Meltdown: Productive

This weekend ended with an emotional meltdown on my part, that got passed on to Shelby on Monday night. On the bright side, I got something out in the open that had been bothering me, and I also think we as a group are getting better at fighting in a more productive way.

Saturday night my team had a game, and we took a rough beating, but left with the satisfaction that we had accomplished the non-points-related goals we had set for ourselves. On Sunday, Aiden, Shelby, and I hung out at the pool with my derby wife, Ninja, and had a lovely relaxing afternoon. Then Ninja went to a movie with another friend, and the three of us and the kid had dinner and drinks at the house. After dinner I cleaned up and did dishes - our usual balance, since Shelby provides the food and Aiden cooks.

When I finished the dishes, I realized the house was completely silent, and went around looking for everyone. I found the two of them outside smoking pot (the kid was in bed). I made a "WTF" gesture at Aiden through the door, and he just smiled obliviously.

Sometimes when I get angry I rage and pout and stomp off in a huff...but when something is really, seriously wrong, there's a creepy calm that falls over me. I went upstairs, packed my bag, returned to the kitchen, grabbed my computer and my derby gear and all the things that I had left around, and packed up my car. My next action in the past would've been to drive away without saying goodbye, but I had promised both of them that I would work on opening my mouth and speaking when there was a problem, so I went back inside.

I was finishing my drink when they reappeared. "We've been plotting against you," Shelby said. I wasn't mad at her, so I managed not to lose my shit. I just stared at her, downed the last sip of gin, and put the glass in the sink. Aiden went upstairs, and Shelby went to do something in the living room. I took a deep breath, resisted the urge to run one more time, and went upstairs. Aiden was in the bedroom.

"How is it okay," I asked, "to go outside and get fucking high while I do your dishes? What am I, some kind of slave?" I don't like addressing problems with words because I tend to fall apart, and I was losing it fast. I plowed through the rest of my statement before I lost the ability to speak. "That is so disrespectful. I am so hurt right now." And I burst into tears.

Aiden looked shocked. "I didn't mean it like that. I totally see how it came across that way. I'm sorry," he said. Shelby appeared behind me. I don't know if she had heard me or if she's that intuitive, but she immediately knew what was wrong. She took a seat in a chair. I inched toward the door, but Aiden shut it and put his arm against it, probably knowing I was on the verge of making a break for it. I twitched and considered asking him to open it again, but instead I backed away from him as he stepped forward, trapping myself in the corner made by the wall and the bureau.

The starting accusation sounds silly unless you know what's behind it, which is a lot. They prodded me with some questions, and once I got going, I almost couldn't stop. The summary is that Aiden displays addictive behaviors that are triggery to me. Not only do I worry about him, but I worry more and in a more deeply personal way than many people would, because my father was an alcoholic and his addiction tore apart our family before eventually killing him.

I first became aware that he was an addict when I was fourteen, and over the next six years, I watched things fall apart. Our family grew strained. My mom tended toward the "see what consequences your actions have wrought" type of spouse, and harbored a lot of anger toward him, which I adopted. He went to rehab three times, and was never clean for more than six months. He told us he had ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease) and only had a couple of years to live. Then it turned out he was lying. Then he had cancer. But he lied about that too.

My mom kicked him out of the house and he moved to the next town. He had lived there about two years when he went to the emergency room because he was having trouble walking. While there, he had a seizure, and they sedated him. He never woke up again.

I'm not afraid to tell anyone who asks what happened. The usual explanation is, "My dad was an alcoholic with PTSD from the Vietnam war and he drank himself to death." I can say it with absolutely no emotion, and I do so fairly often. My mom tried to tell me that it wasn't appropriate that people know that, and I basically told her to go fuck herself. I refuse to perpetuate the lies with which alcoholic families are so often riddled. I'm not ashamed of who he was or what he did, and if his story can help someone else, I will be happy to tell it a million times.

But I forget that people don't see the emotion behind it. I'm not a fragile person, and I have a pretty solid awareness of my own feelings that allows me a fair amount of control over them. This is undoubtedly the most triggery subject in my life by far, but even then, 99% of the time it's not a problem. I drink; my friends drink; it doesn't concern me.

I started noticing a while ago - actually, the second time that I ever hung out at Aiden and Shelby's place - that he exhibited behaviors around pot that made me uncomfortable. It was a small thing at first, and I ignored it. Very gradually the small things collected and started to bother me more.

The time she asked him, "You're usually itching to go smoke a bowl by now, what's wrong with you?" The time he said he had to go smoke before we worked on the kitchen or he wouldn't be able to work. The several times he's gone to smoke before sex, like he needs to be high to enjoy us. The time she told me, "I just do it because he does it. He needs it." The time I asked him what would happen if he didn't smoke before sex and he couldn't answer me. The time he ran off after sex and before sleeping to go smoke. The time he left me alone at fire camp to go smoke with complete strangers after we had just been warned by the coordinators about the zero-tolerance policy that would get us kicked out for any substance use. The chronic cough I don't think he even realizes he has. The fact that he'll go do it by himself even when Shelby won't go with him. The illogical amount of money he spends on drugs when his boss doesn't even pay him half the time, and I've heard Shelby guilt him about it.

