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“Shall we?” “Let’s.” 2010 August 11 8:57

Posted by diamond in : Health, Random , 8 comments

On saturday 2010-07-31, at the security gate in zurich airport around 05:40, Noirin and i broke up. We were supposed to be boarding a flight to Sweden, to attend Herräng swing dance camp. Noirin went through, i went home.

This is an attempt to describe why, what happened, what went wrong, how could it go this badly. This is an attempt to understand. This is for the close friends and family members who had no idea (esp. for my brother, and younger sister). This is for me when i try to remember how things were.

Before we got married, many people told us that the first year is like an extended honeymoon period, everything is fantastic. That the second year is when reality would start to kick in. This was so far off truth as to seem like a sick joke in retrospect. The first year was Hard. The second year was Really Hard. The third year broke us. Nov 2010 will be the third anniversary of our wedding.

Two big things contributed to this, plus a multitude of smaller things. I’m going to try and outline the two major factors, as i currently see them.

Memory
I am a man who has made 1000 promises, remembered 5, kept 3. When i tell people i have a really really bad memory, they almost always say “Oh, me too!”. They ask for examples, i can rarely remember any, so they assume i’m exaggerating. They also tell me it can’t be as bad as i say if i’m able to hold down a job. Life, as usual, just isn’t that simple.

My memory is the single biggest factor in our relationship breakdown. Every day, i tell Noirin i’ll do X,Y,Z, i won’t do Q,R,S, my opinions on subjects L,M,O. And every day, i’ll have zero, zero idea that i’ve said i’d do things we talked about only yesterday; i’ll do things i promised i wouldn’t do; i’ll have a completely new opinion on various subjects, having no idea that i had a different opinion on the subject only a few hours ago. Sometimes i realise later that i’d changed my opinion. Most of the time, i don’t.

Every day i’ll watch Noirin look crestfallen time and time again as i’ve failed to live up to my word. And i’ll have no clue what i’ve done or not done. And after this happens for the hundredth time, she just can’t muster the energy to explain again. What’s the point? I haven’t remembered the last 100 times she told me how she feels about something. I’m hardly about to remember it this time.

We talk, she gives me information that changes my opinion on something. The next time we talk, i’ve reverted to my original opinion, oblivious to the reasons i changed my opinion previously, oblivious even to the fact that i did change my opinion. It’s not fair on her. Not even close.

From my side, i live in a relationship of arbitrary rules. It’s *incredibly* frustrating. But i can’t expect Noirin to endlessly explain herself. It’s not fair on me. Not even close.

Doctors haven’t been able to tell me why i have memory issues. I haven’t slept properly in somewhere between 7 and 9 years. But it’s not clear that that’s the issue. I’ve had blood tests, thyroid exams, MRI’s. Nothing. Maybe it’s all psychological. Even so, i’m not aware of it, i can’t just flick a switch.

I’ve tried lists, i’ve tried harder, i’ve tried leaving myself reminders. I forget to look at the lists. I forget what the reminders are about. I feel stressed all the time, from the moment i wake up, to the moment i fall asleep. Constantly stressing about all the stuff i’m forgetting. And it makes it worse. But how do you stop caring, when you see how much damage it’s doing to your relationship?

From the other side, how can you trust someone who is utterly unreliable? You can’t. You try again and again, giving them chance after chance. And they almost always let you down. How can you stay in a relationship where you cannot name a single area you can trust your partner in? Noirin ended up taking care of all the finances, all the health and other insurances (and my health insurance dealings are extensive). All of the planning. All of the responsibility.

How can i cope with work? I don’t know. The fact that it’s a structured environment means i can always read the docs, or ask someone, when i don’t remember something. But i don’t know.

I remember some stuff. It’s not amnesia. And this makes it harder. If someone never remembers anything, that’s tough, really tough to deal with. But at least it’s consistent. Someone who *mostly* doesn’t remember stuff, but does sometimes; that just comes across as not caring. Not giving a damn. It doesn’t matter how much they explain how they can’t help it. It doesn’t matter how much you tell yourself they don’t mean it. Eventually the evidence you see repeatedly is too much. Too hurtful.

Priorities
How do you define love? One of the definitions is putting the needs and wishes of your loved ones above your own needs and wishes. This led me to the following priority list:

  1. Noirin
  2. The relationship
  3. Myself

The logic for the ordering of 1. vs 2. is simple; if Noirin isn’t doing well, the relationship can’t be doing well. Unfortunately, i never applied the same logic to 2. vs 3. until it was too late. Far too late.

How does this screw things up? I censored my emotions and opinions for the sake of the relationship. A simple example. Noirin likes cooking. When she cooks, she usually wants my company, so i sit in the kitchen while she cooks. I find this really tedious, and hence frustrating. But i would squash those feelings, would not allow myself to feel them. I would sit there, because i thought it was the loving thing to do.

It turns out, if you censor your emotions for a long enough time, you stop having any. You forget how to feel. You’re numb inside. You rarely feel anything, and when you do, you feel guilty about it. But over time, your subconscious gets filled to overflowing with frustration and resentment. And this shows through the numbness, through everything you do to be nice.

Noirin loves me, i tell Noirin that i love her, but it’s a purely rational gesture, it’s never heartfelt, it can never have emotion behind it. I talk based on commitment, not connection. It comes across as cold. And the emotions i do feel are destructive, negative, so i stop talking about them. Noirin can sense them anyway, and it hurts her.

