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looking at my last post, it’s almost comical how deluded i was, and i’m sure i’ll feel the same about this one, going forward. he also cheated on me two weeks into our marriage. he tried to organize an ongoing affair, tried to change plans while visiting family in croatia to make more time to see her again. because he knew he could get away with it. and he did. and about thirty other lies, that i know about, for now.

all of his lies have come out in small, tiny doses, cascading down into a fucking waterfall that has knocked me off of my feet and destabilized every inch of my being. he is not the person i thought he was. he is not a person i would have ever married. he has manipulated and lied to everyone he has pretended to be close to for his entire life - and it comes more naturally to him than being honest. he lacks empathy, rational thinking, the ability to consider consequence. he has no moral compass. i think he has a personality disorder. how did i get here?

i came home from d.c. and i took the week off work. i’m unable to focus, i was obsessing over the cruelty and the betrayal and i was taking care of myself but not knowing what to do with my time other than see friends and counsellors and read and write. well, i’m going to a codependents of sex addicts anonymous meeting tomorrow evening, and i have cut him off from my emotional support. he has now moved into the other bedroom and as soon as he gets a job, he will move out. i am not callous enough to kick him out to the street, and i am financially responsible for him legally as long as his PR application is under way. but i am setting clear, firm boundaries, to help both of us. i have enabled him, unknowingly, for so long. i have allowed his manipulations and lies to show me what i wanted to see. i have stopped wearing my wedding ring and my skin is still indented from the pressure, the impression of nine months of its weight. i want him to be successful in his recovery, but it’s completely out of my hands. he’s an addict, and he will always be an addict, and he is incapable of being honest to me, at least so early on in his recovery process.

i am heartbroken, but i am furious, and i will never let this happen to me again.

aaaaand now I'm stuck in Montreal after hours of delayed flights and conflicting information and I just almost killed someone to get a hotel room voucher. fuck today, fuck it so so hard.

he slept with someone else, early on in our partnership, just after we talked and decided to not see other people, before we knew if he was going to stay in vancouver or move back to australia a few months later. but he lied to me, never told me about it, and he told me a year later. now, when we are dealing with a cascade of other unearthed lies that he has carefully crafted to cover up a series of addictions, life long and deeply ingrained. he did drugs twice this august in australia, after I made it clear to him I couldn’t be with someone who was so wreckless with their life, after he promised me he didn’t want to anymore and wouldn’t, after he married me and pledged his life to being faithful to me. he broke a promise to me on a weekly basis for the past four months, lied to my face over and over, to cover up another addiction. in December he came clean about a different round of lies, and swore he was done lying. that he'd finished coming clean and that the path forwards was only honesty. I made it clear to him then that this was his last chance. he started counselling for his history of sexual and physical abuse, dissociation and lying, and was proud of himself for all of the progress he was making. but he was still lying to me on a daily basis. I can’t see through his web of lies far enough to sort through my feelings other than betrayal, hurt, and disgust. but I only have two options: believe him this time, stay, and try to support his addiction recovery, or to divorce him and watch him move back to australia and lose the chance of ever being together again or him getting permanent residency here. and I hear all the voices saying, this is why you don’t marry people when you barely know them. this is why you don’t trust people or take them at face value. can people ever really change? no matter how much work I do on myself, how much therapy and growing and learning, I am fucked up. I chose this man. I saw what I wanted to see. I trusted too much. I’m crying at the airport, waiting for my plane to DC, getting the fuck out of here and spending a few days with a dear old friend who knows me better than I know myself, and I need it more than anything else in the world right now, except maybe seeing my mom who’s been on the other side of the world for the past year.

when the love of your life refers back to your second date which was almost a year ago, when he came over to make you dinner as his go-to "tactic" to "see where things went" and actually brags about it? like I'm gonna high five him for getting laid, that his strategy worked on me too? jfc, it just goes to show that you can read all sorts of feminist literature and books and have great conversations but the real work comes when you look inwards and understand your own part in it, even if you're not doing those things anymore, even if you were never as bad as the examples in the books. it's so easy to set yourself apart and be shocked by how shitty men regard women but even the good ones still subconsciously get caught in that trap. things have been oscillating between really good and really bad, and I'm just tired. I'm so tired.

