i want to get out.  i'll be very poor, but i'll have my own space, my own bed (he's horrible to sleep with and is often the reason i'm up so early every morning) and things will be clean.  that will be wonderful!  here there is always so much grit, it's impossible to keep up.  no more roaches, big ol' bugs, or lizards that find their way under my pillow.

i don't know when to tell him.  i know this seems sudden, but it's been coming for a while.  he's never been able to stop barking at me when i ask him a question that he's not in the mood for, he's rarely followed thru on things he says he's gonna do, and he's never asked for help when he needed to.  after his hip surgery, someone told him it would take a good year to heal.  that was at least 10 yrs. ago.  since then, we probably had sex 5 times, and then he lost his desire due to the fact that he was scared his his replacement would pop out.  i begged him to talk to a doc about it, he refused.  so, wife2, as far as living like roommates, i've been doing that for a long time already.  nothing i tried worked, and i tried everything i could think of.  living alone, in that area, will probably give me a better chance of getting laid, if i so desire.

divorce?  i don't plan to remarry, so i'm not worried about it.  status quo is fine.  i only feel married now because i've chosen to.  we've been more friends than anything else.  i will say that he saved my life, and i'm forever grateful for that.  but, on the other hand, this other stuff, especially this recent incident, has been way too stressful.  it's the last thing i need.  the stress will not end as long as he has that bank loan, because i know it's what's on his mind.  he's been more than reticent this past month and now i know why.  but when i'd ask him, he'd just say 'i've got a lot of stuff going on'. 

i know that by taking myself away from him will be the worst thing i can do to him, and i'm sorry about that.  he's not a bad guy.  he just has a way to live his life that's incompatible with the way i want to live mine.  looking back, i think i've been putting up with this way of life, just that.  nearly 16 yrs.  not enough has changed.  lots of ideas, very little follow-through or reliability.  i need to rely on things, i need to be able to believe that when someone says something, that's how it's going to be.  maybe me and this culture are just too different after all.  i could easily list all the good qualities i fell in love with, and he still has them.  but the scales have finally tipped.  without trust, how can there be a relationship of any merit?   sucks.
#6904
i stayed alive

i stayed mostly sane

i called the bank

putting my process into play.
#6905
i'm pretty frizzed right now - the enormity of all this is beginning to set in.  let me just say that you all are the very best. the. very. best. people that i could ever know.  your support and opinions and well wishes are more than i could have ever hoped for.  please forgive all my bad words, and 3roses, thank you for editing them w/o giving me a bunch of yuck about it.  i appreciate that.

the questions are now running thru my head.  what happens if he can't make the payments?  he has no collateral - anything of value i bought, including this house.  luckily it's on his family property, so i doubt that it can be taken away.  is he gonna split?  he's talked about going across the peninsula to another town before to try to find work.  i'm pretty much of a gypsy, but i think this is something i don't need right now, so this time i wouldn't be going with him.

he turned this on me last night, telling me that when i was saying 'stupid' over and over in my anger rant that he's not going to be taking that abuse from me anymore.  said he was glad i was able to get mad, but now to leave him alone - he's got enough on his mind.  i can barely speak to him now, can barely look at him.  (yeah, wife2, i appreciated the humor.)  i'm crashing big time now.   called the bank this morning to let them know i'll be using my debit card here and in the states indefinitely.  i've rarely used it, and they froze it on me once when i was visiting.  step 1.

step 2 - later this aft. we're going to the atm's in town to see if my stateside debit card will work.  i've been doing wire transfers all this time - of course he pointed out to me how much money he's told me i would've saved if i'd been using the debit card all along.  i've used an atm machine i think twice in my life - not very comfy with machines.  so, now i have to get comfy with this.  this just screams 'unsafe' to me cuz of all the hacking of cards that's gone on, and i only have this card and the one bank acct. where my monthly payments come.  it's all the money i have in the world.

he wanted to go farther than these 2 steps last night, but i told him i couldn't retain all that.  he also started telling me how easy this all is, that he thinks there's a lot i could've been doing but stopped myself by thinking i couldn't.  he was so helpful - not!  i'm like a stone with a whirlwind inside.  the stress i'm feeling right now is incredible, but when he was saying all these things i simply said 'yes' and looked at him w/ no expression on my face.  i have no feelings toward him, not any good ones.  he wants to keep downplaying what he did by saying he 'made a mistake', like it's some little something i should just get over and move on from.

