Damage Control

I was cleaning my apartment earlier this week when I ran across a photo of Mikey and I from when we were just kids. I was maybe 19 or 20 years old.

Up until this point, I had been compartmentalizing extremely well. I have had a lot of work on my plate and little time to wallow in self-pity. But I suppose it was foolish of me to think that after seven years of going from best friends to lovers, I would be completely healed in only two months time. Nope. This is going to be more of a process than I realized until deciphering some things this week.

The flood gates opened when I found this photo and I literally dropped to my knees in a complete state of shock that someone who can be such an intricate part of your every day life for seven years can suddenly disappear. It's an eye opening experience to realize that you never know someone completely and even as close as you may come, there's no accounting for the fact that they can change or that you can change.

Even through this mini-breakdown, there was never -- and is never -- a moment that goes by where I think to myself, "Well, maybe this could work. Maybe it wasn't so bad after all." No, no. I am fully aware of how much better my life is without him in it and I wake up every day thankful with a renewed love of life. Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that the damage inflicted has magically disappeared.

It has taken removing myself from the equation for me to see how truly toxic the friendship and the relationship was from the beginning.

I started thinking about how we met this week. We went on a date when I was 18 to a concert and I didn't hear from him after that, assuming he didn't like the date much. A year later we ran into each other and became best friends. So naturally, what with the initial rejection, I think I was always on some level seeking his approval. And then when it became a partnership as boyfriends, it was magnified. I now realize that even if it was not malicious and only subconscious on his part, he with his mass insecurities and fears used my seeking his approval to his advantage on a daily basis to make sure I remained under his thumb.

It was his security blanket, making sure that I never under any circumstances recieved that approval. He was incredibly unsupportive, rarely accompanying me to events where I was hosting or performing and getting him to watch me rehearse around the house was like pulling teeth. When he finally did see me do something, he would just smile and go, "That was good," and then retreat or change the subject.

I was even told as I furthered my spiritual development and became more of a selfless individual with my study of Kabbalah, "This person you're becoming is not who I signed up to be with." I was once even asked to not talk to him about my studies.

Now I know that my sense of myself, accompanied by my line of work, can be very intimidating in relationships so I chose to tone it down around him. But then when it was time to turn it up again, I had become this ball of self-consciousness and self-doubt.

There is no "we" here. *I* was co-dependent. *He* was competitive and selfish. The only "we" is that "we" both reacted poorly to those traits.

So here, all this time, I've been thinking to myself, "Gee, it's really too bad we weren't compatible. That's a shame," when in reality it is so much more than that. This is not about being incompatible. It's about psychological warfare. This coupled with his invasion of my privacy -- breaking into my computer, his manic depression -- clawing at my walls and his teeter totter of making me out to be his best friend or his worst enemy on a constant basis with me never knowing which version of him I was going to get... It's really amazing I have not had a complete meltdown and lost my mind. This was not a simple "incompatibility" issue. This was years of me trying to make something work that continued to beat down my self-esteem on a daily basis.

And how, when I professed for years and years growing up that I would never get into a mentally abusive relationship like the one my mother was in, did I manage to fall into the same pattern?

I thought this was normal. It's all I've ever known.

More and more I am meeting couples who have been together years and never said a hurtful thing to each other, never had a moment of being unsupportive. And why would they? Who would do that to someone they love? I guess the same person who would sleep with your ex-boyfriends and not tell you to get off on some thrill of hurting you. A completely sick and twisted fuck, that's who.

Having finally found the strength to walk away from the situation two months ago, I know now that I am worth more and that there are better things waiting up ahead. But there's still so much damage that has been done.

I had held out some hope when we broke up that we may someday become friends again, but someone asked me this week, "With your new definition of what a true 'friend' is, how did he fit into that category? What about him made him a good friend?"

I could think of nothing. And realized in that moment, I have never met a more indulgent, selfish and insecure individual in my life. I don't know how I was so blind to this for so long -- probably because I was all of those things for so many years too! But I grew up and instead of being inspired or at the very least supportive, it instilled fear in him and made things even worse.

And don't get me wrong. I don't blame him. I point the finger at no one but me. It was me who allowed his opinion of me to rule my opinion of myself. Which, of course, means I am the only one who can change it. As Tori would say, "No one else is the reason you're not David Bowie."

I had a breakthrough last night during the full moon. I was doing a little ritual and asking the goddess Bridgette how to get back my self-confidence, my self-esteem, my certainty in my talent and what I have to offer the world and a future partner. How do I get back those things that have been stolen from me?

I heard her answer, "Those are things that can never be stolen from you. No one can steal who you are. Those things are right where you left them. You just choose to stop looking at them to appease someone else."

So in closing, the bad news is that it's a real process getting over the damage done.

The good news is that the healing is coming along quite nicely and I've still never been happier in my life.

I think next time around I'll know better and look for the signs. If I have to accept that at heart I am very much my mother's child, then these days when I date I look for people more like my father and less like my step-father.

Hell, I just want someone to be nice to me and put me before themselves. Is that too much to ask for? Not looking for the world here. Just a little love and partnership.



Seven years in a parking lot.
That's where I've been, still waiting for the green light.

Seven years how things can change
Faster than water turns to air and to ice.

And I knew you
Better than you knew yourself.
And you knew me,
Better than ever, better then all of the rest.

Seven years doesn't matter much.
Trees lose their leaves and the seasons must turn.

Seven years, say goodbye to the kids
On their swings, in a drive-through or just watching you.

Cross galaxies and twilight zones
To find those bombs or just a blueprint.
To listen you be silent
To hear can't hear myself speak.
Deciphering this war.
I'm muted, strangled, so weak
Since crossing the border to your side of the street.

Time out of body, time out of mind
Seems clear I'm still right where I left mine.
"Welcome home son," he can cry
But he can't hear those tears and I
Know just how he feels
When he's muted, strangled, so weak
Since crossing the border to your side of the street.

That dove of white wings flies high overhead and I
Still hear the call, I can still hear her sigh,
"Please be...
Just like my... "