My "aha!" moment.....

Oprah likes to talk about those “aha” moments in your life.  I had numerous aha moments in my relationship, and to this day I still can’t fully understand why I didn’t act on them.  Maybe it was the smothering intensity of the apologies that always followed that sucked me back in, or maybe it was the sincere sounding promises that it wouldn’t happen again,  or maybe  I’m just a fool.  I’ve mostly stopped beating myself up over my part of the situation, but I’ll throw it out there as an option. 

I guess the first aha moment was several months into our relationship when I discovered that he was still corresponding with his ex-fiancé.   Corresponding so much and in such a way that she believed they had an appointment for couples counseling to try and work things out.  I can’t remember the exact details, but he took a call from her when I was in the other room and it made me uneasy.  Then I snooped.  Then I confronted him.  Then he told me more details.  At this point a smart, mature person would have made a graceful exit while he figured things out.  In fact, I asked him if he wanted me to do that.  Of course he said no.   As you can imagine, this continued on for several more months – him talking & fighting with her, me still dating him.  I imagine she finally found strength and sanity, because it eventually did stop.

Another aha moment came months later, when were living together.  This moment gave me a scary view of his true personality (disordered as it is).   I was printing something on his printer, when it got jammed.   A normal person says, “oh, crap” and tries to fix it.  He became absolutely enraged!  I didn’t care about his things!  I was so stupid for putting too much paper in it!  On and on.  Then he grabs the printer and yanks the cables out and smashes it on the floor.  Of course I am crying hysterically, I have never witnessed such a rage in my whole life.  I came close to doing the right thing that night.  I went to  Target and bought a new printer, then told him to pack it along with the rest of his stuff and get out.  But I wouldn’t be writing this if that were the end of the story.  Of course he was sorry, it would never happen again, etc. 

But it did happen again. And again, and again until finally had my AHA!!! moment.   We were married with a one year old child.  I was packing my final bags two days before deploying with my reserve unit for nine months in the Middle East. Until this day, it was, “I support you, I’ll take care of everything, I’m so proud of you!”  Suddenly as his parents, our daughter, and my older daughter stood and watched, I became a “selfish fucking bitch for leaving your family!!!”    We all watched as my bags flew out of the third floor window of our home while the horrible screaming continued.  His parents helped me gather the kids and the luggage and before he realized what happened we fled the scene.  At that moment, while I was cursed out in such a violent manner in front of my children, I had my final AHA moment with him.

 I vowed at that moment that I was done.  But as I would discover, sometimes leaving is harder than staying.