Ignored...and never good enough.

DISCLAIMER: I am venting. This means, I am spewing my angst. It is meant to be taken with a grain of salt, in a figurative way, and any upset that it may cause is NOT the fault of the author. If upset is caused, I apologize now for any inconvenience that may ensue after reading. But don't jump to incorrect conclusions, don't accuse me of being a hateful bitch, and don't give me shit because nobody forces you to read my blog. This is who I am, raw, real, and brutally honest. I just need to vent.
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So today Peter is completely ignoring me. He's not even online to send me an IM like he usually does every day. He's not sent me the promised email either. Nice. All I can figure is, he must like living on the edge, knowing I could totally fuck up his marriage if he pisses me off enough--and oh yes, he's working on my pissed off level increasing every moment that he ignores me, because this is only going to fester into a cancerous anger if he doesn't--and it could get very ugly if I really wanted it to. Ignoring me, after I've said that I will not be ignored, is really not a good idea, ya know? Don't men learn stuff from women who say things like that? Sure, I come here to vent, I say things that I don't intend to follow-through on, but dammit I have feelings too, and right now he's dismissing me, ignoring me, and hurting me.

I mean come on, give me some common courtesy at the very least--some RESPECT would be nice too. I have asked for a detailed and specific discussion of what's going on with him and why he's acting like this and treating me like shit, but I've yet to receive the promised email in over a week. What the hell is so HARD about this? I think he's got a phobia of being the "bad guy." But hello, what else am I supposed to think here? He IS being a bad guy, and I don't understand WHY. So I think that's a chicken-shit, lame-ass, low-life cowardice way of being, personally. I mean, if he's got the balls to go off and cheat on his wife with me for 2.5 years, then why not have the same balls to tell me why he no longer wants to be in my life, after promising he would be??

So today, after another one of my meltdowns last night, Pete has given me a list of things to do, which includes removing all but one photo of Peter from my living space. I only have 3 photos of him. Pete says it's inappropriate for me to have all three of them out and displayed, when I don't have any of HIM around. But this confuses me because hello, he LIVES HERE, and I see him every DAY, whereas all the people I have displayed are family and friends that I NEVER get to see. So, I asked Pete to remove/delete some of HIS vanilla women friends from his computer and/or phone, etc., but he says THAT is not inappropriate at all. I'm seeing a double standard going on here and I don't understand why.

As long as he can get phone calls from A---- while we are having dinner, interrupting everything between him and I whenever she needs a ride, or to play poor me, or to bitch and moan about her life, or when she sneezes, to update him on the type of kleenex she's using for it, well, I should be able to look at a fucking photo of Peter once in awhile. So okay fine, I'll put the one of Peter and I together on my desk and put the other 2 away. No problem. I may even ENLARGE that one. No rule against THAT, is there? And I'll still call him and talk to him and email him, even if he ignores me. But this makes me feel like I'm deliberately being isolated from the one person I cared about most in DC, and like the rug is being pulled out from under me, which is part of why I am so upset.

Then Pete also mentioned my taking off the necklace that Peter gave me. I asked if Pete would replace it with one of his own for me to wear, (which would make this act of removing the necklace much easier on me), but he said no, he just wanted me to "present myself to him without anything on at all,"---I guess to somehow "prove" to him that I'm his---which is absolutely ludicrous, because I just fucking MOVED MY WHOLE PATHETIC LIFE HERE TO BE WITH HIM---what the hell ELSE does he WANT from me??

Christ, no matter what I do it just never seems to be good enough for ANY MAN. Ever. Nothing I do is ever good enough. I just turned my whole goddamned world upside DOWN for this man, which has also, unfortunately, triggered a lot of PTSD shit that I never expected to feel again, which is a big part of all these stupid meltdowns I've been having lately. But none of this HELL I am currently going through is good enough for him, apparently, I also have to just go without any form of security or safety that this necklace provides me with---I don't get even so much as a "I will give you one to replace it?" WTF?? I get no kind of REWARD for doing this??

So, okay, that has left me confused and upset too. I guess until he has a new necklace for me to replace it with, he'll have to just be patient with me awhile longer, because it'll take me a little longer to remove this one. Until this thing with Peter is resolved, once and for all, and until I know this necklace and the symbolism of it will be replaced by Pete, well, I really don't feel comfortable taking it off. I've given up EVERYTHING in my life in DC to be with Pete, why the hell can't he even give me a necklace?? A stupid little trinket, even if it's from a goddamned bubble gum machine, I don't care. Some kind of SOMETHING would be much more do-able for me, but to offer me NOTHING?? Not cool.

