Heart of Darkness

So I was going to write about what happened over the last two months.

"Oh, you mean how you and D were blessed with incredible luck and achieved everything you had been hoping for for years, and then the minute you got it you turned into a miserable fire-breathing wench?"

Yea, that.

I don't really know how to start. We drove across the country in separate cars (me with the kitties and D with the moving truck). I contemplated killing the cats. As I implied before, moving really took my mind and heart away from me in a completely unexpected way. I thought that once we got to Portland that things would be better. And they should have gotten better, but I got worse and worse. I got worse and worse despite the fact that I was working at a job I really wanted, living in my hometown that I loved, and starting a new life with my completely rad husband. I mean, WTF, self?

I know I know, bla bla bla I was going through huge transitions. Moving across the country, starting a new job, living with my parents. But so was D. Except it was maybe worse for him because it was he was living with his in-laws (although they are amazing as in-laws go ifIdosaysomyself). D was going through all of the same transitions and he was being how he always is: pleasant and helpful and patient and never a burden to anyone. He was getting up an hour early to walk my parents' dog, for chrissakes.

It sounds weak and spoiled to say the main issue was not having time to myself, or living with my parents, but I do think that was a large part of things. I was working ten-hour days with an hour commute on both ends of the day and when I came home there was always something: grandparents in town, friends in town, apartments to look at, I had to buy a car.* I dog-sat for a severely traumatized dog that took a half-hour of coaxing to go outside and went to the bathroom inside several times. I went to a friend's beachhouse for the 4th of July holiday even though I knew that I should stay home and rest - we ended up having to sleep on the floor in a hallway and I came home tired, grumpy and out-of-it enough to get a flat tire in my new car while pulling out of a Dairy Queen parking lot. Not once in over a month did I come home and just hang out with D, or read a book or, as you may have noticed, browse on the Internet or write.

Instead of realizing that I needed to find a way to spend some time alone I just kept going, until I completely stopped being able to handle things. Really really stupid things. I yelled at D when I was stuck in traffic and he tried to give me directions over the phone. If fact I yelled at D for everything. I freaked out at my step-mom because she said the downstairs of the house smelled like cat litter. I pouted around the house like a teenager, only worse than when I was a teenager. My step-mom took me aside to ask if something was wrong or if she and my dad had offended me. D finally told me, after weeks of giving me hugs and hoping I would improve, to "stop being a jerk to me all the time."

At the end of it all, we had a huge blowout over my anniversary present, of all things.** We fought for two days and we both were less than mature. To give you an idea: on the second night of the fight I thought it was very mature of me to call D an "arrogant mother-effer" under my breath instead of screaming it at him.

And then...and then I snapped back to senses. I bought Daniel a card and a porcupine finger puppet and propped them up on the sink to say "I'm Sorry." I talked to him about how I craved time to myself. We moved into our new apartment. Things haven't slowed down since then - we are only half unpacked because we went out of town the weekend after moving in, actually - but I am getting better at knowing what I need and then making sure I get it. On our weekend trip I built in time for D and I to do our own thing and stay somewhere comfortable. This most recent weekend we didn't make any plans and spent the whole two days furniture shopping and apartment arranging. One night last week we actually cooked dinner together and then ate it while catching up on episodes of The Closer*** and we both agreed it was the best night we had had in weeks. Lucky for me, it turns out he still wants to be married. To me.

I can't say what exactly caused me to be so horrible for so long, except that it was everything and nothing. I do know that getting our own place has helped and that being protective about a) time to myself and b) time with D has really helped. Being overworked and not having my own space doesn't excuse how I acted, however, and I still have to come to terms with how relatively easy it was for me to treat the people around me so poorly. For now I am focusing on preventive medicine - making sure to get enough sleep and saying no to nights out or weekend activities that will ultimately stress me out. I am also trying to recognize the symptoms and stop them before they get bad so hat I can put myself in check before I start swinging my negative emotions around the room.

So there you have it - my feeble attempt to work through That One Time That I Was a Jerk for A Month. Potential moral: porcupine hedgehogs solve all problems. That, or: for the love of God if you are being a jerk all the time go be by yourself for a while and/or see a freaking doctor.

*Oh dear god, so terrible. Car-shopping made me want to punch people and cry and stomp my feet. I actually did two of those things, come to think of it.

**It is a long story that will not translate well to Internet. But it wasn't about jewelry or anything stupid like that. It was about something else stupid.

***D loves Deputy Chief Brenda Lee Johnson (Kyra Sedgewick). Sometimes he will sigh and say "Oh, Kyra, apple of my eye." This is okay with me because I love Fritz - that man is definitely in my top 5.