(March, 2012: Working on indexing/categorizing pieces I've blogged. Transferring this piece from my once-public blog, versions.)
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october, 2009
James shares via chat that he is having a health problem. I don't give advice, but I let him know that rice water has helped me before. He wants the recipe. I look it up in one my nutrition books and type the information back to him.
While I'm chatting with James, Darcy comes back out to the porch. She is now off the phone. She walks over to the smoking area, her space where she often sits to talk on the phone and enjoy the surroundings.
"You cleaned up my ashes, " she states with disappointment. She becomes upset and sounds angry. "This is my space. I'd thought of writing you a note to not touch my things; I should have written the note. Never put my cigarettes on my papers. Those are my papers. This is my corner. You said it was my space." She is angry, but contained. She isn't hollering, but firm.
I respond firmly, "Darcy, I cleaned up my porch."
I have no idea what she means about putting her cigarettes on her papers; I hadn't done that. Perhaps she means the small decorative saucer for an ashtray that has the 1/2-smoked ciggie in it? I don't ask. I did tell her it was her space; I guess she took it literally. I feel guilty but hide it.
She abruptly grabs the items from her space and walks with a determined gate into the house. I think she feels violated. I tell myself I didn't do anything wrong; all I did was clean my porch. I'd even thought she might appreciate it; that must have been naive of me.
I go back to chat with my good friend James, from Australia.
After a few minutes I hear a dish break, outside, down in the driveway. It sounds like it broke in the garbage container, the big one that we put the house trash in for sanitation pick up. Did Darcy just break my dishes? I hope she didn't break my tiny decorative saucer she was using as an ashtray. I turn to the wooden end table; the saucer is still there. The other items (her papers, her cigarette packs, the sage bundle, and the china bowl where the sage was placed) are gone.
Somehow I communicated to James or he picked up that something was going on. Maybe I told him that I think she just broke my dish. I tell him I'll be right back.
I walk into the house. I feel confused. Do I check on Darcy? Do I dare look in the garbage container? Do I walk out the front door and around the house? Do I go back out to the porch and walk that direction? Do I pretend I didn't here the dish break?
I decide to go out the front door, around the house, and look in the garbage container. There is the china bowl, shattered in the bottom of the container.
Darcy walks out as I am peering into the container. I'm not angry, but I need to let Darcy know she is behaving abusively. I can't let this incident pass. She needs to come to terms with her behavior.
I recall to myself when years back I realized I was being verbally and emotionally abusive to my husband; I'd even started punching his arm, though his firm physique hardly felt my petite punches. It was the physical punches that helped me realize my own behavior at the time. I'd get angry with him because he wouldn't emotionally respond. When I realized I'd fallen prey to my own emotional vandalism, I went to the bookstore and found a book on emotional abuse for abusers as well as the abused. There were lots of books for the abused, but I only found one for abusers. When I began reading it, not only did I recognize myself but also The Way, under Martindale's reign. At the time, I was still too blind and loyal to The Way to see the emotional blackmail and other tactics prior to and beyond the years of Martindale. Eventually I came to see those too. I worked with the book's exercises and with my psychologist to help me stop the abuse I was laying on my husband.
"Darcy, why did you break my bowl, a bowl you never even asked if you could use?" I tried to keep my tone of voice level.
Darcy becomes angrier and hollers at me as we stand in my driveway, "Your bowl?!? That bowl was on the back deck with dirt in it! You wouldn't ever eat out of it. It's not like it was a good bowl." She grimaces as her voice inflection fluctuates, it's almost like a growl. I thought of my mother, the times she would glare at me with almost a fierce hatred or jealousy in her eyes and voice.
"Ah, I didn't realize it was that bowl." I respond, tempted to apologize; but I don't. Regardless if it was dirty or not, she still shouldn't have broken the bowl. Perhaps she had dropped it. But she's not dropped other items since she's been here.