i know that's what he wants - me to just suck it up and go on about my business as if he stubbed his toe or something by accident.  and that it's the other guy's fault for putting that chair that he knocked into in his way.  he doesn't see at all how this has affected our relationship, what it means, how i could somehow excuse this and stand by his side or something, make like it's no big deal.  he thinks he got screwed, poor baby. 

i finally pressed, asked him why he really didn't tell me.  he admitted that he knew it was 'risky' (i interjected 'stupid') and that i wouldn't have gone for it.  there's a saying here - i'd rather ask for forgiveness than ask for permission.  we've talked about that, i've told him many times what i think of that type of mentality.   i don't play those games.

so, he borrowed money from the bank that he has to make payments on every 2 weeks, money that he told me he would be able to cover until possibly july, to invest in a scheme whereby this friend of his knew about getting cars at an auction cheap.  this way my hub (the reason behind all this) would be able to get a car and make some money to boot.  he's been worried about his car for a long time.  last year we talked about him taking a loan out of the bank to get a car, and talked and talked and he finally saw what a losing proposition that was.  he doesn't make enough money to repay a loan!

so, the friend had his brother go to the states to get the cars (i still don't get how this one guy was gonna bring 5 cars back) and decided to pick up an extra one on his way.  the extra turned out to be stolen.  because of this, somehow, all the cars got impounded (and, of course my hub doesn't have the money to get them out) and his friend or friend's brother is in jail, and the thief has split.  my hub is hoping the cops are gonna pick him up.  hah!

what a nightmare this has been.  my daughter's been very supportive, told me to keep her informed.  she talked to the guys she lives with, they said the same thing.  i told her this morning that i started thinking about moving, that i think i'd need a truck.  of course, i have no credit, so that would mean she'd have to come down here, rent a truck in the states, and i'd meet here, drive it down here, load it up, and drive back.  lots of money that none of us have.  but, that'll have to be dealt with later.  for now, i'm waiting for him to come home so we can do step 2. 

my poor little brain and body are being wracked out of whack.  we had a long talk today, it's not their fault.  i'm just hangin' on by a thread - and i know you're all hangin' right beside me.  thank you everyone.  this is as hard a thing i've had to go through as anything else in the past.  i'm too old for this crapola.  what happened to our golden years?  i wanted to just live out my life here in this little town of my heart.  now, i can't wait to leave.  funny how things change.  i'm not laughing, tho.



#6906
thanks for your support, downsideup.  i do believe it's working already.  for one thing, i was extremely tired all day, even after a 2-hr. nap i laid in bed another 2 hrs., just too tired to get up.  for another, during my nap i dreamed of a very nice man (symbolic, perhaps, of the positives i'm instilling) who kind of stayed just out of reach, at the same time my sister (who i believe symbolized the neg. crapola) just kept being annoying and i kept yelling at her to stop and get away.    it was interesting to me, but it, too, made me think that this is working.  so i'm gonna keep it up.

on another front, i'm so pissed off i'm frickin' ready to leave my husband and this place.  he went to the big town up north (where i have to go for the specialists) for the day, but didn't tell me why he was going.  i thought it was for his eye again.  when he came back tonite at 11, he told me the real reason and i blew up.

i don't know what to do.  i absolutely hate him right now.  without telling me, he took out a bank loan to buy 5 cars at auction w/ someone else he knows up there, apparently to import and sell them here.  then he told me he's in a load of doo-doo.  it seems that this 'friend's' brother went to a city in the states to get the cars, and decided to pick up an extra one, which turned out to be stolen.  i don't know how the whole thing went down, but the friend is in jail, the cars are impounded, and the brother is long gone.

i can't believe he was so stupid.  too bad for him, but what i'm really mad about is that it's got me involved financially, since both our names are on both our bank accounts.  i'm gonna have to close my acct. and have my daughter wire me money thru western union or something.  i can't take a chance of opening a new acct. here cuz i don't know if they'll come after me cuz we're married. 

i've worked so hard over the years to get this acct. and wire transfers set up for my soc. sec. money (thank god i didn't have it transferred here automatically every month!), first thru a joint acct. with my ex in the states (cuz i was too sick to think about numbers and money matters), then a few years ago i was able to extricate myself from him and got an acct. in my own name.  later i put my daughter on the acct. cuz i help her out every month, and i figured that if i croaked over, she'd at least be able to get the money out and it wouldn't get absorbed by the bank or the gov't.

she doesn't have a car, which means that it will considerably put her out to wire me money when i need it.  i hate this * place so much right now - he's been on the streets, we've been burned by his so-called 'friends' before, i can't * believe he was this stupid!!!  and he was trying to tell me not to lay any more shiiit on him cuz he's gonna be in so much trouble if the cops don't find this guy!

