Xmas was.. well.. interesting. I wish I had a computer xmas eve because I was in a total freak out state and needed to talk to someone here.. anyone....

Why? well... my partner and I were at his parents place for xmas and we wound up going to xmas eve church service in a local high school (the church they go to was too small to hold all the people) and lo and behold the school where we had church... the principal of that school is the guy that molested my partner 17 years ago!!!!!!!!!! We were terrified!!!

Man were we anxious/nervous/uptight that night. My partner had a death-grip on my hand walking into the school - I thought he was going to crush my hand.

Yes we could have chosen not to go but my partner's parents still dont know about the molestation and not going woudl have raised some prying/ugly questions/accusations by his parents...

Luckily there was no sign of the perp.... my partner actually said "well we are going to God's house so we have to trust that He will protect us"...

Also my partner is currently prosecuting his perp so rumour has it that this guy is removed from the school at the current time. So you can see if we did run across this guy we would have been petrified..

So all in all the perp was nowhere to be found around so all is well that ended well.. but man were we scared. During mass I started crying a few times just to ease the tension.. I was so scared I was shaking...

How a pedophile could work for 20+ years in a school system and work his way to principal without being caught is beyond me.... anyhow..

That was the lowlight of my xmas - that and a thoroughly depressing visit with my own parents.. where my dad acted up and started insulting me, I cried both days I was there... someone remind me why I voluntarily trigger myself out of some feeling of family duty.. phuuuuuck!!! Every year I say "not next year" and then I do it again... blargh.

On the up note though there was a lot of skating, a lot of chocolate, some road hockey, and a visit with my partner's extended family who are all very nice!!! And I only gained 3 lbs!

PAS

The 2 of you are outstandingly courageous!!! It is so incredibly hard to re-visit the physical scene of a violation, let alone re-visit the "human" landscape!

Actually it wasn't the scene of the violation.. but the fact that this perp was able to continue on and become a real leader in his community, to have constant access to kids.. while my partner has suffered depression, drug abuse, alcoholism, a lot of crappy relationships.... ughgughgugugugggh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I felt dizzy off and on that whole night. And to know that this person was walking the halls of the very place that we were actaully in.. ugh.. it was SO awful.

We cried and cried all through church.... at one point there was a reference to "God seeing that good triumphs over evil".. we cried harder... hung on to each others hands.. cried and cried... big crocodile tears flowing...

And we managed to stick it all the way through...

And on the way out my partner sighs, and goes "well that sucked" in a really dry, matter of fact, understated way... and we both burst out laughing...

and laughed......

and laughed...

till we cried!

Funny, in times of extreme anxiety, I always get an attack of "black humour".



P

HEY PAS!!!

I'm sorry too that you weren't here xmas eve, I'd been waiting for more good news from you...

And while I am sorry and angry about your christmas eve, you know what really jumps out at me from your post, is all the "we." You and your guy are really in this together, from the fear to the humor. That is good news, for him and for you. Your story could have ended, "he was tense and angry the whole night and on the way out we started fighting about my parents." But it didn't. His story could have been, "I had to go there by myself with no one to hold my hand." It's not. You have a lot more happiness than one little smiley guy in these two posts despite the detestible awful fact that people have to be afraid to go into schools and churches.

That's what healing is about.

Sar

Naw.. that didnt happen until January 3rd we had a whole day blowout but I am sure that a lot of it had to do with the Xmas tension... the fight was weird and twisted and long and it only started to get resolved after I made him a sandwich... (he gets even more anxious when he's hungry - thats the first thing I check on my "oh my gawd we're fighting" checklist - are we hungry??) It was a long fighty day but it ended well... at least when he was fed we could start talking about REAL issues rather than just weirdness!

It is good that we are a we now - it has been a long and painful and lonely journey for him to be always pushing people away.. it has been the hardest thing for him his inability to be intimate emotionally. He wants to be close but for him close = anxiety and pain and control.. but he really really really deep down WANTS to be close to me, that's his motivation for diving in and going into all the scary places he's never gone into before. And it IS paying off. If he didnt have this burning desire to be closer I dont think things would be progressing as fast as they are!!

I was glad that at least we coudl sort of kind of talk about our feelings about going to the church.. well at least we didnt fight then or push each other away then.. but it was obvious there was a lot of tension.. but we did well to push things aside at that time at least!

P

P

I'm just NOT doing Christmas next year :rolleyes:

Dave

Every year I say to myself "never again" I'm just going to book myself a cruise and go away from the 23 and come back on the 28th or so..

And every year, I dont do this and I voluntarily trigger myself for some unknown undeserved family "duty"!! I gotta get some kahunas one of these years and just tell my parents that I just can't face another Xmas with my dad unless he shapes up.

I hate Xmas.. I'm not doing it anymore either!

P

Even being Jewish doesn't help - I find myself just as "triggered" over this season... There's too much "expectation" in the air, I guess.

Anyway - we always end up going to the movies that day & try to block out the rest of the world: sometimes it helps.

Eesh being Jewish does that give you not just 1 day for triggering, but 8? That would suck :*(

HA HA HA!!! LOL!!! Who SAYS we don't have fun here!!!

Great post about 8 days.......!!

Maybe next year I'll go away for Christmas with my husband and not HAVE to do anything at all!

Wishful thinking!

I have a multifaith family. On the good years I get a few days in between the end of Chanukah and the beginning of Christmas. On the bad years (like this one) we have to drive all over the city and outlying areas in holiday traffic showing off my children to 4 sets of relatives who don't celebrate together. :rolleyes:

And before you ask, I never got compensated in my childhood for this grief with extra gifts at the holidays. Instead I got 8 WEAK presents (like, a lollipop) and no chance of believing in Santa Claus.

I would have to take one huge cruise to get out of it all... more like an antarctic expedition...

you guys rock
Sar

Yeah!!! But it's soooo great to be able to laugh about it!!!