I take a deep breath. I feel that I need to confront her behavior head on. "Darcy," I pause. She looks at me and I at her. "Your behavior on the porch was abusive," I state seriously but not angrily. I feel as if I am speaking with an adolescent or young teen in a tantrum. I had felt that way before with Darcy; so had my husband. I don't think ill of that; I've felt like an adolescent for decades, until the past eight months or so. Sometimes I still feel that way, but not as often.
Darcy becomes livid with my statement. She walks around me, off the driveway and into the back yard. She begins yelling at me, backing away from me into the yard, pointing her finger at me, screaming, "Carol you are the one that's abusive!!! You are abusive for calling be abusive!! I'm afraid of you Carol!! I'm afraid of you a lot!!"
I contain my composure. I can't allow myself to engage and get pulled into this emotional battle. "Then it's time for you to make arrangements to leave," I state firmly. I am really trying to keep tabs on myself to not respond emotionally. I do feel some anger, and that's o.k., as long as I don't act out.
Her eyes get big. She is in a state of disbelief that I have told her it's time for her to make arrangements for departure. We had discussed in the past weeks about her leaving and that if things got to be too much we wouldn't throw her out, but would let her know she needed to make arrangements to leave. I had also told her she could stay up until six months, unless my daughter needed to come back home or something. This episode had crossed a line, a line that scared me.
The flame became a bon fire. Darcy's voice continued at high volume. I was concerned her rage might escalate.
Somewhere in the commotion I went back to my computer. James was still there in chat and had typed to me, "I just tried to call you." "I didn't hear the phone ring," I typed back. "I'm leaving my house. Will you be around in 30 minutes?" "I'll be here," he types back, "I've opened the private area at the forum so we can discuss what's been happening."
James was again holding my hand through a tumultuous flare-up with someone, Darcy, recovering from cultic and abusive lifestyle(s). He understood the scenario and typical symptoms and has held my hand, online and on the phone, a lot the past two years when I had dealt with my own flare-ups and with others'. I had done lots of work with myself and had pretty much rid myself of these toxic-type relationships.
Darcy follows me to the porch as I clear my ritual bill-paying area; I never did get to paying my bills. I don't recall the exact order of events, but I do recall some of the accusations and her throwing my faults at me. I don't know how much time elapses, I just know I need to get away. I address some of Darcy's words and try to communicate with her, but to no avail; emotions are too heated. At some point I start responding with smart-ass comments agreeing with her blame and fault-finding toward me, but I don't raise my voice. I get the feeling she wants me to engage; my smart-ass comments are the closest I come to the engagement.
She follows me inside the house and out to the garage as I collect my things to leave. Again, the glare in her eyes brings to mind my mother's glare some years after Dad had his wreck. I'll never forget Mom's hateful glare with jealous piercing eyes that caused me an internal shutter. When I was a child, I recall thinking Mom was Alfred Hitchcock in disguise. These feelings were lurking within me as Darcy continued with her verbal goads.
I feel like a badger's prey. I feel like a floating cosmonaut that is trying to avoid being sucked into a black hole, a black hole that wants to be filled, that wants to be whole or implode. I feel like a contaminated piece of DNA, a lump of ugly fat; yet so very small compared to the vastness of a great dark void trying to pull me into dangerous territory.
Once I drive out of the driveway I begin to tremble. I shed a few tears. My voice is shaky as I call my counselor. I get his voice mail.
I go over the scenario in my mind, the accusations Darcy screamed at me. My responses to Darcy through what just took place. I go over the past seven weeks, the highs and the lows. Red flags that I had dismissed in what I had thought were acts of empathy and compassion. Were they? I question myself wondering if I've been abusive, not understanding enough, not tough enough. I don't trust my own judgment. I don't feel safe. I feel guilty for telling her she needs to make arrangements. Red flags that I can no longer ignore. But hell, I just had to leave my own home. I'm confused. I review the things I know about abuse, how it works, the patterns. Red flags that I can no longer lower, no longer rationalize as someone injured going through layers of grief and healing; the price was too high for me and my family.
It was around 5:15 PM when I left. I didn't return home until after midnight.
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