Somewhere along the way I lost my empathy. I've turned callous and unforgiving, setting impossible standards and lashing out when they aren't met. and it doesn't mean that the things he's done aren't hurtful, and that my feelings are invalid, but instead of accepting apologies and moving on, deep down I expect some grandiose show to make things up to me, to prove to me that he really does love me, even though he did something selfish and unthoughtful. I spend most of my time on this planet thinking about other people's needs or punishing myself for my own, so I'm incapable of seeing how others can "just not think about it" or do such hurtful things and not realize the consequences until it's too late. Sometimes I'm manipulative and controlling. I can see through my own bullshit enough to hate myself for it, but my intense fear of abandonment forbids me from being honest and speaking the words out loud. I think to myself that if I just know that they're happening, then it's in my control to change - and why burden anyone else with my problems? These are the systems I've learned to deal with a difficult upbringing. They have worked in some ways, and failed me in so many more. I'm so tired of being scared and hurt all the time. These patterns aren't working for me. They never have. I'm almost thirty and I'm dealing with the same baggage I've tried to leave behind every day of my life, but stubbornly keep dragging along behind me.

hey there ol' secret blog

just dropping in to say that yesterday alojz and I were at IKEA and ran into the artist I started dating at the same time as alojz, before I knew what things were between us. it was so awkward. I introduced them, and he introduced us to his (mute) new partner (assumably) and then I spent the next half hour giggling to myself about how fucking strange this world is, and how lucky I am for finding alojz, and how stupid it was to waste my time with that selfish prick just to try to not become too attached to alojz. but thank god he made it so easy to break things off with, later than I should have but still, I did it. neither alojz or I could have seen this coming but it's the truest love I've ever known. it was a crazy leap of faith but I'm so glad I'm married to this special man.

wedding looks... hooooly fuck i can’t wait to stand next to this dude on a beach in mexico in front of our friends and family in less than a month and tell everyone how much i love him!

I'm going to the Sunshine Coast tomorrow, to my friend Spencer's cabin for the weekend. The only person who's ever dumped me - and broke my heart twice in a row last year. We didn't talk for six months but around the end of the year, I wrote to him asking to have a coffee and talk. Since then we've been really good friends -- we hike together, we cook dinner for each other, we play cards on porches and play on the same soccer team. It's not a friendship without boundaries, and there are certainly walls that will probably always exist after such a tumultuous start, but the level of care for one another is evident and precious. I'm so thankful for this friendship, and am so aware of how it would probably have never existed or continued if I hadn't reached out to him.

5 ways to keep your long-term long-distance relationship going strong

“In general, people in both long-distance and geographically close relationships with insecure attachment styles disclosed less to their partners, idealized them less, and were less satisfied. However attachment and satisfaction differed for people in close vs. long-distance relationships. People who were anxiously attached in a long-distance relationship were painfully aware of the partner’s absence. In a geographically close relationship, you can be anxiously attached but your partner’s presence will provide you with reassurance. If your partner is not physically close, you won’t have that regular solace. Moreover, without your partner around to provide that comfort, you’ll be more likely to find your partner to come up short and therefore will be more critical and less satisfied.” reminder to myself that: 1) i have a tendency to be too critical in relationships (often for good reason but not always) 2) i lean on the anxious side of attachment styles 3) he is listening and open and asking questions and actively improving his communication skills based on things i have asked from him or told him i need 4) this distance is temporary and he is an incredible communicator in person 5) this is already feeling so much more manageable 6) we have already made it through six weeks (today) and there are only 58 days until i see him again 7) we are extremely committed, both to each other, and also to putting in whatever work is required to make this work, thrive, and last

islet

just met with our immigration lawyer

and i’m crying because the whole process is so expensive and far more than we were quoted even (because TAXES?! and not including the fees for the actual paperwork in the quote initally?! UGH) and i am so frustrated because nothing even guarantees that they’ll let him back into the country in november when he flies back, EVEN IF he buys a return ticket, EVEN IF we are legally allowed to file for PR and we will have already had the wedding ceremony (but not the legal part) in mexico.

basically my entire fucking future depends on the whim of a random goddamned border guard’s MOOD that day and i am NOT okay with this and there is absolutely zero i can do about it except cry.

islet

thanks for the words, friends. I am still struggling but he finally got back in the land of reception and we had a really long difficult conversation which involved me pacing around the campus and crying in the rain for an hour.

