Today I am in no man’s land, numb. Makes a change, I guess.
I’ve spent the last 6 days in bed on the whole . Covid has wiped me out.
My last post was in a moment of uplifting. It didn’t last.
So this…from this point on, is either the beginning of the end or, the end and a new beginning. And whilst I am not in complete control, my decisions from this point could potentially sway it either way.
I’ve really hurt and upset him this time.
He’s not faultless, no. But my reactions and my irresponsible method of dealing with everything…well, that has caused this issue.
Let me tell you what happened.
Two days ago, I was feeling a little better – not needing to sleep all day, just pockets of it. At one such semi-awake moment, I decided to get my laptop to watch something as I had uncomfortably survived with my phone the day before.
As it was loading, I realised that I hadn’t used it since before my trip to see Wildcard. Sure enough, as it started, Messenger opened.
In the week leading up to Christmas, I’d had an issue with my phone draining when I plugged in the charger. This had led me to downloading the app on my laptop. The issue, is that I hadn’t deactivated the status button.
If I see someone is online but hasn’t read my message, it unnerves me – and that goes for anyone, not just Wildcard. Admittedly, in the early start of a relationship, I find this particularly hard. With him, to be fair, there have been very rare occasions when he hasn’t replied quickly. He always replies and usually in a good time. But, undeniably, not being able to see when he is active has helped me manage my expectations of this. It’s been turned off for over three years and for good reason.
So, the Messenger screen opened automatically as I clearly hadn’t shut it down before Christmas, and I could see that he’d been active 15 minutes ago. He’d last spoken to me over an hour before.
It shouldn’t matter, should it? Who am I to dictate who he speaks to and how? But, when that shock rolls through your body and you feel sick and scared, you’re not thinking of that.
I shut the laptop and stewed a little. He uses his sim/normal phone to message and call his parents and work colleagues and main friends. One brother uses WhatsApp to call. The other does use Messenger but not at this time of day, usually in the evening.
Listen to me trying to justify and catalogue what was normal! But that is what I did.
So then the adrenalin built, my negative thinking built and collected and spiralled. Who was he speaking to?
I opened up the laptop again. He was now active again. He was supposed to be in work.
I franatically searched for alternatives. If he was on Facebook, would this mean that it would show as active even if he’s not on Messenger?
I’m building desperation, I messaged my married friend. I knew that if he called me anytime soon, this irrational behaviour would just burst out. I didn’t even want to speak to him at this point.
She was calm, she was rational. She went through the unreliability of using that little green button as proof from her own experiences, as well as pointing out that it could literally be anyone.
I calmed a little but my head was buzzing. I decided to journal.
It was the worst thing I could have done. I wrote him a non-letter. I poured out every anxiety and fear, everything I worried about and kept inside – even things I haven’t written on here. By the end of it, instead of making me feel calmer, I felt worst. I’d built a spiky defence of accusation and hurt around myself, not released the demon thoughts into the ether. Everything negative was now up front and centre in my head. I even tried to counteract by writing a positive one but I couldn’t, the negativity was now like a loaded gun.
Yes, I did keep checking. I watched him go offline and later come back on again.
I managed to keep hold of myself when he called after work. Maybe still having Covid helped hide what was threatening underneath.
Unfortunately, when we had a usual evening call, that was not the case.