This is the worst year of my life

I have spent the past 5 months being sick, hating my life, loathing the people at work, and being so horrible to my husband that it wouldn't be at all surprising for him to shoot me one day.

Things are so bad now that anything at all sets me off, and I've trained my husband to be just as much of a bitch to me as I am to him. So we seem to constantly be strained with one another.

Last night I was so furious with him that I actually went to bed wishing him bad dreams and unrestful sleep. He was awful. Today I was cordial with him and that's all. And I've spent the entire morning feeling like shit even though I'm still angry with him.

And the people at work? My opinions, I've just been reminded, are ignored unless they fall directly into a very narrow description of my job. We've spent over three months making a decision about video games, which is now being overturned by teenagers. So, yeah, I'm a little upset that teenagers have more clout that I do, even though their arguments are the exact same arguments I made for 3 weeks in February...and was overruled.

This morning has been as close to hell as I've been in a very long time. And I've bitched and moaned and cried so many times this year that I don't feel like there is anyone I can talk to. The only thing keeping me going at this point is stubbornness. Otherwise, I'd've gone home and started drinking.

Even church isn't a refuge anymore.

In sum: I don't feel good (I'm not even sure I'd recognize 100% health if it bit me in the ass), I hate my husband, my 13-year-old is the most annoying child I know, my coworkers suck, I can't talk to my family about this because they'd just tell me to stop whining, and I can' t think of any friends whose patience I haven't already worn thin this year.

I either need a really long vacation, a retreat, or a gun.

Dreams

I had the strangest dream last night, about another blogger. He and a friend of mine have been phone pals for several months but haven't met in person; he is coming to visit her next week. He's not at all my type, although I find him very amusing to read. He's just an old adolescent, though: in his mid-30s and still all about "hooking up" and clubbing and so forth.

Last night I had this wack dream:

I picked him up at the airport (alone, our mutual friend wasn't there as is planned) and brought him home. Apparently, he was meeting my friend at my house. Except--as usual for dreams--my house wasn't really my house. I think it was a dorm, but my roommate was the hubby. And this guy and I ended up having sex...in a waterfilled bathtub...with the hubby just on the other side of the bathroom, unaware of our adventures.

Quick jump to sometime later. Blog-guy is gone, I'm worrying because I hooked up with him and now I have to tell my friend and apologize. At some point I was at church, drafting the apology letter during the service. Then I went to work, early, so I could finish the note. Unfortunately, my boss and her husband were there. They were bringing in gift bags of goodies for the staff, leaving them in one part of the building.....except where they were leaving the bags is in a different spot in this building. Totally different place, different layout, somehow both in the basement and on the first floor. We opened and a bunch of moms took the goodie bags and gave them to their kids. So the staff didn't get the bags; we had to split one. And I never did get the letter finished.

There were also some vague guilt feelings about the hubby, but I was so much more stressed about my friend being upset.

The kicker is, now I can't get this dream out of my head. That's why I'm writing about it here, to expiate it (I hope). I can't stop thinking about this guy, to the point of compulsively checking his blog and my email repeatedly (he and I have exchanged a total of 4 emails over the past 6 months, so it's not very likely I'd actually have a message from him). I've even caught myself mooning over his pictures (sent illicitly to me by my friend).

Did I mention that I'm not even remotely interested in him? I think he's kind of scummy and immature. Don't quite see what my friend sees in him, really.

OK, now I can kind of see the outline of a meaning for this. This helped.

On other subjects

Gossip alert not about him

Yep, as expected, Jenni shows up at 12:15 at work. Tells Miss W. that she’s here to apologize. So now the gossip begins. I can’t talk to her here. There is no way in the world. Call me, yes, but I can’t have this conversation at work. And I turn around at my desk to find that she’s standing across the room (in the public area) staring at me. Telling Miss W. everything, I’m sure. Ai.

