Wednesday 5 May 2010

Not Happy

I haven’t felt like posting in a while.

For one thing it has been really busy and I have been travelling around the country working on various election events. I have a couple more, one later today and then another on Friday which could be a celebration do or a sorry everyone, we didn’t make it but you were brilliant event . It really should be an exciting time and I should be riding the wave of success as, so far (touch wood), everything has gone very well. I watch all the younger staff who are working on their first election events and they have so much enthusiasm, but I’m just going through the motions with that false smile on my face.

In truth, I feel I’m being dragged back to that pit of depression that I have worked so hard to stay away from, what with the therapist and some soul-searching posts on this blog. It feels like I have said so much recently, digging right down inside of me, that I’ve been left feeling a bit empty. I didn’t think I had anything worthwhile left to say. So, I was going to write a dutiful post urging everyone to go out to vote, no matter who they support. Because this election, every vote will count to make sure the right party are in power.

However, my dear friend, Nancy has been on my mind recently.

She is the same age as me and has three children, but last year she discovered she was pregnant….with twins, They were due in February but Max and Maisie had other ideas and arrived early in January. They weren’t in the special care baby unit for very long. Although they were both tiny (and oh, so cute) they are both strong fighters, like their mother, and so she had them home at the beginning of February.

During the pregnancy, she often confided in me that she didn’t think she wanted the babies and couldn’t face the thought of putting her life aside again to look after them. She said she knew it was selfish and she hated herself for those thoughts but that she couldn’t help it. I have to admit I understood what she meant. This time of our lives is when we see the light. Our babies have grown into young adults and are about to set off on their own and we get to discover ourselves again. I have loved every minute of being a mother (well almost!) but having to start over again would be something I would find incredibly difficult too.

However, after the twins arrived and for that brief time when they needed special attention, Nancy was in a frenzy, praying that they would be OK and begging for forgiveness that she could even have considered that she didn’t want them. I was with her on the day they took Max out of the incubator and put him in her arms and she looked like a little girl again, lost in wonder and love as she cradled her beautiful new son properly for the first time. I’m welling up now thinking of that moment and how any feelings of doubt were long gone. She has since been a great mother to the twins and of course her three teens have been a real help and so, surprisingly, has her husband, Will.

They got married when they were in their early twenties but he has never fully appreciated just how lucky he was to be with a truly beautiful woman. In fact, because he had got himself a successful model, I think he thought he could get any woman he wanted. And so he did. He has been unfaithful to her so many times and they have split up and got back together more times than I can remember. The thing is, as much as I should hate him, I have to admit that I have always had a soft spot for him. He is great fun, incredibly good-looking and a real charmer and when he is not being a complete arse and looking at other women, he is an amazing husband and father. It is because of that, she always takes him back. And every time she takes him back, she gets pregnant! And he promises to change and he does for a bit and then he blows it. And now, when the twins are not even four months old he has done it again. A few days ago, he told her that he had met someone else. That this time it was different and that he was moving out. That he was sorry and that he would always be there for her and the children but that this woman understood him in a way that she never has and that Nancy would be better off without him.

We all spent the day with her on Bank Holiday Monday. She is trying to be very practical and matter of fact about how it has happened once too often and that she is used to it and that this time it really is over and she will never take him back but she won’t deny him access to the children and that she can cope because she has before …but the fact that she kept dissolving into floods of tears betrayed just how devastated she is.

Ewan was so lovely to Nancy and told her that he would be speaking to Will to find out what the hell is going on. He is a quite a wise thing really and he was very hands on with the twins, helping Sasha and Kyle to bathe them and put them to bed. But since we came home that night, even though he has done nothing wrong, I can’t bring myself to talk to him. I know he is confused.I haven’t slept for the last couple of nights and have been in a silent, seething rage that seems even worse this morning.

Sasha has always laughingly called me a man-hater but I realised last night that there is such truth in that. I am so angry with Will. But I’m also angry with men in general that they always seem to come out on top no matter what they do. And I’m angry that like so many women, I am weak and pathetic and have let them do me such emotional damage over the years. I know that yet again I have turned this round to be about me but it has triggered something deep inside of me.

I am seriously pissed off and I want to behave like a child and have a tantrum.

9 comments:

  1. This is so true. I often feel like I'm living in a man's world which I resent. And I constantly worry that my husband is going to leave me for someone younger and more attractive, despite me being 7 years his junior and the best he'll ever get (even if I do say so myself!)

    As for voting, I posted my vote several days ago so have been hoping that Mr Brown doesn't do anything else stupid to change my mind. Any idea who Sue is?

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  2. Well, if it helps (which it probably doesn't) your post had me seething too. Will is a complete git. I don't care how charming he is - his charm is just a mask for his selfishness and cowardice. Does he have commitment problems? His wife has just given birth to twins for God's sake! His every instinct should be telling him to be there to support and provide. Bringing up one baby is hard enough work let alone two! However, Will is not every man and doesn't represent every man. Commitment phobes comes in both genders...

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  3. men suck...at least those that abuse both emotionally and well otherwise...it makes me angry as well, but in realising you can move forward...

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  4. He sounds rather like a gay man.

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  5. I'd be angry too, but focus it on Will and not Ewan. At least he's trying to be decent. Not a complete fool like Will. But we do let them treat us like this so often.

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  6. Hello,
    Please be strong, reason with him, try your best to better him, if not, move on...
    Happy Mother's Day!

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  7. I'm with Steve, having had a friend who was similarly treated. Sounds like Will is scared. And lazy.

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  8. Hello Selina - how awful this is for your poor friend but I don't really understand why you are cross with Ewan. Perhaps there is some back story that I do not know and you were already cross with him about something else.
    As for Will - a handsome charmer he may be but he is also a first class shit and I hope when he is older he will realise how bad it is to hurt someone who loves you.

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  9. As difficult as this is for her, it really sounds like they're not meant to be together. If a relationship is so tumultuous that the two people involved are constantly breaking off and getting back with one another, can it really be healthy?

    She's lucky to have such good friends, and she also seems to be handling the situation with grace and maturity (many women would try to restrict their husband's access to the children).

    Hopefully she'll be able to deny him emotional power over her, dealing with him cordially but not allowing him to trouble her heart.

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