Okay, if he's not going to think of me as good enough to wear HIS necklace, I always have my Steve Perry eighth-note necklace that I can wear, and I wore THAT one every day of my life since before the first time I saw Journey in concert, for YEARS AND YEARS. I still have it, and I can just put THAT one on, because the simple fact is, I NEED TO WEAR A NECKLACE. It makes me feel safe, secure, and grounded. If it's not Peter's necklace, and if Pete isn't going to give me one, then I will just wear STEVE PERRY'S NECKLACE. But I can goddamned guarantee, I WILL WEAR A NECKLACE. I'm not going to go without ANYTHING around my neck and that's that.

I don't think it is unreasonable for me to want some CLOSURE from Peter, because right now it still feels to me like an unresolved conflict, and I LOATHE unresolved conflicts. If he hates my guts and wants nothing more to do with me, then TELL ME SO, and admit that he's lied to me, and admit he's the bad guy and has hurt me very much, and just apologize----but END IT if he must---with a detailed and specific explanation of why he's ending it. That's all I want. I just need that closure from him. I don't think that's asking for much. I think that's a common courtesy thing to do. It's just a form of respect that one human being should give to another.

So until Peter does this and ends things once and for all with the email he keeps promising me, then I guess the necklace stays on. Ohhhh but when I finally DO remove it, I'm going to send it to his house, for his daughter, for Christmas. The more he ignores me, the more shitty he treats me, until this is resolved, then the more stuff (emails from him, the photo of the two of us together, etc.) I'll include in the package. How do you like THEM apples, Mr. Married Man? Fucking DO IT and BE DONE WITH IT, or I'll fuck up YOUR life just like you are fucking up MINE right now.

Fair is fair, after all. Tit for tat, as they say. An eye for an eye.

My dad treated me like shit too, and never apologized, despite my several efforts at reconciling with him over the years. He never once gave me any kind of explanation, detailed reasons, or apology, for all the shit he caused me and my family to go through. Why can't Peter rise above that, and do the right thing? Is there ANY man out there who can just be a MAN and do the right thing?? I have yet to meet one.

Frankly, I just don't feel SAFE or SECURE without some kind of symbolic thing around my neck, but apparently I'm not good enough for Pete to put a new one on me to replace it---oh yeah, and this morning he told me that he also thinks I'm a mentally messed up chick who needs therapy because of the PTSD issues---which kinda hurts my feelings on top of everything else. I mean, give me a fucking break here, I've been handling it just FINE all these years, I don't NEED, nor do I WANT to sit there and dredge up the whole fucking mess all over again with some total stranger who doesn't give a shit anyway. I haven't had the luxury of medical benefits in nearly two years, and guess what, even when I did have them, therapy isn't covered under medical. And I haven't had the money to just go off and pay for therapy on my own. I've read books, I've written in my journal, I've talked with Peter about it all...that's all I could do. And I'm just FINE with it, being the way I am. Here's a newsflash fellas, I'm never going to be perfect.

If I'm not good enough for Pete the way I am, if he can't ACCEPT or LOVE me the way I am, then I made a huge mistake in moving here, didn't I.

I would like to think it was NOT a mistake.

But that means, just like the song goes, Pete has to just "TAKE ME AS I AM, and THAT MAY MEAN YOU'LL HAVE TO BE A STRONGER MAN." He doesn't want me to color my hair anymore, he wants to see the "real me," which I might add, has GREY HAIRS that I LOATHE and do NOT want to display to the world. He doesn't like it when I wear make-up either. He seems to want me to be something I'm not comfortable being. I LIKE WEARING MAKE-UP, I LIKE COLORING MY HAIR. I LIKE THE WAY IT MAKES ME FEEL, SEXY AND PRETTY AND FEMININE. But he doesn't seem to like me the way I am. I like the way this necklace feels around my neck too, but again, he doesn't approve of THAT either. He wants me to be someone else I think. Someone I am not. He wants some frumpy, ugly, plain-jane person like his two ex-wives were, but I'm just NOT LIKE THEM, nor will I ever WANT to be like them.

So, to re-cap, let's take a closer look at why I feel so upset. My dad told me when I was 8 years old that he wished I had been born a boy. From that day on, I could never please the daddy, no matter what I did. Playing a musical instrument like he did, never pleased him...it was a FLUTE after all, not a GUITAR like his. He never attended any of my concerts or performances. Liking rock and roll music never pleased him, because COUNTRY was HIS favorite. He hated Journey and Steve Perry especially, "that long-haired drug-addict sounds like a GIRL." (He hated Elvis too, so he's an asshole and I don't really CARE what he thinks about Steve Perry).

