The 4th Year: Neither a Fixer nor a Victim be...

Years of unresolved divorce issues and financial concerns wore me down. I started to see myself as a victim, as a person who had no control in the situation.

My therapist said something to the effect that it made her angry to see me allowing my husband to bring me down. She had seen me with energy and resolve, not allowing my husband to make me crazy. But in the fourth year, I was LETTING him get to me. I was allowing his craziness to disrupt my happiness and peace.

I had the TOOLS to disengage, but it was harder for me to utilize them because I was just exhausted from the long battle. He was counting on me becoming exhausted.

During one visit with my psychiatrist, I was very agitated about my husband cutting off support payments and the way that he went about it with no warning except to text the children. My male psychiatrist is paternal and wise (in some ways like my new attorney) and he calmly explained to me that my husband couldn't cut off support because of Army regulations. He told me precisely what to do to remedy the situation: report my husband to the Command.

My psychiatrist also talked to me about "victim status." What he said echoed things that my therapist had said. Basically that I was allowing myself to view myself as a victim, which rendered me powerless. It gave my husband control. He urged me to take control back. To stand up for myself. He offered that I generally react to hurt with sadness, but another option is to be angry.

I thought that anger was bad. I thought that anger was a secondary emotion flowing from hurt, and therefore it was "better" to be sad than to be angry. So I was surprised when I was encouraged to be angry!

What I have learned from this whole mess is that I much prefer to please people. I prefer not to criticize. I'd rather be hurt myself than hurt someone else. For people who are defensive and angry inside, this is a position of weakness which they can take advantage of.

There may be a reason that I ended up with damaged partners. On some level, I may have believed it in my power to provide the answers. To save them from their sadness. To FIX.

I'm learning slowly that I cannot fix. And I don't need to be a victim either. Somewhere in all of this is my ability to be strong MYSELF.