I’m depressed, have been for years. I never realised. I saw a psychiatrist here for 6 months because of how badly the relationship was going. He said “well you’re clearly not depressed”. We went together to another psych for one session. He said “well you’re clearly chronically depressed”. Colour me confused. But the next tuesday, i was in work when i realised two things:

  1. I’d spent most of monday and tuesday wanting to go home to bed, curl up into a little ball and cry.
  2. This was normal for me.

So yeah, the second psych was absolutely right. I see him regularly now. I’m on 3 different antidepressants. I’m on the road to recovery. I’ve realised that i’ve been censoring emotion, and that’s what’s making me so angry inside. But these things take time to fix. A long time. And time is not infinite. Living with a depressed person is incredibly draining. And eventually it got to be too much.

Where does that leave us?
How Noirin lasted so long, i’ll never understand. She’s amazing. Towards the end, we finally got to the point where we understood each other, what we were both going through. The breakup was gentle. Noirin couldn’t go on any longer, i couldn’t ask her to sacrifice herself any more for the sake of the relationship that was so destructive for both of us. Living on the edge for so long has torn us both up, and Noirin has had a rougher time than me (partially because i simply don’t remember so much). If she’s at breaking point, and she is a higher priority than the relationship, then it’s over. It’s as simple as that.

I waited till the following thursday before i told my parents. I was hoping against all probability that something might happen, something might change, that Noirin would change her mind. Then i realised that this wasn’t fair on Noirin. Putting all the responsibility on her, yet again.

On friday, i realised something more. I couldn’t go back either. If Noirin returned on sunday and told me she wanted to try one more time, i’d have to tell her no. I need time to figure out how to be myself again. I need time to work through this depression. And i can’t do it inside a relationship. The stresses of trying to live up to a role i just can’t cope with is a big part of the problem that’s brought me to this point.

We’re still friends, we still talk to each other. It’s as amicable as it can be under the circumstances. The title of this blog post is from a comedy sketch we saw on our last cruise. The comedian was painting the picture of middle-aged couples separating with utmost civility and mutual understanding. It amused us greatly at the time, i look back on it as bitter-sweet.

I hope that in the future, where we’re both doing much much better, it’s possible we might get back together. But i can’t live my life centered around that hope. I spent the last 6 months of this relationship hoping things would get better, and it’s killed me. “Hope deferred makes the heart sick”. In the meantime, we’re working on being friends. And if we get that figured out, maybe we can work on being more than friends. But that’s a long way down the road.

***Update***
Noirin has just posted her own take on the situation.

diamond & breadknives 2008 November 26 21:25

Posted by diamond in : Health , 2 comments

Today, i went down to the break room at 16:00 as usual, looking forward to a few games of pool, and a delicious combination of swiss bread, cheese, and meat of unspecified origin. Peter was the only other pool player available from our group, and we quickly got stuck into a discussion about how load-balancing works in linux.

So deeply was i engrossed in this conversation that, while cutting myself some bread, i failed to realise until Too Late that the knife was going to end up removing a significant portion of my left index finger’s exterior. The knife was efficiently sharp, so i didn’t notice until about 1cm of my skin was hanging off (shuddering as i type this. I hate that memory). The doctor has told me “in a year’s time, you won’t even see a scar”. I’m guessing that was meant to be reassuring. I’m not convinced it had its intended effect however.

Still, my finger now looks like it’s dressed up for a black-tie event, with a very tasteful bow keeping the outer layers of cladding in place. And boy was i glad to have noirin only one floor away when the incident happened, as her first-aid skills (and general Competence) were put to good effect.

It’s, of course, typical that i was getting back into guitar playing. Here’s hoping i don’t have to wait all of the 6-8 weeks of healing before i can go back to that.

Filled this under the things-i-wish-i-had-been-paying-more-attention-to-so-i-could-have-avoided category.

Doctor, doctor 2006 November 30 12:29

Posted by diamond in : Health, Work , 2 comments

On 11/29/06, Stephen Shirley wrote:
> I managed to strain something in my wrist yesterday.
> It seems to be getting better, taking today off to try
> and rest it up.

Failed to get better, doctor has ordered me to rest it till monday, girlfriend complains that i never take her orders, all allegations that this is a foosball-related injury are strenuously denied. Girlfriend now also complains that she was only joking when she suggested the above mention and that i wasn’t meant to type it. Sheesh.

I’m available by mobile if anyone needs more girlfriend-related whining.

Steve

I was worried about jet-lag 2006 November 22 18:40

Posted by diamond in : Health , 1 comment so far

No longer. For the last 3 days in california, i started getting up at about 05:40, to try and lessen the jet lag when i flew home on monday/Tuesday. As i was flying out at 16:30 california time, and landing in london at 02:00 california time, i needed to be sleepy in the early evening if i was going to be able to sleep on the flight.

That kinda didn’t work out.

I didn’t get to sleep on the flight at all, nor on the flight to dublin afterwards. I finally did fall asleep at about midnight last night after being awake for 34 hours. As such, the 8-hour time difference between here and california is entirely outweighed by the amount of sleep deprivation, so once that’s sorted, i’ll be on irish time anyway ,-) It’s like a good plan, only much much worse.

Fry, wash 2006 November 20 2:10

Posted by diamond in : Health, Random , add a comment

Exhaustion, unfamiliar traffic patterns, confusing and/or misleading road signs managed to turn this into this. I’ve normally got an excellent sense of direction, and i’ve driven most of this route before, which is why the end result is quite so remarkable. This whole getting-up-at-05:43-to-try-and-lessen-the-jet-lag-on-Tuesday lark is pretty tough going.

What’s also scary is that the washing machine in this apartment did a full wash cycle in the time i took me to plot out my meanderings; 20 minutes. I’m afraid to look too closely in case it’s nuclear powered.