We were kissing and I felt Jeffrey’s skin on my skin. I felt the bumpy texture of his freckles and moles, the braille of his scars along his hips and back. I felt what it felt like to feel completely present in my body next to him, to learn what it felt like to not be concerned about what was happening and escape my constant, fluttering uneasiness. Then Jeffrey starkly got up and left me on the sofa in a manner that shifted presence into worry. The energy moved and I did not see when or how. Jeffrey stomped into the bedroom belligerent, bumping into walls like a bowling ball against bumpers down the hallway. I could both see and hear Jeffrey rifling for a change of clothes while still sitting on the sofa. I could hear him foraging from his closet to the space under the dresser. Jeffrey was looking for the cane he made with his father, the one with wood he picked for the handle because he liked the chatoyance. I found myself in the doorway of the room where my office was in the apartment we shared. I did not walk there, so how was I there? I gave Jeffrey space as to not overwhelm him more than he clearly was. I asked what he was doing, why he was leaving. “Why don’t you come sit with me and we will have some quiet time? Or take a nap?” I said all the things I knew to say that might interrupt what was happening and, in his loudest and most abrasive octave, he yelled as he shoved his feet antagonistically into the Nike shoes I bought him, “Y’never unnerstand anythin’… you don’t, you just… you never do. Are you… are you an idiot??!” As he spoke, I noticed my whole body was solid, my torso bracing for whatever could happen next. It was never physical, but I was never sure. Psychosis meant we were not in the same room at the same time. A more fucked up Inception but no one knows the plot or who is stealing our dreams.

Jeffrey threw open our front door and slammed it shut behind him. I heard his key stumble to find the lock followed by the hall door clatter shut behind him. I started to wonder about what to do next. Do I follow him? Does he have his phone? It is not my job to babysit him, but is he safe in this headspace to be out in the world? What does this mean? What if he gets hurt or someone hurts him? What state will he be in when he gets back? Will he be drunk? Would he come back still angry at the ghosts in his soul? I sat on the sofa again.

Just as I felt the texture of the woven, olive-green material, I woke up. It was 1:29am. “I am in Chico,” I thought, “I have to wake up for therapy in Sacramento soon. Jeffrey is dead.” I slept a few more hours, dreamless. My alarm went off at 5am and I got ready to take Dottie and me to therapy in Sacramento. I go to therapy in person whenever I can. It is a 90-minute drive and the time in the car is helpful for the unwinding I need to do after I process my new hellscape I still struggle to logic. And now I have this super-fun trauma dream to discuss on top of feeling overwhelmed by people wanting me to feel hopeful again, and the one-year anniversary of moving to Chico.

I told my therapist that I felt my body remember what it felt like to be there in the seconds after Jeffrey left. I felt the relief of his energy not being in the room, that he could not yell at me or get injured while I watched him refuse help. I explained the absolute dread about what would happen when he came back. I have rarely dreamt of Jeffrey since he died. Only two other times. Once, right after he died, I dreamt about a bike ride we planned together and I woke up in a panic attack because I missed him. The second time was the first night in the hotel room when we moved me from Seattle. I dreamt Jeffrey was angry at me for not saving all of his things. I woke up in a panic attack I hid from my parents who slept in the same room. And now this. A dream that encapsulated what feels so confusing about grieving him.

In psychosis, Jeffrey blamed everyone else for the miswiring in his body, his brain, and his soul. I always knew the words spewed at me, laced with the venom of a lifetime of self-loathing, were not about me. It always felt like what he yelled at me he was yelling at himself. I always knew and still know it was not my fault.

I told myself over and over again he could not help it. He was not in his grounded mind to have any agency in what was taking place. He almost never remembered what happened or how. He always apologized and we always made plans for what to do next time. I explained to my therapist I feel like I still do not understand about what was happening between us. And she softly, gently asked me the thing: “What if he was mentally ill, could not help it, loved you, AND was abusive?” Something in my body relaxed when she said it. What if all of these things are true at the same time and I do not have to know which one is right? What if?

I feel embarrassed I let this happen to me. I feel deep shame. I taught clients about abusive relationships while entrenched in my own. A hypocrite defined. I know all the things to say to myself to help complicate my own judgement. Abuse happens to everyone and does not discriminate. You had unmet needs that were fulfilled in your relationship with Jeffrey and it is okay to have filled them. He really did try to do better for you. He really did love you. This is not your fault. You are still a good person. But none of these things change what is true. I both loved Jeffrey and was abused by him.

I feel like a traitor when I talk about the shadowy parts of us. How do I grieve someone I loved so deeply and who hurt me this much? I have asked myself this question every day for fifteen months. Because today is fifteen months since Jeffrey died. I told my therapist I wish I could ask Jeffrey what he thought about us. I wish I could know how he thinks of it now that his soul is theoretically unburdened by everything Jeffrey navigated while he was alive. Would he see it the way I do now? The way I did then? Does he feel bad about it? Does he feel like I betrayed him by talking about it with people? Am I betraying him by writing about it?  Part of me still misses the part of our cycle that reassured me we were still on the same side of something. It was us against his mental illness, right? The thing we did the next morning after he rested and was himself again, when I got to tell him how his behavior hurt me brought us together. He listened, validated, and apologized. That is the thing about abusive cycles: the two people in the cycle are often the only two people who know about it. Our pattern of Jeffrey exploding and then reconciliation afterward allowed both of us to foolishly believed we solved it after every incident, but we never did. It never stopped, even the week he died. It is as they say: you cannot see the forest through the trees when the trees are all falling on you. I have yet to meet anyone who can.  

Today, I talked a client through how normal it is to know someone does not intend to hurt them, but to be hurt by them. How normal it is to not know how to make sense of what is abusive behavior by someone they love and care for. I reassured my client of the thing I always needed to hear: I was not crazy. It was real. I asked them a version of what my therapist asked me: what if they do not mean to hurt you, and it still hurts?

The burden of knowing exactly what to say to people because I have also heard these things is heavy.

I hope I win the lottery soon.