January 19, 2010 cont’d

It was a Tuesday evening I had come home from work with some papers for Alex to sign for my father. My dad was in finance and forever keeping our investments, wills, insurance up to date. I come from five siblings and my dad always wanted things legally binded, the money from his legacy safe guarded should the unexpected ever happen ( death, illness, divorce, bankruptcy).

The papers that day were about his properties in Florida and basically were protecting those properties for his five children solely in the event of his passing. Pretty straightforward stuff.

But Alex didn’t like it. He believed there was some secret going on and this was a trick. He thought I must be planning to leave him, otherwise why would he need to sign anything. I explained to him that all the spouses were signing the agreements, that it was just my dad doing his due diligence in his will.

My dad has done SO much for me and my four siblings, and our spouses and children. All of us have had every opportunity ….university , travel, vehicles, extracurriculars, jobs and most importantly unconditional love. The work my dad has done for his community, charities and country at large is a conversation for an entirely different blog. I would not stand for anyone accusing him of sneakiness or wrong doing.

As Alex became more and more irrational and angry. I became silent and mumbled ‘forget it.’ The simple request had spiralled out of control. So I left the kitchen to go upstairs to diffuse the situation.

He ran up behind me, yelling, swearing…horrible words about my dad calling him a crook. And it that moment all the verbal abuse, all the demeaning behaviors, all the micro aggressions, the love bombing, the abandonments , the drinking …hit me . You can say what you will about me but for some reason when it came to my dad I snapped.

I yelled back, I screamed how dare you…”for godsakes he helped me by this million dollar house…for you!” I wailed my fist against his shoulder, years of pain and sadness breaking the damn. The tears. I had officially reached the breaking point after 10 years of toxicity . (Years later during my healing journey I would learn, that this behaviour I displayed was very normal. The years of narcissistic abuse are continually pressed down, buried, explained away until the empath basically fragments and bursts often violently ).

In my screaming and crying fit, Alex grabbed me around the neck and took me down to the gorgeous Italian tiled floor of the foyer.

Anger was quickly replaced with fear as our two and half year old slept sweetly above us.

🙏🏻

To be cont’d

“But I ignore things and I move sideways,

Until I forget what I felt in the first place.

At the end of the day there are worse ways to stay alive”

• N Kahan