July 13, 1997
"I saw a couple in Maryland a few years before the Pandemic".
What's On My Mind...
The sadness of seeing a perfectly loveable human being self-destruct.
The pain that goes with watching what could have been a great relationship go the
way of the dinosaurs. The absolute wretchedness of alcoholism and the damage it does
to those who cannot pull themselves out of that illness. You think it's funny? You're
dead wrong. The damage it does to both the victim and the people they love is beyond
understanding until you are forced to watch it happen to someone you love dearly.
The silence of this apartment that was supposed to house two is now deafening.
Colette used to watch TV and I used to be in here typing and surfing. That is over.
Now it's just me. I admit it is nice to have the peace and quiet and not have to
put up with the noise of the TV, but it is also a reminder of how sad it is to lose
love and to not have the person with you that you had fallen in love with. But then
I don't think I ever really had that person. There is the old saw about setting something
free and maybe it comes back to you. I don't think it will because I think she is
lost.
I spent the weekend trying to put myself back together. Attempting to
put some perspective on the whole affair and trying to give myself some piece of
mind. I was partially successful and it will come with time. The sadness isn't overwhelming,
it's just there. Like a piece of me is missing, which is the case, and that I will
miss for some time. Not like I didn't see it coming, but that it still hurts just
the same.
So now as I contemplate life alone with a healthy mind, I can't help but
think....was there something else I could have done? Was there something I could
have tried? Something I should have said or known to say or not to say? The answer
comes back no. I couldn't make her well and I can't do her work for her. I loved
her as best as I could with all my heart and soul and mind and it wasn't enough.
I was competing with her depression and her alcoholism. There was never any question
of the outcome of that struggle. At least not now.
The idea of our having a relationship was not a good idea at the time.
But I was healthy enough to know I could make it work and that I wanted her in my
life. That two people who met under the circumstances we did could have a healthy
relationship was a long shot but one I wanted to take. You can search forever and
not find someone with no problems. At least I knew Colette's problems and had made
my peace with them as long as she worked on them.
I met her when we were both in holding for being suicidal. We met on February
22nd 1997. She moved in on 1 May and we were together until 11 July 1997. There just
wasn't enough time.
I will miss you Colette.
What's New...
Colette left on Friday night. She had relapsed again for maybe the fourth
time and was not working on her depression or her alcoholism. Friday the 4th she
made a concious decision to go out drinking and that put the final nail in our relationship.
We had agreed that we would enter into this relationship only if both of us were
working on our recoveries. She could not. I don't know if Colette loved me the way
I loved her. I think she loved me at some level, but I was also a way-station for
her on her way to something she never told me about. She was a very quiet person.
It was very difficult for her to talk and get things out. That was her undoing. Because
if we don't talk, we die. I know. I almost died from not talking and hiding my depression.
I tried to help her to see that but it didn't work.
She drank pretty much the rest of the weekend and I came home on Monday
to find her just totally smashed. I told her that she couldn't continue to stay here
because she would destroy us both and that I had to look out for my own mental health.
I called her sister-in-law and her father to see if I could get some advice. Basically,
they said that she would have to crash because she had done this so many times before
that there was nothing they could do to help her. I knew this but I had to call.
This only pissed her off more when she found out who I had called.
I spent the rest of that week staying with her because I was afraid that
she would hurt or kill herself given her depressed state. I might as well have saved
myself the effort. Many people tried to help her last week get into programs, help
her with her legal issues concerning her kids or give her support. She heard none
of it. I broke down sobbing on the carpet on Tuesday begging her not to leave the
apartment for the streets because I knew in my heart that she had very little likelihood
of surviving that kind of experience. I was so deeply afraid for her that my body
was shaking with fear for her. Many people tried to get through to her that week
but to no avail.
On Friday we went out to eat before I took her home and she decided to
drink. After dinner, returning some videos, she asked where we were going now. I
told her the apartment to get her things and then home to her Dad's. She said she
didn't want that and got out of the car. She had made her choice. I asked her one
more time if this is what she wanted and she said yes. I drove off and didn't look
back. I didn't see which way she went and didn't try. I admit I was angry but I was
also hurt and and hurting for her. So I didn't she which way she went.
When I got home I called the police to alert them to her condition should
they encounter her and they said there wasn't much they could do. I knew this but
it was the last thing I could do for her. I packed up her stuff and put in a corner
of the apartment. She called at 0630 Saturday morning saying she would be back between
12.00 and 1.00P to pick up her stuff. At 0800 she showed up, drunk, to get a clock
radio, her meds and another radio. She said she had to work and needed them. Colette
has no job. It was the saddest thing I had seen in a long time and I hope I don't
have to see something like that again. She never showed up for the rest of her things.
I haven't heard from her since. Time now: 11.06P on Sunday night.
I hope that she is just waiting for tomorrow and me to be gone to pick
up her things. I do not want to imagine her on the streets in the clothes she left
in, or possibly dead by her own hand. But that may be the future for her. She cannot
come to terms with her life and her issues. I don't know if she ever will. All I
can hope for is that sometime, somewhere, someplace, she will find it within herself
to heal herself and pick up her life.
I had to write this tonight while it was still fresh in my mind and so
that I could get to sleep tonight. Last night I was exhausted and took 3 melatonin
to sleep and wound up sleeping 14 hours. Tonight though, I have enough distance and
rest that the ghosts are haunting me. Taunting me. With visions of her hurt or hurting
herself or drunk in an alley or being abused or raped. That's one thing alcoholics
don't see. The damage done and the hurt that keeps on hurting even after they leave.
Be Joyous!
So what's going on in your
brain case housing group?
<Just a smoke this time...>
"The Arabs keep trying to code them up from the base DNA but they just keep
croaking...".
Copyright ©1996, 1997 A.T.Green. All Rights Reserved.