I needed him to understand the emotional labour that I'm putting into this and that isn't being matched, as well as understand the impact that all of this stress and work has been putting on me. I feel like I'm doing this alone a lot of the time and it's not fair. He had this trip planned before we met, and I never expected him to change his plans, but this is much harder than i thought it would be. I've never been great at asking for help or communicating my struggles, I've had to be self sufficient and was trained to not take up too much emotional space as a young child, and these patterns die hard even though I have made progress in leaps and bounds. We're going to do this thing and he's going to change some things to make it easier for both of us. We're going to borrow money when we need it and we'll make it work. But Jesus fucking Christ, none of it is going to be easy.

oh, AND he just left san fran this morning and won’t have cell phone reception for at least a day or two SO I CAN’T EVEN TALK TO HIM ABOUT ITTTTTT

just met with our immigration lawyer

basically my entire fucking future depends on the whim of a random goddamned border guard’s MOOD that day and i am NOT okay with this and there is absolutely zero i can do about it except cry.

haha how did this happen, i am marrying a fucking male model, i have literally never seen such a handsome man before in my life. #blessed

exploring different types of intimacies in a long distance relationship: something that tbh really scared me/made me feel anxious but now i realize how important it is to be extra vulnerable and get outside of your comfort zone because it leads to immense growth for your relationship-- and I feel so much closer to him which makes everything so much more manageable. learning.

I’ve been making my bed every day since you left. I never made it before, but you made it every day you slept in it. I unearth relics of your life here: sunglasses in the kitchen, a stray neon sock in the dryer, your white hat that you washed in the sink, your clothes under my bed.

I think about you often. I wonder what you’re thinking, what you’re feeling, what you’re doing. I look at photos of you, try to dissolve the distance. Sometimes I see a photo of you, and the last six months no longer feel real. I wonder if it was a dream. I try to recall your voice, your laugh. But my memory isn’t doing them justice: your laugh isn’t as loud, your accent not as strong, as I know it is.

Last night I dreamt that I found a four leaf clover, picked it and gave it to you. It was dying but I found it and picked it before it withered. You looked at me, beaming and proud, with your classic giant smile. I worry that your feelings for me will dull over time. That you’ll come home to me and your smile won’t be as wide, your enthusiasm not as strong, the light in your eyes not as bright. That I’ll meet you in Mexico to marry you and you’ll wonder if you’re making the right choice.

And you told me not to worry, that I have a bad habit of thinking too much, and you’re right about that. You told me not to think, even for a second, that our love is dwindling, even if we don’t talk for a week. You told me your love for me grows every day even as we’re apart. That you think about me often. That you can guarantee me that you’re thinking of me and missing me and loving me every time I think of you.

I want to fast forward the next few months, but I know I can’t. I know that coming out on the other end of this is important for us. It will make us stronger. It will build on our strengths. It will prove to others that this isn’t a brash, lust-filled decision, but instead the most real connection each of us has ever found and neither of us thought existed.

I love you more than I knew was possible and there's nothing more terrifying, exciting, and hopeful than this state of complete vulnerability.

fuck I don’t know how I found this angel of a partner but I am so fucking determined not to fuck this up. fuck fuck fuck. I know that I deserve his love and I know that he adores me and three months of us being apart will not change that.

three weeks ago we went camping. we did mushrooms and I thought I was dying; in my eyes, he saved my life. I terrified him. I saw the panic in his eyes. that night we held each other tighter than we ever have before, and every day since have been increasingly grateful for each other in our lives. I thought I lost him. I thought I lost everything.

the next day, between my apologies, he told me he was glad it happened. that he felt closer to me than ever before. that he thought he was losing me and never ever wants to feel that again. and then us getting married stopped being a practicality for a PR application and became so much more.

ninety four days left.

i’m so curious what my life would be like if i was raised with secure, stable parents who could demonstrate (and pass on to me) a secure attachment style of loving. like what does it even feel like to not feel insecure in a relationship, especially when there are days between your (brief and surface-level) communications? to not wonder in the back of your mind when and if everything will fall apart? to trust that someone loves you completely and that isn’t a transient condition but a promise and a permanent commitment? i have no fucking clue. most days are fine, but today, i am struggling.

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n: a small island