TBI is hard to live with - the mood swings and angry outbursts are tiring and draining.
PTSD is hard to live with, & when compounded by TBI fallout … life can become very hard in a very short period of time.
Holland suffers bouts of TBI combined with PTSD; his injury happened when he was a very young child growing up in a highly dysfunctional and violent home - his older brother smacked him extremely hard in the head, with a baseball bat: sibling rivalry was always out of control in the redmill family network (father, uncles, aunts, siblings, cousins...). TBI is not something that can be cured - it is permanent; and fallout is unpredictable. And, due to the dysfunctional family - both sides of the tree; he was forced at age 14 into premature adulthood, living on his own = additional trauma. Basically there were no mature adults in his life from beginning to end. He has trust, and self-worth issues. He has an over-inflated ego, and a fixation on controlling everything and everyone in his immediate surroundings.
My PTSD issues started when when I was a young child growing up in a highly dysfunctional and violent home. Because I was eventually loved unconditionally, I was able to rise above it and live a very happy life in a very happy marriage for 44 years … but it came to the forefront of my life again when my first Husband, Bob's body, died in the winter of 2018: it was further set into motion with my children's viciously angry abandonment following, which led to a sudden and malicious separation from my beloved grandchildren. I did manage to side-line it as I began to grow into a new life, throughout 2019 - 2023. Before I remarried, I was just coming into my own as a solo lobo feeling competent and secure in who I am - I was beginning to think I could trust some people, and was adding new friends to my very small circle of close friends; my PTSD symptoms had been pretty much put to rest. I was gaining confidence through self-love~self-care; I was feeling happy and worthy of the space I was taking up in the cycle of Life.
But my new husband is a secret keeper due to his familial dysfunctions, and I was not aware of his TBI until we were married and I was getting a first-hand experience of his abrasive mood swings and sudden angry outbursts. He is always sorry afterwards … but the things said and done during those melt-downs are hard to get past even after forgiving.
Wednesday he went too far.
Forgiveness will not cancel the overstep - for that to be laid to rest, he will need to seek Elohim's intervention. Trust has irrevocably been broken, as far as I am concerned.
I find that I cannot trust my new husband's love for me: love does not continually, & selfishly chip away at happiness; or make one feel worthless in relationship hierarchy. A husband should be his wife's safe place: I do not feel that in this marriage. I do not feel that he values my place in his life at all. I do not feel that his presence in my Life … or in this marriage … offers a sanctuary for my heart to rest. There is too much familial drama on his end; and he glories in the crazy train ride. There is too much distancing - concerning everything a normal marriage shares (in normal marriages spouses strive to make a prominent space for each other in their life; are privy to their partner's immediate information, like who their doctors are - especially in cases like Holland's COPD; decisions concerning financial decisions; vacation plans; ect.). But in this seriously warped marriage - his siblings, SIL, & friends hold too much sway in decisions that should only be shared, and decided, between the 2 of us. And there is too much need to have ultimate control over me - this I cannot have, will not tolerate, and refuse to submit to.
So, now he is isolating me from people, thinking that will bring me to heel; but, I am not a dog. Holland may consider all women bitches … but he will find it very hard indeed to break this "bitch". I have teeth - and I am not afraid to show them.
This past Wednesday's actions and outburst is going to be very hard to move on from. Aside from the blatant seize of absolute control & defining change of direction concerning a decision we had agreed on before leaving home; Holland angrily cut me off from in-law-relatives he knows are close to my heart: 2 of his cousins were friends of mine before I even met him; and 1, I met last year on our road tripping; the rest I don't care for, so the spitefulness in that instance of forced isolation is meaningless. Intending to have his way; all the time, about everything, He continues to try to bully me … but I refuse to be controlled.
I've had enough of these childish tirades and cave man tactics.
I am taking space from this marriage that is more like a battlefield than a marriage.
I woke up this morning with this song from Valley of the Dolls running through my thoughts …
So, I looked up 🧐 the lyrics:
I'll Plant My Own Tree song lyrics
I’ll plant my own tree, and I’ll make it grow
My tree will not be just one in a row
My tree will offer shade when strangers go by;
If you’re a stranger, brother - well, so am I!
Come tomorrow, all that I see is my tree.
Oh, lord. What a sight!
Let someone stop me, and I will put up a fight!
It’s my yard, so I will try hard to welcome friends, I have yet to know.
Oh, I’ll plant my own tree!
My own tree … and I’ll make it grow!
I live every day moment-to-moment; but lately the needle seems stuck in the same groove 😟🤦🏻♀️- and it gets tiring 😒 to hear the same thing over and over and over, again 🙄
I'm doing the best I know to do ☝️✝️🕊️, while hoping and 🙏 the needle will move. Soon.
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a common condition that can develop after a traumatic event. It involves symptoms like flashbacks of traumatic events, anxiety fallout in similar situations (like angry shouting, bullying control maneuvers, closed areas with no visible escape routes, ect), a false sense of inadequacy under pressurized circumstances (like angry shouting, bullying control maneuvers, unwarranted silent treatment, & a punishing withdrawal abandonment - even for a brief period of time), avoiding situations, places and activities related to the traumatic event (very difficult to do at this moment, in this living situation).
Holland, in his TBI black moods, trips my dormant PTSD with his loud and angry shouting, and his childish, punishing silent treatments. His need to be in control, and control me, has soured an otherwise good marriage. And at this point, I'm not sure it can be salvaged.
I stay because I live my Life in obedience to Elohim's Will: He literally placed this damaged man in my Life, and short of being a convenient booty call, I will be a wife in obedience to Elohim's Will for my Life.
If Holland wants a full-on Wife, then he needs to become a full-on Husband.
My relationship with Elohim & Yeshua; and my Blogging & FB connections with friends, are my saving grace. The main treatment for PTSD is talk therapy. But my husband does not talk with me - when he is not shouting at me, he talks at me, and around me … but he does not engage in meaningful talk with me. And I cannot talk with my husband. At any time; about anything. Any convo with Holland at all, revolves solely around him, his needs, his wants, and his directives. Period.
It's very hard to live with.
So, I have made the decision to distance myself from the constant non-stop turmoil Holland surrounds himself in, and with.
Living on borrowed time, as I am with asthma and angina complications; I don't have time to waste.
I am not going to be making time for any more chipping away - I'm going to plant my own tree … and watch it grow. Holland can join me under it's shade - or he can continue to throw shade my way. But I am going to make the most of what is left of my Life and enjoy it: with, or without, him in it: the choice is his.
First thing I did this morning when I got downstairs, was to open the front door - wide, and air the house; stale air is not good for the brain cells or the lungs. Holland, upstairs in bed, would be warm enough under the blankets. I wanted fresh air in my immediate environment. The door was open for about an hour.
Holland, when he woke up and drank his mug of coffee, immediately left; without a word of where he was going - again, this is typical redmill men behavior. Common courtesy never crosses their minds, and their women "don't need to know" where they are going, why they are going, who .. or where, they are going to. I've reached the point in this toxic relationship, that I really don't care anymore; he was gone for a couple hours, and the house was blessedly peaceful and quiet.
I listened to some music, watched a Congressional hearing, did a little knitting - and made a quick and easy Supper:
VAL'S 4PATRIOTS ALFREDO w-CHICKEN Recipe; Ocean Park-WA: (https://roadgypsiesvalandholland.blogspot.com/2025/06/vals-4patriots-alfredo-w-chicken-recipe.html)
Nothing, and no one, is going to stop me from finding peaceful moments in my days.
No comments:
Post a Comment