It adds up to a picture that gives me a fucking panic attack. And I felt like I couldn't say anything, for several reasons... (1) It's not something I understand. Pot doesn't do anything to me, so I can't gain any direct empathy for what's happening when he's high. I just know he's different, and it freaks me out. (2) It's not my business to tell him what to do. I don't want to be the controlling bitch who makes demands. (3) I don't have a problem with drinking, and that should be my trigger if anything is, so I feel kind of hypocritical complaining about the pot when I'm happy to drink all night long.

But my emotions finally overcame my logic, and I sobbed and yelled and got icky feelings all over everyone. Shelby was amazing. She sat down and listened and answered my questions and agreed or disagreed where it was relevant, without getting emotional or taking any sides. When she said, "Oh yeah, his addictive personality drives me crazy," I almost started crying again, this time in relief. I wasn't making it up out of my damaged paranoia.

Her theory is that it's actually the cigarettes that are driving Aiden's addictive behaviors and not the pot; that he smokes pot as an excuse for a nicotine fix. She said she had stopped going outside with him recently because she didn't want to condone it. I had noticed that, and had been grateful to her every time she stayed inside, but it didn't change his behavior at all.

They both said they knew it had bothered me to a certain extent, but hadn't known how much (said Aiden) or what to do about it (said Shelby). Aiden said the fact that it bothered me enough to make me freak out and cry - something I don't think he's ever seen me do - made a big impression. Shelby told me it was sweet that I cared that much about him, and I said that was kind of embarrassing. She asked why, then thought about it and said I was totally right, it was embarrassing, and we had a laugh.

After many words and many tears, the going-forward is that they're going to quit cigarettes and see what happens from there. I told him the most important thing is to be honest with me. I understand that quitting is not a straight-line process; there will be slip-ups, and that's okay. What would absolutely not be okay is lying to me about it. My experience with addiction has given me a pretty bleak view on how it goes, particularly on how many lies will be told to salvage the addiction at the expense of the loved ones. I'm aware that that experience was not had with Aiden, however, and I'm going to do my best not to smear it all over him.

I spent Monday in a truck with two of the guys from work. We drove 800 miles between 5am and midnight to pick up some equipment in another state. When we decided in the afternoon to do the whole trip in one day rather than staying over, I told Aiden I'd have the next day off, and he called in to work so we could hang out. We got back to town just shy of midnight, and I took a shower and snuck into bed next to Aiden. When Shelby got up and he asked where she was going, I realized no one was actually asleep and something was fishy.

"She's mad at me," Aiden said when she had stepped out the door.

"Oh? Why?"

"Because I had a hard time with the rule when it was in place." He was referencing something that happened back in February, when Shelby had been feeling insecure about my presence in the relationship and tried to deal with it by making a rule that Aiden and I couldn't have sex unless she was around. It went badly for everyone. We didn't actually break the rule, but we had a very hard time following it, and since most of it was a grey area anyway, I'm not sure that we entirely obeyed it, either.

"Oh. Yeah. That came up in conversation last night." I'd mentioned in passing while coming off my own meltdown that I'd had to push him off me once to stay within the bounds of the rule. Shelby said later that she hadn't thought about it at the time, but the next day it had floated to the surface again and she had become angry, feeling that he had tried to take credit for more trust than he'd actually earned.

After a bunch of restlessness and Aiden chasing Shelby around the house, I finally dropped off to sleep. The next morning she had gone to work by the time I woke up, and he came back to bed to snuggle and make puppy eyes at me. I would've been fine with discussing what was going on for a while, but experience told me that he wouldn't snap out of his pouty state until she decided to stop being mad at him, and that could be days. I considered going home rather than wasting my day off, then thought maybe we could still go do something fun.

Then he asked me if I'd be willing to work on the kitchen with him. After an 18-hour work day, on my day off, in his girlfriend's kitchen, in a desperate attempt to make her less mad at him...I said hell no. Not my job, in every possible sense. I went in to work instead, deciding to take a different day off that would hopefully not be wasted.

Shelby messaged me as I was driving out of town and said she hoped she hadn't ruined my day. I said it was already ruined but I wasn't mad at her, that I had left and was going to take a different day off. She suggested I go back, and I explained why that wouldn't be helpful. She was apologetic.

"I didn't mean to ruin your day...but I guess ruining his kind of does that." I said not to worry about it; I probably would've been every bit as pissed in the same situation. She explained to me what she was upset about - that he does things that seem sneaky and sets off her paranoia triggers - and when I got to work, I responded with my own side - that I understood her anger, but the rule had been excessively difficult to follow. She understood that too, and we moved on.

I love how logical she can be when angry. It really works much better for me than trying to empathize emotionally in the stereotypically "female" way. She was concerned that I saw her as naive and stupid, knowing what had happened and that she didn't know about it. I said absolutely not; if anything, that situation makes me the really stupid one, because anything that he does to her, he will more than likely do to me too, eventually...and yet I hang around. Now who's naive? Shelby laughed and said that we're both dumb, but at least we get along.

Aiden also apologized when I told him I was annoyed about his kitchen request. He said he never means to trample the flowers in the garden, but sometimes he does, and then flattens everything trying to make it better. Awkward Turtle stumbles through the room, bumping into walls, knocking over chairs, and apologizing for his clumsiness...