)(*&)(_* that!!!!!!  i'm the frickin' victim here, he went into this deal with his eyes open and w/o talking to me about it at all before hand.  he's always been the one to say before we make any big decisions, to always talk it over.  what a buttwipe!  if he'd have talked to me, i doubt this would've happened cuz i would've tried to talk him out of it.  i can't trust one frickin' person in my life now, except my daughter, and she's got her own problems.

i don't know what i'm gonna do.  i really don't want to stay here, don't want to be with him, can't stand to look at him.  this get-rich-quick frickin' mentality here by schemes and scams - i think this may be the straw that broke this camel's back.  i don't know how i can live with him anymore.  and he told me, when i asked, that this happened a month ago!  all this time he's been pissin' and moanin' about how broke he is, how strapped he is, wah wah wah.  i've come to his rescue so many times in the past, but not this time.

for better or worse - HAH!!!  i know i'm gonna need surgery on my eye, and i wouldn't be able to afford that in the states, so i think i'll have to stay here until that's done.  right now i'm thinking that after that i'm gonna ask my daughter to help me find a gov't-funded apt. or something near her, or an old folks' home that takes medicare.  he doesn't know what he's done. 

he said he didn't tell me cuz he didn't want to stress me out.  what a bunch of bull pucky.  i asked him, what did he think telling me tonight was doing?  once again, i'm gonna have to leave my home, for the umpteenth time.  i'm so mad, so sad, so hurt, so disappointed in him, feeling so worthless.   he's gonna get my money out of the bank tomorrow, and i'll have to talk to my daughter, which i dread.   i can't *' believe this!  i wish i could pack up and leave tomorrow!   AAAAAAAAAAAAAAACCCCCKKKKKKKK!

:spooked:    :fallingbricks:    :aaauuugh:     :pissed:     ???    :stars:     :Idunno:      :sadno:     :sharkbait:      :blowup:      >:D     :thumbdown:      :blahblahblah:   

ok, i'm not much of one for those things, but i needed them right now.   that last one is for the frickin' hot air that comes out of my hub's mouth that doesn't mean jack *.  talk about believing something that isn't at all what i thought it was.  disillusioned.  i've been living in a house of cards, and in one breath he blew it all away.  i have no respect for him anymore, no support for him, no energy of any kind for him.  it was all a play, and i guess i'm a stupid gringa after all.   i got played royally.   wow.
#6907
ya know, it can be hard.  i can hear an underlying voice wanting to berate my brain, take it to task, have those unrealistic expectations of it that were had of me.  i think that's why talking out loud helps (altho i may look crazy to someone else!  lol!) - it overrides anything neg. that might want to sneak in there. 

these are the three things i want to do daily.  thanks, again, elphanigh, for the focus.  lovely.  big hug to you.
#6908
Therapy / Re: Therapy journal
April 19, 2017, 12:42:04 PM
hey, 3roses,

i think as long as you're feeling good about what's happening, both in the session and within yourself, then it's a go.  from what i understand, gestalt is about the whole picture, how you belong with you and everything around you.

it sounds like what happened was a good thing to me, too.  like you said, unless someone can see in order to understand what happens in our world, and how we fit in our world, it's difficult to imagine it.   one of the best trauma therapists i know began with a gestalt background.   without intending it, you gave your t a very gestalt look at what you're dealing with.

whether this type of therapy, or this particular therapist is going to take you all the way to where you want to go is still up in the air.  i do believe, tho, that, from what you're saying, it's a productive path leading in the right direction.  so far, so good.

i'm just so glad for you that you're ok with this so far, that your t is validating your experience by wanting to learn more about the c-ptsd world through you.  kudos to him.  and kudos to you for sticking with it.  very courageous, my dear.  big hug to you.
#6909
a great story.  your wisdom comes from being able to apply these things to real life in a real way.  not everyone can do that.  thank you again, for being you.  i appreciate you very much.  big hug, dear friend.
#6910
very clever, candid.  thanks for the suggestion.  i'll try it on for size, see what happens.      :hug:
#6911
good for you, hurtbeat, for realizing such things as going too fast or taking on too much at once.  that's progress, in my book.  well done! 

