How are Things?

Tag: toxic

  • Monday 1st December 2025

    Tonight I heard ‘Technically Missing’ from the Gone Girl Soundtrack. It is a piece I haven’t heard for close to three years, and hearing it again is like listening to an old argument. The piece is the music to Amy Dunne’s monologue of blue-flame rage against her husband. Both of them are as unpleasant as each other. Amy is not as clever as she thinks she is, her plan of revenge goes awry once it meet the real world. But the presentation of her rage is not sniggered at in the film, and that has made it unique.

    For myself, the music is almost a call to arms. Caught up as I was in the approaching black hole that was my ex-husband’s mental illness, the permission to be angry was an inspiration. Anger removed the freeze I was in. Anger made me move, made me plan, made me decide that enough was enough. Anger provided propulsion that got myself and my son out and away from the sickening sliding hatred of his father and into our own safe space. Anger was clear.

    I have been feeling a lot of anger lately. I have had a lot of time away from my counselor, and that may have had something to do with it. Nevertheless, I am enraged a lot of the time and I don’t think that I want very much to lose my anger.

  • Sunday 9th November 2025

    Today my son had a play date. He met up with a friend from his gym and they went bowling.

    What was impactful to me was seeing the family home of his friend. Being in a family home hurts me. There were photos of smiling children on the wall. Rooms where things could be stored, and cared for. A fire place to rest in front of. And a husband, who wanted to be there. Who didn’t hate everyone and everything. Who didn’t hate his wife so much he became mentally ill. There were cheerful children who didn’t have their shoulders up, spines spiking with fear. There was a happy life being lived there.

    I’ve been sad all day, since.

  • Tuesday 7th October 2025

    Today, my boss told me that her deputy will be joining us for all meetings.

    And she also said that she would be unavailable due to a medical procedure from this Thursday.

    Now, what do you make of that?

  • Monday 6th October 2025

    So, I am back in the somewhat sagging saddle. The charm that is work is the main priority for the moment but I am going to make something of this other side of myself. So I need to devote time, and passion, and interest in this. But that means staying up past 11, when I have been awake since 5am.

    So what? Did anyone say it was going to be easy? No, not a single one.

    But my life has been a series of wrong moves, brought about by a need to ‘make something of myself’. I need to find a pathway of accord, one that brings a new level of peace, rather than another dust covered thirst-inducing road that is empty of any meaning at all. I want flow, not force.

    Today I was back in it, exercising, showering, work. My context is off, though, I don’t recall the things that seemed so important. I met with my man from an old time, and I was aware that I had thought of him after our last conversation. No, that’s not true. I had dreamt of him. I dreamt of my loneliness ending. That’s not a euphemism, I dreamt that I was no longer lonely. I woke up aware that I was lonely.

    But the idea of a relationship is a horror.

    I am going to write up some notes. And then I am going to bed.

  • Tuesday 30th September 2025

    I returned to work this morning.

    I’d been away for nearly seven days. My return was marked by absolutely no-one, except for a single colleague who threw a ‘oh, hello, welcome back!’ over her shoulder. I went into my office and threw out the week old coffee from the coffee machine, and got on with it. Remember, you are nothing to these people, and they would not remember your name if you left tomorrow. My own direct line manager has said nothing to me.

    My son is equally the same; the food is prepared and the daily life continues on, so I’m the best ever. My goal as a parent is for my worth and importance in his life to become smaller and smaller, and my life needs more than that.

    So I am setting a goal. I am going to create a life that has worth to me and where I am able to create something I consider important to me. It will be self-directed and it will be based on self expression and creativity. I will be working much, much harder than I am right now, and I will get there.

    Tomorrow, we start.

  • Monday 29 September 2025

    I have covid for the last seven days.

    My son is finally returned to me, he rushed away from me into the arms of my ex-husband with an eagerness that said a great deal.

    Myself, I had a strong taste of what life will be like when he reaches adulthood, and as of yet, I’m not prepared for it.

    It brought home to me that I have a life so shallow it has the depth of a saucer. Work seeks only work, not happiness, and the relationship means nothing to me. The only texts were from people wanting things, and in my delirium I bluntly told them to go elsewhere. There were no attempts to find out how I was, by anyone.

    This is an empty life. At least it seems that way these days.

  • Monday 18th August 2025

    Nighttime. My son sleeps. Satie’s Gymnopedies 1 plays. The cat is sleeping beside me. I’m so worn out from being responsive to every living thing around me I dread the presence of another.

    Yesterday we came home from a visit with my 84 year old father. He has a new cat, a 4 month old kitten, that he has no idea how to treat. He has given it no toys, and shook it when it scratched him.

