As I was trying to come up with an idea for this week’s blog post, my husband, Terry, made a suggestion: “Why don’t you write about Psycho Squirrel?”
Last fall, we started tossing peanuts in the shells to squirrels in our backyard. We were captivated by the show they put on as they acrobatically chased each other along the fence and through the tree branches. Plus, we liked being nice to our furry neighbors.
Most of the squirrels picked up the peanuts and scurried away, burying them to eat in the winter. A couple of squirrels, however, were smart. They learned that humans meant food, and every time they saw us, bounded over to the ground below our back deck. They’d sit on their hind legs, twitch their tails, and look up at us expectantly. Of course, they were rewarded with peanuts.
Aw, aren’t they cute?
Well, they started getting brave, and crept up the steps of the deck. We opened the back door, which led into the kitchen, and tossed out a peanut. The squirrels scurried away with the peanuts, buried them, and came back for more. So then we squatted down low, cracked open the full-length glass storm door, and held the peanuts at their nose height. They were skittish at first, but soon began taking the peanuts right from our fingers.
They’d sit on the deck, hold the peanut to their mouths and roll it, as if looking for a place to bite the shell. Sometimes they ate the peanuts, and sometimes they ran away, buried them, and came back for more. If we weren’t right at the door, we could hear them tapping on the glass with their tiny claws.
Aren’t they cute?
We ended up with three “pet squirrels—”one day they all kept coming to the door like a tag team. Eventually, if they saw us, they’d leap through the trees to the ground below the deck and then run up the steps. When they saw us walking up the driveway, they followed. We started keeping a small ceramic bowl filled with peanuts on the counter next to the back door, so they’d be handy when our squirrel buddies showed up. We imagined that they really appreciated us when 18 inches of snow blanketed the ground and all their peanuts from the fall were hidden.
A few weeks ago, spring finally arrived, and we exchanged the glass in the storm door for a screen. We hadn’t seen the squirrels in awhile, but one showed up. She looked well fed, but still remembered how to beg for a handout.
I opened the screen door, held a peanut low for her, and she took it. She came back several times; I fed her about five peanuts. Then I had to go back to work. I closed the screen door, but the main back door was open to let the warm breeze into the house.
A couple of hours later I walked back into the kitchen and stopped short. The screen by the door handle was shredded—someone had broken into the house! Then I noticed the ceramic bowl was empty, there were broken peanut shells all over the floor, and a small yellow puddle on the counter.
The squirrel had chewed through the screen, eaten all the peanuts, and left. I couldn’t believe it. I shut the main back door—wood with glass panes at the top—so she couldn’t come back in. But she had learned well, and a little while later I caught her trying to climb through the hole in the screen again.
That was it. Now it was No Contact with the squirrel.
Terry took the screen out so it could be repaired. The squirrel didn’t know this, so when she next saw me in the kitchen, she leaped at the door, expecting to cling to the screen. Instead, she slammed into the regular door with its glass panes. With nothing to hold on to, she slid to the deck.
We stayed on the No Contact program, even though the squirrel kept following us around the yard and begging. No more handouts, no more bowl of peanuts on the counter by the door. In fact, since we couldn’t really tell the squirrels apart, none got fed. One overly aggressive squirrel had ruined it for everyone.
After a couple of weeks, hoping the pushy squirrel had forgotten that she had been sponging off of us, we replaced the screen, which had cost $25 to fix. It was fine for awhile, but the other day, I walked into the kitchen to find holes in the screen next to the door handle. She didn’t forget. But at least there were no peanuts on the counter, so the squirrel didn’t come in.
Now the screen needs to be repaired again. “That squirrel owes me $50 for the two screens,” Terry complained.
We don’t think the squirrel is going to pay. In fact, it’s probably going to cost us even more, because now Terry has decided we should invest in pet-proof screens.
Sigh. And it all started because the squirrels were so cute and we wanted to be friendly.
Ox Drover;
I really did buy the pie just for the Xmas atmosphere. It looked nice on the table with some candles…
I was actually pretty stunned by his very odd behavior, and remember thinking to myself “this guy has some serious intimacy issues…”
Sistersister,
About people being prosecuted for spreading HIV sexually, I beg to differ….in Texas, 6 women prosecuted a man for giving them HIV KNOWINGLY, and he went to prison for life. He was prosecuted under use of a DEADLY WEAPON….there is an article here on LF about it but I can’t remember the guy’s name enough to search for it.
I think the problem is that most DAs just don’t want to prosecute and try to put the victim off. There is NO lack of proof that HIV is sexually transmitted….and the different strains can be told apart in a lab, so that ONE PARTICULAR STRAIN can be told from another….that dentist in Florida that in some way (and they never did know exactly how) who gave 5 of his patients HIV, they proved it was THE strain he had. Since then different and better infection control policies have been instituted in dental offices such as the handset now has to be sterilized, not just the grinding tip, etc.
