There are only so many things a person can take before they break. Sometimes, there’s only so much a person can take.
This is her story:
When our son was a baby and you went through that rehab program, they sat me down for Family Day and made me come up with an ultimatum to “help” you with your sobriety.
“If you go back to drinking and X happens, I’ll leave.”I hated it. I didn’t want to say anything like that. I believed there was nothing you and I couldn’t get through together. We love each other very much, and I could never picture a scenario where I would need to leave you.
Since then, you’ve had several medical scares, three suicide attempts, and a second, more intense rehab. You had that spell last winter, where for three days you had no idea who or where you were. Then, after a year of sobriety, you went back to drinking again. I’ve been there for the hospitalizations, your treatments, the roller coaster of your mental illness, and the nightmares caused by the traumas of the things you have seen and done in your past.
I stood by you and loved you through all of it.
I can’t do it anymore.
It’s been a very long time since I’ve been able to really confide in you anything going on with me. You can’t handle it. I had a major emotional upheaval last summer and I can’t even tell you about it because you would never be able to deal with it. It’s still continuing, and it is gaining in intensity.
It’s causing me constant distress, and you have no idea. Because of that, I had a nervous breakdown last winter. I was even having panic attacks. I’m taking antidepressants and seeing a counselor every week to deal with what’s going on with me. You know about my counseling and medication, but you don’t know the real reason why I need them.
While I was still fragile from my nervous breakdown, another horrible incident happened. We were constantly being taken advantage of by your friend. At one point, I was sick with the flu, but you still couldn’t say no to his request. But due to your drinking and your mental illness, you were unable to deal with the responsibility you had taken on that night.
Still very sick, I had to go take care of it and I got stuck in a blizzard. Between my emotional stuff, the flu, all the constant worry about you, and the terror of the white-out blizzard, I had a mini-stroke the next day.
You couldn’t even handle calling for paramedics even though I was incapacitated.
What if it had been something worse? What if it had been a full-blown stroke, or a heart attack, and being able to know you have to call 911 for me could literally mean the difference between my life and my death? What would you do if I died? You can’t even take care of yourself, how are you going to take care of the kids and make sure the bills get paid?
You’ve admitted that you have no hope of being able to quit drinking. You’ve written off rehab, calling it a “temporary fix.” You won’t go to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and you won’t take any steps to try to stop drinking on your own. Then there was that one night last spring when you were drunk and admitted to me that you still think about suicide all the time.
You promptly denied it once you were sober, but considering that you listed all the ways you had thought about doing it, I’m pretty sure your confession was the truth.
Without you finding a way to stop drinking, it’s only going to continue to get worse and worse. It’s to the point now where we live inside the story of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde because you’re a totally different person when you’ve been drinking all day on the weekends.
I know your brain is a scary mess. I know I couldn’t handle five minutes inside your head. You have been through things so horrible that I can’t even process them. It’s no wonder the worst horror movie doesn’t bother you – you’ve been through worse.
It feels like the Grim Reaper has been following you around as long as I’ve known you. On top of all your mental and medical issues, you’re so accident prone. I’ve lost track of all the times I felt like I was looking at the last months, weeks, or even hours of your life.
It has all led to me having to think about your death constantly. I’ve had to plan for the worst. If you were to die in your sleep tonight, I know exactly what to do. I know what to do in regards to your funeral and burial. I know where the kids and I will go to mourn, lick our wounds, and then regroup. I have a plan for what will happen once I get back on my feet. I have hope for a beautiful future.
That future no longer has you in it.
Our kids need at least one stable parent. If things keep going the way they are, I won’t be mentally or physically healthy enough to take care of them. I can’t keep worrying about you. I can’t keep taking care of you.
You and I both believe in an afterlife. I believe that once you have died, you will finally have the peace you’ve never had. I hate that I think about your death all the time. It makes me sick that I have to admit to myself that your death is what’s best for all of us – you, so you can have peace, me, so I can become healthy again, and the kids, so they don’t have to watch you destroy yourself.
I’m purging the house because I don’t want to move all that crap in the basement again. I’ve started a list of the things I will sell when you’re gone. I’ve made my arrangements for where the kids and I will go. I’ve looked into schools there for them. I’ve even figured out places I’m going to apply for jobs. And meanwhile, I pray that God will be merciful and let you die peacefully in your sleep.
Because I know there is only so much more I can take. If I have to break down and just leave, it will break your heart.
And that will definitely lead to you killing yourself.