What to do? I suppose I will have to call her. But I’m going to call our minister first. I can’t be in conversation with her without someone else there to mediate. I can't even accept an apology. I will need to apologize too, but I must make it clear how upsetting this is to be doing over and over. There is no call for her to be so consistently… un-Christian. Or, if you wish to be secular, negative. I can't take her talking him down (only I can do that) and I can't take her summation of a process that ultimately worked as Satanic because it made her cry. Geez, as upsetting as last night was, I wouldn't characterize her as evil.

But most of all, with all the other drama in my life, I simply can't take her presence in my life. And if that means I withdraw from all church-related activities, so be it. It's just too much. As I said over and over last night: I can't do this anymore.

Ho ho ho

Watched TAR last night and then I took a bath. Read a junky book in the tub. Went back downstairs to say goodnight; he was watching an astronomy show. Watched with him for awhile and chatted. Since I'm going to work early tomorrow (today), he asked me not to wake him up when I go. He took the day off to 'babysit.' Everything was normal.

Went to bed and worked on a crossword till I fell asleep, around 11. At 3 I woke up for some reason. As I was drifting back off I hear roaring from downstairs. I go down, making sure he knows I'm coming, calling, "Are you ok?" He's in the kitchen. We hug and he assures me he's all right.

He's drunk. And he's angry. Of course, because the second always happens when the first does.

I say, "What's wrong?" He keeps saying he's fine, until finally I ask why he was yelling. He steps back and glares at me and says, "My fucking counter's broken." What counter?? I'm too bleary to know what he's talking about. He picks it up and throws it across the kitchen.

I say, "OK!" and start turning to go back to bed. He says, "Good ni-i-ight!" with the implication that I'm walking out on him. I turn and say, "I'm sorry, good night. I'm going back to sleep."

Wait. No response. He goes toward the bathroom. I go upstairs. Not to sleep, to wait. I hear him sit back down in his recliner. The volume of the TV goes up. I lie still, my brain rushing around my head. I think about how scared he makes me. I think about Al-Anon and AA. I think about attorneys I know, and reject them all. I think, "No. No more. No more. No more." Over and over. I think about my EAP at work. I think and think and think until I hear the recliner shift again.

I roll over as if I'm asleep. Sure enough, he comes to bed. It's 3:45 He isn't drunk enough to fall into bed, but he goes right to sleep. Or passes out. Whatever.

I lie there. I wait for morning. My alarm is set for 5:30, but by 4:55 I'm crawling out of my skin with thoughts. What am I going to do? I have to get him to stop, or get him out of the house. What about our minister? Can I trust him? I get up and dress for work, leave a note on the inside of my kid's bedroom door asking him (the boy) to call me when he gets up. I pack up my stuff for work and leave.

He won't get up until after 8, at the earliest, unless the kid wakes him. If he is awakened, he will yell at the kid. The kid won't know why. It will be a shit day for him.

What am I doing to my kid by not handling this differently? Better, really. What am I doing to myself? What about our marriage? I love him when he's sober, most of the time. As soon as he drinks, even just one drink, I get twitchy. We talk and talk about it, and still he does this.

Help.

Goin home

OK, a productive day. No gossip. Nose to grindstone.

Anxiety attack about home at lunchtime. Talked to him, eventually told him I hate walking in on him and the kid fighting, and on him with a drink in his hand.

Talked to him at 5--he's sober. I can tell on the phone.

So that's good.

Last night and today

We watched our show on tape as a family, with his koozy-cup of gin on ice. After the kid went to bed, I took a bath while he watched some car-creation show and drank gin. I went to the basement, watched the end of "Airport" with him, and then went to bed. He was uncoordinated and slurry. He's done half a bottle this week. I can't stand to be around him.

Woke up about 3--alone in bed. He passed out/slept in the recliner again. I couldn't sleep--read for awhile, last week's Entertainment Weekly.

He came to bed sometime between me turning the light back off and 5:30. I got up at 6. He got up around 8, stinking of gin-sweat. Ugh.

Today I work till about 6. I wonder what the odds of him drinking before I get home would be. I really don't need to wonder--I know he will have had at least one drink. Hah. One drink that never ends from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Maybe I'm wrong.

But I'm probably not.