In the wake of Weinergate, CNN posted an article entitled, Stop calling Huma Abedin a victim. Abedin, of course, is Anthony Weiner’s wife, who I’m sure was, at the very least, embarrassed by the scandal, and perhaps angry enough to consider divorce.
The article quotes a couple of authors telling women to choose not to be victims. Instead, women should choose to define their own happiness. Oh, there are a couple of caveats—the advice doesn’t apply to women who fear for their safety or are facing financial ruin. But there is no discussion of what to do when your relationship is so emotinally abusive that you are psychologically traumatized.
In short, this story offers advice for women coping with infidelity whose partners are not sociopaths. Which is fine—these women need advice as much as anyone. But the article also reinforces society’s “just get over it” attitude, which makes life difficult for women dealing with true exploitation.
Read Stop calling Huma Abedin a victim on CNN.com.
Star-your therapy seems to be better than mine.
Star:
Thank you. I will really look forward to talking with you about the anger when it’s not so late! Hopefully in the next few days! 🙂
Star-it hasn’t been the greatest time for me this week. I have still been unable to tell her. I talked to a straight male friend about it and he told me to tell her too. I was going to tell her the other night because I thought the time would be perfect since she had asked me to go down the street for a drink with her. Unfortunately another neighbor’s husband had to ruin the mood by saying something to her that hurt her feelings.
He got ahold of her while I was changing my clothes. She got a new hairdo three weeks ago-covered her gray and got it cut and let her curls come out natural. She was really insecure about it when she had it done. I have been spending the last three weeks telling her how beautiful she is every chance I got so she would feel confident about it. That day she finally got the courage to wear it down. I had been asking her to. He got ahold of her before I could stop him and told her she looked frumpy. It ruined all the work that I did and she suddenly got really insecure and not acting right. I had to do damage control. She was not in the right mood after that.
Then tonight I accidently hurt her feelings. She was concerned because I was frustrated over the job thing and she said I should write a nursing article and try to get it published. I laughed loud when she said it. I didn’t realize til afterwords that I made her feel bad. I called her and apologized and she sounded upset and not like herself. She said she’d see me tomorrow. I have a feeling that something else may be bothering her. I kinda feel like she may feel something, like what I’m feeling. I’m feeling bad now and I hope I can get up my damn nerves to tell her.
We posted over each other, Liz. Your neighbor just sounds like she is having an insecure day. We all have those days. And what kind of a jerk insults a woman? Ugh. Men.
Liz, you cannot help but to be exactly who you are. The longer you go on hiding it, it’s almost as if you aren’t accepting of yourself – you are trying to be someone you’re not, so she will love you. I think the important thing to remember is that if she rejects you, it is not the end of the world because you still have you. And you will be released to move on to someone who can love you for who you are. You are so afraid of this imagined pain of rejection, and I will tell you that IF that happens, you will hurt like a mother_ and then you will get over it and be better for it. Please believe me on this. I’ve taken SO many risks with my heart, and they have ALL made me stronger.
Star, Do you find that once the anger is on the move out of your body, it comes out in HUGe amounts of wind and mind- bending FARTS??
Better out than in!!
I had around 3 days of incredibly painful gas pains, after Id done some cord cutting with a lovely lady who is a Psychic facilitator.{cutting off my toxic offspring.}
I cant afford her very often as she charges $70 for 2 hours, but she helped me a LOT.
PS Ididnt fart when she was with me, it happened later, thank god!
Love,
GemXX
Miss elizabeth – stars advice is RIGHT on the money. this is what i meant when i said it sounded like it was traumatizing you – you can’t keep pretending to be someone you are not so that she will love you, because she is then not loving YOU.
I know you are deeply infatuated wit this woman, and i know what i am about to say will probably upset you, but i am going to say it anyway because there is way too much drama already for this connection to be healthy. and i don’t mean just what you are cooking up in your head because of your fear and desire. FROM WHAT YOU WRITE (and understand this is not about who she really is, only from what you write) there is a lot of push and pull with her, avoidance and coming close. this will create an enmeshed trauma bonded relationship. This will not be good for either of you.