Let's delve a little deeper into my psyche, shall we? My dad also cheated on my mom for years, and as a kid, I figured out that, for some strange reason, my mom could not please the daddy, nor could I. BUT, I learned that the other woman somehow COULD please the daddy, and therefore, of course, I decided then and there that someday I would like to BE one of those "other women." Makes perfect sense to a KID. And that's what I'm stuck with as an adult too, logically I know it's not exactly right to think in that way, but it's something from very young that stuck with me. So, when I was with Allen, and with Peter, I DID please the daddy. And that made me happy for the first time in my life. I actually pleased a daddy. They had kids and were married, so even though technically they weren't MY daddy, they were still somebody's daddy, and that's close enough in my childlike mind of logic about this issue. Sure, I am an adult woman of 40 now, but that belief is still stuck inside me, and that's the thing that has put me in the situations I've been in with these men. I understand where it comes from, I did my homework to trace it back to this beginning, and so I consider myself pretty damned self-actualized as a human. Nevermind that it may not be logical anymore...at the time, it was, and with my inner child, it still is.

But, even though I managed to please Peter, the daddy, for 2.5 years, suddenly I am now being shown that I'm STILL not good enough for him to give me an explanation of why he's treating me like crap, and this reinforcement of my belief that I'll never be good enough for any man, really fucking hurts, way deep down inside me, and makes everything that (to others) might seem irrational, completely and totally RATIONAL in my mind. The more he puts it off, or puts ME off, the more he ignores me, the more I feel like something is super wrong, this is not like him at all, what did I do wrong? What did I do to make him treat me this way? WHAT DID I DO TO BE PUNISHED LIKE THIS??? WHY IS HE PUNISHING ME FOR WANTING HIM TO LIVE UP TO HIS PROMISE??

And now with Pete, I'm learning that it's just not good enough that I uprooted my entire life from DC to move here for him, it's not enough that I took a HUGE RISK in doing this, to "prove" that I love him...but oh no, now he expects me to present myself without the one little piece of security and reassurance that I FINALLY got from the ONLY man EVER to give me such a thing in my whole life--and that's hard enough---but then I'm told in addition to removing it, it won't even be replaced with a new one from him either, because, again, I guess I'm just not good enough.

Why is HE punishing me too, for wanting to be ME, and the way I am??

So what the hell is the incentive to taking the damned thing off? Am I the only one here who is taking risks then? Am I not good enough for him to invest a little necklace with, it doesn't even have to be a real jeweled one or anything, I mean it's not like I'm asking for a fucking COLLAR for Christ's sake, I don't think that's something I am ready for anyway. But DAMMIT, Pete, can't you just throw me a goddamned BONE here? (and I don't mean the one in your pants either). Can't you just love me WITH make-up and hair color? Why do you want me to be something I'm not??

The way I see things, I've lived my life mostly alone. Taking off the necklace makes me feel like I'm all alone again, empty, unprotected, unsafe, insecure...and when it's addede to criticism of the make-up I wear and the hair color I have, and if it's accompanied with the rejection from Peter...all of these things make me feel like, so be it, I might as well change the locks on my doors, and live alone, and just BE ALONE and BE WHO I AM, AND HOW I LIKE TO BE, all by myself from now on.

I'm sick and tired of never being good enough for men. I bust my fucking ASS for men in my life, but it's just never fucking good enough. WHY CAN'T THEY EVER JUST MAKE ME FEEL LIKE I AM GOOD ENOUGH??

This is why I am upset. Logical or not, rational or not, I can't help that I feel these things. I can't help that I'm feeling stuck between a rock and a hard place, I can't please either one of them, so my heart says, "FUCK IT, FUCK THEM BOTH, FUCK THE WHOLE GODDAMNED WORLD," and I want to just run off somewhere, hide, and shut down again. I don't want to reach out to anybody anymore, for anything.

All I ever get is the constant reinforcement of never being good enough. I just want to be loved for ME, with all my imperfections included. I just want to be understood, accepted, and loved. Instead, I'm going through an emotional hell with the two men I've loved most in my whole life. Why they are both making me feel punished, I don't know, nor do I understand. I don't go to THEM and criticize what THEY wear, or the color of THEIR hair, or what THEY do...

Will someone please explain to me why the hell I'm supposed to transform myself into some perfect little goody-goody princess to make THEM happy, while they can just go about their business being themselves without giving me an inch, a scrap, a tiny piece of positive reinforcement, a symbol of security, safety and love? Who the hell decreed that I have to conform myself and meld myself into what THEY want me to be, when neither one of THEM are living up to the promises they have made to me????

Until they both prove to ME that THEY are good enough, then this is all they get of me. Take it or leave it. This is who I am. You don't like it, fine, dump me and move on. I am tired of trying.

--Sassy Girl