There is still no cure for a wounded heart....

Betrayal

She awoke in the middle of the night, unable to breath - or to go back to sleep. Instead she sat up in the brownish dark. It was over - finally over - he had packed his personal things right after dinner - an anniversary dinner she had prepared with love - a dinner she thought would return him to a calm space in which they would reminisce about the good times, the happy times, the loving times and then they would decide to try to repair their damaged relationship, one more time. But he ate in silence, went quickly up the stairs to their bedroom, packed his personal belongings, put them in the trunk of his car and drove away without even so much as a backward glance.

The faintest tease of light moved softly against the wall. A single scolding finger of light. Saliva rushed to her mouth the way it always did before she vomited. She swallowed it down, closed her eyes, leaned against the headboard and felt weak with heartache - totally lost.  Her mind continued to work rapidly as she thought about all that had happened in their years together. It was funny how crisis recalled crisis - how pain brought back old pain. How, even now, in the throws of this most recent painful episode, she had still clung to the promise he had made to her, when not lost in a bipolar episode, that he would never leave her. And so, no matter how irrelevant and emotionally invisible she became to him, no matter how depressed he got, no matter how extreme his mood swings became, no matter how manic his depression got, no matter how unrealistic his thought processes or his accusations or his threats became, she was completely willing, once again, to put all his painful words behind them and work her way through the fog, till there was light at the end of the tunnel. Knowing him as intimately as she did, she believed that he loved her, as she did him. Realistically she knew that nothing had hurt her more than being disappointed by the one person she thought would never hurt her - and she had experienced disappointing and hurtful things he had said and done when he was in an episode fog. But she also knew, or had thought she knew, that he truly didn't mean what he said and did, but couldn't seem to control himself. Each time the fog lifted he had admitted to not meaning his damaging behaviour and promised to seek professional help so the episodes would not happen again. She had, each time, forgiven and forgotten and succeeded in returning their relationship to where they loved and cared and shared and laughed and worked hard at keeping their love growing. But the professional help never materialized and this time he had threatened that, when she least expected it, he would leave her. She didn't believe he would, as he had promised he never would, but he had, and now here she sat - broken hearted, exhausted, emotionally drained yet unable to stop the tears that were flowing down her face or the sobs that continued to erupt from her soul. 

She did feel very angry. She couldn't understand why this had happened to them, although she was well aware that a bipolar type disorder was disruptive in all ways. But she had been willing - lovingly - to hang in, work through and do whatever it took to keep them together. She could not believe that he had so selfishly chosen to make such a drastic change  - a change that would entirely and painfully alter their life and the live's of their family and their friends - all who had done nothing but love him. She couldn't fathom that she had now lost everything. She hadn't needed a man in her life - she had chosen to be with him. He was intelligent, kind, honest, gentle, sensitive, communicative, and had a sense of humour. The man of her dreams, her soul-mate. The man who had promised her a 'new world'. The man who had promised to support her, protect her, keep her safe, never hurt her. The man who would give her freedom to keep her identity, integrity and independence. But now she was having to face the reality of the man he really was. And, again, as in the past 'hard spots' in her life she had to accept that sometimes things just don't make sense. Sometimes things just aren't fair, and now she would have to discover life on her own again, and be strong enough - again - to survive the journey.