that perfectionism and impatience thing can really do a number on us, set us back when we wanted to move forward.  i guess that's why people talk about slow and small steps.  it's something i've had to work on a lot. 

i've gotten chest pain when i've felt afraid, and have finally been able to recognize it as that.  my next step is to explore what it is i'm afraid about.  i don't know if you relate to that or not, but it's helped me understand a lot more how my body is talking to me when i haven't been able to access my emotions immediately.

sounds like you're doing just what you need to do for you.  very smart!     :hug:
#6912
Recovery Journals / Re: Berceuse's journal
April 18, 2017, 11:50:35 PM
thank you for that great reminder, berceuse.  i, too, felt like i'd gotten stuck, kind of wallowing in what had happened, but i feel like i've turned a corner and am now more present-focused.  it feels better.  so glad for you that you're feeling more like yourself.  it's wonderful to hear.  yay for you!   big hug!
#6913
very clever, elphanigh.

my 3 things for today are that i breathed, did my stretches, and talked to my brain in a very nurturing way.

thank you for this.  i look forward to more.
#6914
thanks, wife2.  very sweet and generous of you.  you touch my heart. big hug.
#6915
hi, slow river,

first, may i say thanks to candid and elphanigh for their votes of confidence.  very sweet, both of you. 

i am an emdr therapist, have been for over 25 yrs., and i believe in it and its process.  i go along with what the others have said about what to look for in a therapist, how a good therapist will treat you, and to go with your gut.  sometimes it's a matter of pick and choose, sometimes it's just not a good fit.  either way, if the therapy doesn't work out, it is never your fault.  i do hope you would try again.

i think one of the biggest things to remember in therapy is that you are in control of your recovery.  if it's going too fast, if there's a glitch somehow, if you're feeling uncomfortable, whatever problem might arise, you can speak up.  i don't view therapists as 'authority' figures, but rather guides who have extra knowledge about how to help you get to where you want to go.

emdr targets and utilizes the brain to help unfreeze distressing memories and the emotional punch they pack.  we have become stuck in these memories at their moment of impact, and emdr can help free us physically, emotionally, and mentally so those memories don't have the same 'charge' anymore that has been ruling our lives.   it's hard work, and can be exhausting at times, but it won't hurt you.

there is another, newer, trauma therapy that's out there called progressive counting, or PC.  it was created by an emdr therapist, and also has had very good results with resolving trauma.   

bottom line is trust and safety.  it might take some time to build trust with a new therapist, and that's ok.  trust is earned over time.  safety is something you will feel in your gut - if something feels off, you can talk to the therapist about it, see what happens.  if s/he argues or discounts you, you're probably not in the right place with the right person.  honor those gut feelings.

trauma therapy can sometimes seem to be slow going, but, as was said, a good trauma therapist is going to put your needs above everything else, and wants to make sure that you are not re-traumatized.  you can pick and choose what memories, thoughts, or feelings you want to process.  i think starting with something less 'heavy' is a good way to go, and work from there, see how it progresses, allow the process to unfold. 

a good therapist will come from a wellness place, looking for your strengths and reinforcing them.  slow river, you have survived what has happened to you, and that, to my mind, is your biggest strength.  your willingness to go after the beast of c-ptsd shows your courage, determination, and perseverance.  you have a strong spirit that is enabling you to ask for help.  you already have what it takes to continue in recovery.

unfortunately, i can't guarantee anything about a therapist you find, or how the therapy will go.  i am sorry that you've already had some neg. experiences in therapy.  so have i, to the point that my very first therapist was, i believe, npd, who damaged me through manipulation, deceit, and betrayal.  i ended up on anti-dep/anti-anxiety meds, and also reported her to our state board of licensing.   the best thing she taught me is how NOT to be a therapist!   lol!

i hope you will keep posting on your journey and, if you find a therapist, how it's going.  this has been a wonderful place for people to get feedback on  both their therapy and therapist.  i give you so much credit for being brave enough to want to give this another shot, even with some neg. experience behind you.  your experience is valid, and you are valuable. 

by the by, i am one of the therapists who give hugs.  not every t is comfortable with that, but i think pos. touch is an important part of healing.  we usually haven't gotten enough in our lives.   keep taking care of you as best you can.   i hope any of this helps.   hugs to you.