early november

dear ray,

i tried to explain the hurt you have caused but i know that you can't hear me over the sound of your mental illness and addiction. without your understanding and acknowledgement i feel like i can't move on. i can't get out of this space in my life that is entirely dedicated to you, your trauma, your chaos. i see you joking on facebook about drinking a fifth of vodka or smoking pot and getting high and it makes me feel so hurt i wish i was dead. it's like you're spitting on all the weeks of sweat and stress and labor that i gave to you, to get you into the next program, out of the next hospital, the next referral, the next med change. i called in favor after favor for you, networked you through to the best doctors, fought for your visibility and for every provider to respect your identity and your history. and you paid me back by putting me in danger repeatedly, forcing me to end our marriage, buying coke, getting in bar fights. for you i emptied my entire savings account, money that was earmarked for our wedding. it is the most deeply unloving and betraying thing you could have ever done to me. and to hear you say that you think this is my fault-- any of it-- that this is my illness or my responsibility-- shows me just how far from reality you have allowed yourself to go. you took my future from me, my marriage, my best friend, and the only chance i ever had at experiencing family. and i know you have taken so much away from yourself too-- you have lost me, our relationship, our home, our dog, the support i would have given you when your dad dies. everything good, trampled on the ground by your selfish and stubborn inability to shine a light on the dark parts of yourself that hold you back and make you hurt everyone who loves you.

i see you spiraling, wrapping yourself up in lies and self justification, and i feel jealous. i feel jealous that you can fall so far and still have anyone come get you, feed you, house you. i feel jealous that anyone tells you they love you when i am alone in this house without my soulmate, the only person i trusted. i have had to learn over and over again that family is a lie, that love is pain, that no one will come for me except me. you have proven me right, again, when all our relationship you tried to show me i was wrong.