    He is a person who cannot give care, only accept it from others. He waited until my son and I had gone to bed (after I cooked, cleaned, tidied, etc), then proceeded to play erotica at such a loud volume (“HE TOOK OFF MY DRESS AS I PANTED WITH JOY”) I could hear it from the floor below. The following morning he told me over breakfast that I was fat .

    On the way back up the cat threw up on the car, making my son hysterical. Then, as we were nearly home, the cat defecated on the back seat, an event that horrified her as much as anyone else. It also meant I couldn’t rest. In 77 degrees I had to pull out the carpet cleaner and get to it, then wash it all out in the bath, then wash the bath. Then empty luggage, clean the cat of vomit, see to my son, and then rest. Only to discover we were out of milk, so I had to go out at 9.30pm again and get some.

    Today, thank goodness, I had a session with my counsellor. She’s been away and I’ve been away, and so it had been awhile. After speaking to her I felt some of the knot in my stomach and in my shoulders go down somewhat, but it is hard to keep my nervous system in check. My son flares up at everything at present, and there isn’t enough hyper-vigilance on the planet to keep him or me going. I wish I had the energy to cry, but that would mean feeling the pressure had come to a conclusion, and that is not yet the case.

  • Thursday 31st July 2025

    If you’re reading this, you are probably imaginary. No one is reading this; the stats remain flatlined, like the heart readout of a patient in a TV ER show. “I’m sorry, Doctor … we did all we could.” So you reading this, are all in my head. A busy bespectacled professional, hoisting a leather notebook out of a satchel, wondering how my day went today. A mom with the sound of happy children coming from another room. A wise old woman, long silver hair in plaits, patchwork quilt to work on as my words go on, a view of old trees outside the window.

    The last day of July. Here comes the commencement of the march towards Autumn, and what I suspect will be a very hard winter for the world. How has my July been, and this rare, unique time that I now exist in? My son is away from the house, with his father and the man I do not like to think of, not least as my ex-husband. I get more than four hours sleep. I exist in a schedule of my own making. I am rested. Unrushed, for me.

    I think that it has taken me days to get to this state, where my pre-frontal cortex is alert enough to contemplate and reflect properly. I need to use this time to think, to really think, and to remind myself of who I am. Who I want to be.

    There is an art to strategy, to ruminating, and it is about time I got back to it. I should sit in the back of the cave and think for a while, the choice to do so won’t be given to me forever.

    One last thing to think tonight; going without sleep makes you stupid, upset, and unable to plan. Get more sleep.

  • Friday 25th July 2025

    It’s Friday. I made it. I got through the interviews, and the meetings, and the work, and taking care of my son, and now it is Friday. Today, my son went to spend two weeks with his father, and I will get to sleep.

    His father lives with his parents, and has since we broke up, which was in 2021. He exploded our lives with viciousness and resentment; he had in fact been doing that for years, but had never pointed it at my son. It was an ordeal for me that had been going on for the best part of a decade.

    But then he did it to my son.

    My son. He was his father, but he was/is my son. I took care of him, I fed him, I worked from 5am during Covid so I could take of him, I dealt with all the schools. I was the parent. My then husband was also in the house.

    When he did that to my son he screamed at him, yelled at him, then walked out of the room as calm as a swiss knife returned to its slot, leaving a terrified child and myself in freeze/fawn mode, but aware that something was very wrong.

    I am not going to talk about that tonight.

    It is years later. He still lives with his parents, a situation I approve of as at least I know there are two other sane people in the house. I will speak to him every night on the phone. It’s alright. It’s all alright.

    He will be out of the house for two weeks. I will work, work out, and get to cry a lot. I will get to think about myself for a bit, and just… rest. The music can change tempo, be slower, kinder, more reflective.

    You know you have lived a life not many would chose when the idea of being alone is so utterly restful and kind, so peaceful!

    Peace, just peace.

    Good night all.

  • Friday 19th July 2025

    Finally, this week is over. I have been so tired and so uninspired this week, and now there is a chance to rest for a moment.

    I made an appointment with my councilor, a woman who by now knows me way too well. Then I had lunch with a fellow colleague where we got a chance to raise our concerns about senior management.

    Problematic person has done a lot of crying but has broken up with terrible person but I’ve gone ahead and notified security about his awful ex; if only because apparently my name was mentioned in the break up conversation. The Problematic person’s emotional wave has gone out from shore, and in fact is now heading back in: they have texted me to say they’re annoyed with the other people being annoyed with them. This is a mess, and I’m going to get myself out of it.

    Dinner was made by my son and it tasted amazing, mainly because he is a great kid. I’m listening to Amy Poehler and going to bed. Night all.