Feeling sad, part II

7/5/11, 11:30 pm

Dave just asked me what's been hard the past year, and I told him it's been hard to be sectioned off from him.  First when he was angry at the church, I felt like I couldn't tell him about promptings or experiences I felt that I'd had, because even though I was trying to enter his assumptions/world view and understand where he was coming from, he was too angry to accept my worldview or to acknowledge that those experiences were real and special to me.  Second, I felt I was separated from him in that I couldn't tell him things I didn't feel he could handle, about how his depression was affecting me.  A)I thought that could make his depression worse, and I was scared of doing that, and B) when he's deep in his depression he shuts down when he hears things that scare or hurt him, so talking about it wouldn't do a lot of good.  That made me feel really alone, to be a segmented self and not to be able to share everything with him.  What's more, I didn't feel there was anyone else I could share those things with, so it made me even more segmented.  After I talked about that, I said it's been hard to always know what mindview I should have, to know that it won't do me or him any good to feel like a martyr and so I should change my thinking.  It's tiring to always be changing your mindview, to try to change or get rid of your victimist or angry thoughts.  And that led to I think my biggest issue - that I was making these constant, daily, tiring changes without ever knowing when I would get something back.  I knew those changes would help dave get better, and that they would probably be the best course for me, but Dave has to be at his very peak levels before he is able to give back to me, and I didn't know when if ever these exhausting constant changes would do anything for me, would make life better for me.  And people are constantly asking how Dave is doing, and what they can do to help him - which I appreciate, I do, I do!  And then they would ask how I am doing, and I would say fine and move on.  And even people who knew it was hard for me never really asked me or really cared or acknowledged or wanted to hear about how it was hard for me.  And I think that was maybe the hardest part - feeling like my life was hard, too, but no one was helping me.


And I feel a little hurt, and angry, and dissappointed, and upset, that no one tried to help me.  One person with good intentions tried to tell me that probably Dave was doing a lot better than I thought.  And that made me feel belittled and like I should be happy and I should be satisfied because probably I didn't even know what was going on and how good things were for me.  I know that's not what he meant, but it's how I felt.  And I feel like someone, of all of the people out there in the world, should've tried to help me, and someone should've succeeded in helping me.  And I can't feel angry at Dave for not helping me, because his depression made that impossible and because he has been doing so much over the past months to get better, to get so much better.  And I'm really genuinely happy and proud of him for his work.  But it makes me feel a little alone & segmented from him that I can't be mad at him, can't have expected him to be present & aware of my problems and to help me.

[EDITORIAL COMMENT:  See editorial comment from part I]