BBE, high triglyceride problems can be genetic, and usually are….I have actually seen people whose cholesterol and triglycerides were so high that when you spun the blood down in the tube, the “cream rose to the top” like raw milk and the serum was actually opaque white instead of clear yellow.
Sister sister is right about the thrush, but to me the entire thing to me is that he was SNARKY about the pie, like there was NO other reason you had bought the pie except for HIM….it never even occurred to him that YOU might like to have a piece of pie even if HE didn’t “like sweets.”
My son frequently buys sweets and treats that on my low sodium, low calorie diet I can’t have….but it isn’t all about ME—just because I can’t have them (or don’t want them) doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy them. With your X, it seemed to be ALL ABOUT HIM. He seemed to enjoy being “offended”—like his British reserve being “offended” and being “offended” by the Pie….he seemed to be able to find all kinds of things to be OFFENDED BY. Personally, I would label him as we say here in the south as TACKY. LOL
Sistersister;
While people can get Thrush HIV+ or not, it is as you mentioned a complication of a compromised immune system.
HIV is central to my story with the x-spath and it was a factor that made it very unusual.
Now, talking about a compromises immune system, stress can lead to this and a whole host of problems, for example Shingles. I experienced this first hand, as the x-spath took me to the hospital because I had broken out in a severe rash which I attributed to a reaction to anti-biotics. At the hospital, doctors were seriously concerned that I might have contracted HIV.
When I told the x-spath the doctor’s concern, he had no reaction other than agreeing I needed to be tested ASAP. We went about the day without any further discussion.
The next day he dumped me. If I understood unmasking then, it would have all made sense to me…
All I know, Oxy, is that OMSJ is winning these cases left and right because no expert wants to step forward and make the very claims you are making, in open court. Their licenses to practice medicine or other fields would be revoked if they made claims they couldn’t back up with evidence. Even the manufacturers of the tests don’t make those claims.
People are being sentenced to life in prison in cases where the defense doesn’t threaten to produce an expert witness on the validity of the test; where the defense does that, they are getting off on a plea bargain. Sometimes the whole case will be dropped, but more often they strike a deal.
Actually, prosecutors love these kinds of cases because they add that extra element of sexual drama and community “contamination.” Google “NuShawn Williams” for the kind of (sometimes racist) hysteria these cases kick up.
As I said, there are people who will do this, maliciously, but they’re not succeeding in “infecting” others with anything but worry. If a spath claims they gave you “AIDS,” you should just laugh. And then stop laughing and get tested for other STDs.
I read your posts with interest, behind_blue_eyes. All these things you mention are from a suppressed immune system.
My I suggest that just being around this guy suppresses your own immune system?
HIV is indeed very, very central to this incident. Because I’ve noticed that “all about me” thing around it, too. Before he tested “positive,” he was an ordinary gay man, unappreciated, sometimes discriminated against. Now . . . he’s that person you have to walk on eggshells around, so as not to upset his “immune system” and “thrush” and general self-importance.
No Contact, dude. No Contact. He’s contaminating you with worry, and medical dangers and contamination-by-association in the eyes of doctors. Come out into the light, all ye vampires! Live in the light of reason, and daylight, and respect for others — a thing sorely lacking around pathological victimhood addicts like this guy.
Read up on the psychology of HIV. Look up “Casper Schmidt” and read his whole thing.
And finally, please don’t take this the wrong way, but explore how it might be “all about you,” too. It’s a hard thing to look at, and I cannot possibly know that you have a problem with it — but it’s a possibility given the company you’re keeping. I’ve been doing alternative counseling of HIV positives for a long time now, and I know the patterns, psychologically. It’s a complete jolt for them when they realize what’s being done to their heads. I usually get the hell out when it blows.
Ox Drover;
Separately none of this meant much. Together, it all makes sense. The third thing, which I noticed at the time but did not make the connection was his physique. When he took his short off, I was alarmed because while he had thin arms and legs, he had a bit of a paunch. I attributed this him drinking too much and it really stuck in my mind. That physique is quite common among the HIV+.
Once I had my suspicion, based upon what I came across on night online, it all clicked.
The importance is two-fold. One, it gave me an excuse to dismiss what he did to me. I had some warped thinking that if he had only told me, things would have been different. The other is of course why did he not trust me? It was the one thing we talked about most…
Sistersister,
Let me get this straight….are you saying that HIV is not spread sexually?
“It gave me an excuse to dismiss what he did to me.”
He probably thinks it excuses him, too. And while you get distracted by his victimhood, his HIV status, and worry about your own possible infection — he keeps playing these games.
Sistersister;
This was in the past and I must agree that his hot and cold treatment of me contributed to stress in my life. There was other stress due to the Wall Street sociopaths with whom I worked at the time.
I have not contacted since I figured everything out nor will I. last year, prior to my open-heart surgery I almost emailed him, but something inside (and several here) told me not too.
I am so, so glad now as “round two” of my discoveries about him really showed not only is he not a very nice person, it allowed me to accept that he is a sociopath, even though I had evidence for a year.