HI GEM! in the vajrayana buddhist meditation for purification (Vayrasattva) we envision a white purification fluid flowing from the Vayrasattva, and out through the all of our orifices and the soles of our feet as black pus and insects – WAY more gross!
One step, do you find that Buddhist meditation is a lifesaver for you? It really is for me. It was for me in my 20’s and now it is again. Being centered and in my body (present) makes all the difference in how I relate to the world. It’s not easy. I’m so used to living in fantasy. It’s kind of scary to face the world head on without any fantasies. I hope some day to be able to teach this meditation to others because having some kind of practice like this IMO is ESSENTIAL to everyday life.
Dear Lizzy, I’m going to be honest as well as One/Joy
All the obsessing over this neighbor with all the BLACK and WHITE picturing her….she is a spath, no she is your true love, now she is your friend…now you are afraid to “tell her”…..etc back and forth, drama-rama, isn’t about whether you are gay or she is, or whether she wants a relationship with you or not….One joy has a good take I think on you worrying over trying to be what this woman wants, not being yourself.
You are creating SO MUCH DRAMA about this relationship with her, and I think viewing it as the duct tape that will fix YOU and make YOU happy that you are frantic and unable to focus on fixing yourself, instead of this MAGICAL THINKING you seem to be doing looking for a relationship to fix you, the way I looked for a relationship to fix the grief I felt over the loss of my husband. AIN’T GONNA HAPPEN.
You have to FIX YOURSELF FIRST before any relationship that is health is POSSIBLE.
You appear to me to be floating down the River DE-NIAL and FRANTICALLY grabbing at any thing that looks like a log to grab on to, but is more likely to be an alligator. Sugar I grabbed on to a psychopathic man in my pain and my loneliness, my neediness, and then after that I left myself open to the “summer of chaos” because I was in even worse shape emotionally, mentally and physically. It is only when we are HEALTHY ourselves that we can find another healthy person to share that with, but when we are still confused and unhappy, no relationship in the world will fix us….we have to fix ourselves first.
You’ve got a lot on your plate now with looking for a job, getting your finances in order, and all that, but you WON THE FIRST ROUND with the Unemployment board. That’s a good start on the financial part of the “fixing it”—-rather than focus on someone else, or a relationship, focus on YOURSELF…getting yourself healthy. Stopping smoking (I hope you are still doing that) and eating healthy and exercising….and DE-creasing the DRAMA and STRESS instead of increasing it. Go to the library and check out some books on “self health” and exercises you can do at home inside (too hot to do them outside) and take it SLOW but steady. Cut down the calories in your diet, eat more fruits and veggies, and cut the concentrated sweets and high calorie things and aim for 1-2 pounds a week in wt loss, you’re a nurse, you know the routine of a healthy weight loss. Ditch the caffine (slowly so you don’t get a head ache) and alcohol if any, and be good to yourself….listen to relaxing music or read before you go to bed, and then count sheep or whatever you have to do to turn off your head so you can go to sleep. TAKE CARE OF YOU but don’t for goodness sake add more drama-rama, it is just going to keep you in the spin cycle you have been in since you and sheetface were together. (((hugs)))) Love Oxy
Star, Onestep, and Oxy-thank you very much for your opinions. I do respect them but this is something that I have to deal with the way I deal with it. I don’t feel traumatized or stressed. I think it may just be better if I go back to not bringing up the subject on here anymore. It definitely worked better for awhile and I can just focus my LF time on the exspath and getting myself healthy. I’m on here too much anyway, mainly because I’m bored. The not having a job thing has been the longest 4.5 months of my life-it seems twice as long to me. I am starting my volunteer work on Wednesday with homicide and I plan to call the police crisis unit as well because the lady in charge of it has needs. I am still just PRAYING MY BUTT off that a job will come soon because that is going to do the most to make me feel like a whole woman again.