Slow Descent Into Madness
It’s funny, you think you know someone then, BAM! They hit you with a shocker so big they blow your mind. Like they really dig horse porn, or when they were young they dressed in their sister’s clothes because they liked the feel of lacy under-things on their skin. After that, your relationship is never the same. It’s like you can divide your whole relationship into two parts. Everything that happened before the revelation and everything that happened after it.
Sadly, this is not one of those type interactions. This is the story of a slow descent… Well, you read the title already. You see, with Nora, her problems started at home with her parents. I think every one’s problems start there, but part of adulthood is rising above circumstances and becoming an adult on your own terms. A sign of maturity, you might say.
The little pink pill
Her parents were a collective piece of work. Her father started out kind of rocky, and never got over it. His father died, and every man his mother married after that was progressively worse than the last and they also all died. I believe the final number was 5 (as in she outlived 5 husbands). He grew up in an abusive relationship with all of his father figures, but in those days, a mother would take what she could just to have a roof and food. Women were hard pressed to find work in those days. Needless to say, he and his brother are not entirely there now.
Her mother had an equally rocky start. She was not the oldest or the youngest of 8 children, but she was the one selected (seemingly at random) to be shuffled off to live permanently with the grandparents. I really feel for her, and this situation (which, by the way, has never been satisfactorily explained to her) has played hell with her self esteem ever since. She’s on her third marriage (likely this one will stick) and she doesn’t speak to pretty much any member of her family, including her daughters.
Needless to say, her parent’s marriage didn’t last. They divorced about the time Nora was beginning puberty. Her younger sister started to act out violently (mostly at her) and her parents played “kid ping-pong,” sometimes at the request of the girls. At present, their hatred for each other keeps them from being in the same state together, let alone the same room. Later stories will help press home the dysfunction in this family, but rest assured, it runs deep.
Why would I marry into that, you might ask? See the previous blog post. I didn’t really know what I was getting into. I found out the history far too late, but then, I wasn’t really digging at the time. For the first five years of our marriage, things were not what you’d call fine, but the were on par with what I had come to know as normal. We fought, we made up, we had make-up sex… You know…
Well, the descent started during those five years, but was almost imperceptible. It was after the first five that the trouble started and the signs started to show. I used to think her temper was cute, and it came in handy when trying to get a refund for a defective product or if the service / food at a restaurant was bad. I can’t tell you the number of free meals she garnered by going “psycho bitch” on managers. I even used to tell my friends to put her on the phone to negotiate with any company they were having trouble getting through to. It always panned out to be better than they even asked.
It was after that magical 5 year mark that she started directing that anger at me for whatever shortcoming she perceived I had at the time. I’m not sure what the trigger was, but it started to come fast and heavy. At one point one of us suggested marriage counseling (I think it might have been her). I said, “sure.” That counselor was priceless. We went to two “couples” sessions and shortly thereafter were given the “we need to split you up” treatment.
At the time I had no idea how bad she had gotten, but I was put in a room with a guy, and she was put in a room with a woman. We would talk about football and fishing, and they would talk about how evil I was. What’s funny is, in my first individual session, my counselor (we’ll call him Bill), said that they were going to prescribe her a pill or two to see if that evened things out. I was all for it, and we went home with a shiny new bottle of Paxil and a rather shocking bottle of lithium (both for her).
I didn’t think much of it, except that I had read somewhere that lithium was used to treat psychotics and depressive people. I assumed that she was depressive.
Well, things improved, though not entirely. The meds made her moods more even, but there were occasions where she’d intentionally do things to hurt me, and no, not call me a stupid doody-head kind of hurt. We’re talking, throw a full cup of coffee at my head, kind of hurt. As luck would have it, she was a lousy pitcher and I was pretty quick on my feet. I don’t even have many scars. Lucky for her I still don’t believe in hitting a woman (though, there were times I really started to question that belief).
At one point, she decided she felt fine (a common trait among the psych med takers, I hear) and she stopped taking the pills. That’s when her normally colorful tendencies went into shades as yet unknown to art or science. I have stories and I will tell them, just you wait…
I remember the day I’d had enough as if I were still standing there. She was livid that I had taken a Saturday to help a friend move, and she let me know with a tirade of verbal abuse and rage so venomous I finally said, “What am I really hanging on to this for?”
I was raised that marriage was a “forever” proposition. In fact, my entire family has almost no history of divorce on both sides, all the way back to the boat. It’s me and my uncle, and he only got divorced because his wife (who was a German citizen) missed home and just left one day. Not too much he could do. I’d say he got more of an annulment than a divorce. So, when I say I finally got to the point where I’d had enough, I really had a mountain of preconceived notions about permanence and commitment to climb before getting there. Maybe I’ll cover that another time. I have a mental record of the major events that pushed me over the precipice and into the realm of “I’m done with this.”
Until next time…
