Today, H got on a plane to the UK. It probably took off about 40 minutes ago. My pastor came with me to drop him off, so I wouldn't drive when upset and possibly dissociated. Of course, because my pastor was there, I was incapable of any emotion when saying goodbye. To keep things in context, except for minor (and unexplained, not-me sort of) tears welling up, I have not cried in several months and at that point I was in a very bad place, safety-wise. I do not generally cry over my own stuff. In fact, I'm nearly incapable, even in therapy, even about the most difficult of things. I can cry over sappy movies or other peoples' stories at the drop of a hat, but it takes being near a total dysfunctional breakdown level for me to cry otherwise and even then, moments later, I've dissociated into, "Who the hell was that?"
After lunch, but before his flight left, I tried to call to get one more goodbye in, but H's phones were off already. I meant to get a photo of him with Boo before he took off. And, as usually happens when he goes, I start to think: I don't have enough...
I don't have enough photos of him and Boo together, enough of me and him together, any handwritten notes or voice recordings or videos that are at all recent. If something bad were to happen, Boo might barely remember him at all and have not much to go by. I mean, yes, some pictures...but not enough. I know this is horrible. I know it is irrational. But it feels real.
It is this legacy of losing person after person in my life. There are parts of me who believe that when someone goes away, they are not coming back, or if they do, everything will be so irrevocably changed that the relationship will have disintegrated. I know now (when I can manage to believe it) why it is impossible for me to feel safe when significant people have to leave, because I was left unprotected and very bad things happened...so bad I had to find somewhere to hide them for 25 years. I know where it comes from. I know it means going from having maybe one person who notices you to being invisible, expected to somehow manage an adult world you can't even understand. I get it. I know these are past feelings, but I can't seem to reconcile them and feel safe in my present.
I feel like a horrible mother, because I look at Boo in the "Daddy's Little Monkey" shirt I put on her and keep breaking into tears. I meant to get a picture, even on my phone, of the two of them or the three of us before he left. You know...just in case. How awful is that? It's like I can see a whole lifetime of Boo growing up without her dad and then it triggers the incident from over a year ago, where I thought I might be separating us from him. And I'm sure it triggers inside kids' abandonment stuff as well.
Boo is doing her quiet time (the best I can get in lieu of her inability to nap) and I'm trying to pull myself together before we have plans with friends in about an hour. I don't want to feel alone like this. I don't want to feel unprotected, like something bad is going to happen, just because it can or might. I want this ridiculous video of the worst that could happen out of my head. I want my T. I want to beg him for the extra session he said me might be able to get me this week, even if it means driving an 1.5 hours round trip just to see him for 1.5 hours. I want to hurt myself to distract from the pain. I want to medicate with the chocolate cake in my fridge. I want to get drunk at my friends' birthday party tonight, as I am riding with other friends to avoid driving anyway. I want anything that can let me stop feeling as if my world is ending just because for 11 days a person who I am used to having here, who I love deeply, but who I also have so much ambivalence about due to his involvement in a huge chunk of the pain I have been in these last few years, is not nearby. I'm sick of knowing what's going on, my triggers, issues with attachment, object permanence, whatever. Understanding doesn't matter, because I cannot stop feeling alone and unsafe when things like this happen. It doesn't stop these scared kids from asking to just please not make them be alone again.
Sorry to blah this all over the OF. I'm hoping that I can ground myself through writing it out.
