SYMPTOMS OF A FAITH LOST - PART 11

Learning to Cope

I discovered many ways to cope during the next many months…some were beneficial, some could have been a little dangerous, and some just didn’t really work that well.

I started by gathering up everything that was his, everything that he had given me (with exception to the Frank Sinatra CD…because...well, why should I have to spend another $19.99 on a second copy? -Just because the guy who gave it to me is an asshole?? I don't think so.), and everything that reminded me of him and I either got rid of it or threw it in a box. I showed up to work with an armful of his junk and plopped it in his arms as he was standing in front of me with this confused and wondering expression on his face. I wondered, could he really be confused at this point? How dense is he really?

I redecorated my room, painted the walls, and got some new artwork to hang. We had spent nights together in that room, and I needed it to look like a completely different place.

I started neglecting my responsibilities and I stopped doing the things that I one enjoyed. My friends and family rarely saw me or heard from me. I started skipping classes and calling in “sick” to work again. I was sleeping all through the day and couldn’t sleep at night.

I ordered a bunch of man-hating, rage filled, vengeful female power songs from itunes and was constantly listening to it. Singing along to the music at the top of my lungs was very cathartic and satisfying.

And then I started burning things. I literally carried around a “burning can” and a bunch of matches in my car for a few months. I never knew when I might feel motivated to pull out something and burn it. I still had a few of his things around too, so I burned them. I wrote down memories and burned them. I wrote down my feelings of hate, of betrayal, of anger at myself, of sadness…and I burned them too.

I went on ridiculous cleaning sprees at the most random times. When I feel out of control of my emotions I need desperately to feel in control of something and that usually results in cleaning and organizing…and cleaning, and organizing (the common area on the floor of my dorm room was never cleaner than it was during those months!).

I enrolled for a weekly kickboxing class (even though I couldn’t really afford it) and imagined that his face, his hands, his neck, his eye, his heart...was pinned up to the punching bag and I got a lot of pleasure out of repeatedly punching and kicking him to death (not literally of course).

I threw my shoes in the river. I know it’s not the most green thing I could have done…but it was incredibly symbolic for me at the time. You see, through all four years that I knew him, we had the very same pair of classic black Adidas. We showed up to work wearing the same shoes and we’d get our shoes mixed up at friends’ houses. I don’t know how many times I saw our shoes sitting side by side. He said it was “proof that we were meant to be together” and no matter how ridiculous that was, I admit I kind of believed it a little bit. I knew that I needed to get a new pair of shoes…but more than that; I needed to destroy this old pair. I took out a permanent marker and wrote words of farewell, words of profanity, and words of empowerment…and then I tossed them over the Mississippi river bridge. And it wasn't just the shoes that I threw in the river that night, it was any chance of their ever again being a "me and him". And it felt so damn good.

I was starting to get a little self-injurious…doing anything I could think of to make myself sick because I so desperately wanted my physical body to feel as much pain as I felt mentally and emotionally. I started thinking of suicide and that’s when I knew I had to do something. Going to work each day, seeing his face, and reliving all that had happened was not helping me to move on or to let go of the anger, it was just making it worse…so I quit my job (which turned out to be one of the best decisions I made during that time) and that finally allowed me to get some much needed space from him.

I was starting to get a little reckless in other areas too. I would randomly drive to the lake and jump in during the middle of the night. I once attempted to switch seats with one of my friends while we were driving down the freeway. My other friend in the car almost had a panic attack, thoroughly freaked out by my "apparent death wish" as she wanted to have no part in it. Late one night I went for a long walk in the rain. I walked past all the bars we had been to that night, I walked past two of the restaurants where we had been together, and I walked all the way over to the other side of town, each step reclaiming a piece of land, a landmark, or a property where we had either been together, slept together, or worked together. I was reclaiming it for my own sake. Since all the shit went down, I had avoided everything that would remind me of him. I would refuse to go out if it meant I would be near one of those places or risk seeing him or someone that he knew. I would start to panic if I got too close, so I usually just turned around and went the other way. But that night, I was reclaiming it for me. I was no longer going to let him rule over me. I ended my walk a few hours later, on the other side of town, dripping wet…and scared for the first time. I was so far from home, I was wet and cold, and I was not in a good neighborhood. I called a friend and when I told him where I was he came to get me right away and drove me home. My friends were starting to worry about me, but I still took every chance I could to feel a little thrill, a little fear, a little danger…because anything was better than feeling sad.

I started to journal, I wrote poetry, and I created art work. I started taking guitar lessons to keep myself busy and I eventually started talking about what had happened. There was so much guilt and shame pent up in me and keeping it a secret didn’t help. I found that as I started talking about it a little bit of that shame fell away each time. I analyzed myself and my actions, in the attempt to learn every lesson possible because I never wanted to make those mistakes again.