Mark is here right now. He came by for another visit with the kids. They are playing Twister in the middle of our dining room. He is talking in his sing-song voice. He is talking very loudly. Maybe he talks loud because of his hearing issues. Maybe he talks loud to maintain the stage. I would rather scrape my fingernails across a chalkboard. I would just as soon slit my wrists. Instead, I am pretending to be pleasant. I am being nice so that my children can spend some time with their dad.
After these visits, I used to immediately call a girlfriend or my mom. I would need to tell someone about his weird behavior. I would need to say, “How can he be like this? How is it that he doesn’t know how to enjoy his kids? You should hear the way he talks to them. You should feel how strained the energy is in the room.” I needed to vent. I needed to hear someone say, “I don’t know how you put up with that for so long.” Basically, I needed to have my decision, to leave, validated. I needed to provide more examples and explanations to confirm that I had made the right choice.
Each time we would have one of these visits, and I would make a call to vent, I would feel my blood pressure spike. You know how that is when you get all worked up about something. Someone cuts you off in traffic, someone slights you at work, a clerk is rude to you at the grocery store and you feel your pulse begin to race. You get agitated and defensive and your blood pressure goes up. I would inevitably get myself worked up and I’d have to deal with the fallout of what that stress would do to my body. I wouldn’t sleep well. The next day I would feel a case of heartburn coming on. It wasn’t really heartburn. A doctor once told me that stress creates an excess of acid in your stomach. It sits there until it dissipates and it feels a lot like heartburn.
It got to the point where I realized that I was boring my friends with the same stories. Over and over again, the same things were happening. Nothing was any different. By now, it’s pretty obvious that I left for all the right reasons. No one needs any more convincing. I made the choice. No one else was questioning my decision. It turns out that I was the one still questioning my decision. When I came to terms with that, I could be done with the calls, the venting, the ranting and the drama. I don’t need any more convincing.
When I was done with the drama, I was done with the Pepcid. I was sleeping better. I was less volatile. I felt better. I was at peace. I was happier. I drank less red wine. I drank less coffee. Things seemed to settle down. That’s not to say that Mark was better during these visits. I am saying that I handled them better.
I suppose the drama served a purpose. A bit of that is healthy. You can’t keep all that bottled up. You have to release the pressure once in awhile. My health is so much better now. Sure, I still vent sometimes. Quite frankly, that’s what this blog is for. My fingers speeding across the keyboard have replaced the spikes in the blood pressure. For my sake, and the sake of Will and Jenny, I try to avoid the drama, the negativity and the caustic attitude. In the end, it was hurting me more than it was helping.
