A year ago today, I fell in love with a man who would ultimately unravel my life.
His destructive force, governed by a mental illness I did not understand, was not something I could have seen coming. Warning bells began to ring - quietly at first - and I silenced each of them in turn, always believing his voice over my own. Always dying to myself to try to quell the anxiety in him. This continued until I ultimately became silent, trapped in madness I couldn't escape. The balance of my energy skewed toward him over time, with ever-worsening results. I understand now that he really had no power to control what he was doing to me, but that did not change the fact that he was intensely emotionally abusive. And eventually, I lost my compass completely. He was all I could see.
One May night, after a particularly heated and tear-filled night of fighting, I woke around dawn to flash flood warnings blaring over my iphone. Laying next to him in his depression-appointed double-wide in the flood plain of Norman, it dawned on me that I no longer cared about my life or my future at all. Everything I'd chased with my whole heart, for my entire life, had faded away, replaced by the impossible pursuit of his happiness. In that moment, I realized that I was very literally in a fight for my life.
I had to leave. So I got up and drove into the deluge outside, to the continued tones of warning from my phone.
Somewhere in the clang of madness that spring, I had preserved enough of myself to earn a fellowship that would take me to Washington, D.C... a fellowship I, at one point, had offered to give up to quell his fears. However, if I was going to get there... I had to write again. I was three months from my graduation deadline, and almost none of my writing was done. To help me power through, for the first time in my life, I checked myself into therapy. I kept booze in my office drawer for those late nights when I'd cry so hard I'd hyperventilate. My advisor and a few close friends were a light in dark days. And somehow, a dissertation was produced. I graduated, packed, and with a survivor's heart, left the place I'd loved living more than anywhere before.
Somewhere along the way, I didn't know when, I knew I would find the desire for my life again.
Today, I sit on the other side of that pivotal moment, the beneficiary of my brave decision to continue living. Things have changed quite a bit since I threw my life into boxes and dumped myself into this old home on Capitol Hill. Nothing could have been better for me, I think, than the shock of being thrown into my job: a science advisor and full legislative assistant for a Senator. I'm suddenly living one of the greatest adventures I could possibly imagine. Some days, I even feel the dawn of my enthusiasm return. But, alas, I still find myself unable to talk about what's really going on in my life publicly. The bonds of confidentiality dictate what I can say.
To resolve this impasse between past and present, I decided to start this blog, One Year Later. I still don't feel comfortable talking about what happened with Stephen today, but I know writing about it will help me heal. I just don't want to live in silence anymore, or pretend that it never happened. I also very much want to write about my insights into Congress, lawmaking, science, and my personal triumphs and struggles here - to share when I'm able. One Year Later will give me the ability to address both needs in one forum.
So this will be a secret blog for the present - but for you future readers (if I decide to make this public), enjoy this trip between two pasts. I'm not sure what the mix of my writing will be, personally and professionally... that joy of uncertainty is left to the future. :)
A future I, thankfully, have begun to want again.
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