Maggie's Story

I received this letter after posting the story of P's betrayal in my Soul2Soul newsletter. It sparked a correspondence with this survivor. The following is an essay she wrote in 2000 about her break-up with P.

I hope my writing to you is not an unpleasant, unwanted intrusion into your private lives. But I believe we have something rather significant in common -- an experience with a man in Bismarck, ND? A man that left us hurting, or at least left me hurting, in a way I've never experienced before or since. Breathtaking, heart stopping, conversations in the middle of the night. Phone calls 10 times a day. Knowing your every thought, feeling and need. Sound familiar? My name is Maggie. I lived in Bismarck for a year in 1999-2000 and was with P. 3 to 4 times a week. I was in love with him from 1996 until...oh who can say when it died...if it ever did die totally. I thought I was the first. I came to realize I would not be the last. When I drove out of Bismarck, in a blizzard in April 1999, I was sobbing so hard I had to lean on the steering wheel to hold myself upright. It was at least a year before I stopped thinking of him every minute of every day. Anyway, I thought I would let you know there are others of us out there.

Saturday, Feb. 12, 2000.

These last two weeks have been pure hell. I have been so jealous of P…or I suppose of whomever it is that is taking his attention and heart away from me.

Last night, something came over me and I went over the edge. It reached the point where the pain he was causing me was more than the pain of losing him. And I popped...

Told him I was going to go to his wife and tell her everything. Told him I was going to write to the entire Harem and tell them. I was a witch…said everything mean that I could think of.

I needed to make him hate me. His ego isn't strong enough for him to forgive something like that…an assault of that nature. He’ll see it as me losing control, when in reality, it was me taking control. I had to stop the pain. I was like a fox caught in a trap. I found it necessary to chew off my leg to set myself free. Or a dog kept on a chain and teased. No matter how sweet the disposition, the dog will eventually bite. And bite I did.

But it was calculated. My mind could not ever have been that clear if I had been hurt. It was pure rage that I tapped into….rage at being mistreated all these years.

I was high while it was happening, and then of course, really hit the skids when the adrenaline wore off. And then the pain hit…the storm broke and so did my heart. As the tears overtook me, I had to call his voice mail time and again. [How many lovers have poured out how much endless heartache to a voice mail over the years?] God, I wish I could find my Marge Piercy book of poems. I want the one about all ‘left’ women howl in the night…at 3 am I become Sylvia Plath. At 4 am I become my mother.

I love this man more than life itself. And why, I simply don’t know. It’s as if can’t learn to unlove him. I’ve tried it all.

I need to remember why I got so crazy. I need to remember how cold he could get. I need to remember how he disappears…just walks away when I say something that angers him. He’s said the marriage counselor told him that it was his way of controlling the situation. Which I had tried to tell him and obviously failed.

I need to remember the cold tone of his voice when he explained something like he was talking to a slightly retarded child. I need to remember how he never let himself go. How he needed to manipulate. How he talked about the Harem…the plans he had for bringing each under control. How he manipulated them, changed screen names so they couldn’t find him and tell him of their pain. He left them…sort a…kinda but not really. He would call….because he was such a good guy and let them pour their hearts out to him while he was on line with someone else, or was actually concentrating on work.

I remember he told me that Anne or Deb would be on the phone crying, and he would be working away…not even responding unless he heard them stop for any length of time…then he would utter some vague response.

He did that to me when he called from Minneapolis this last time. He was working on figures, which I Learned half way into the conversation. I had to make all the talk...he responded in short sentences…because he was not listening.

I need to remember all those things to help me not slide backwards. I need to remember how I felt New Year’s Eve when he said he was coming over, yet spent the entire evening in the office, supposedly working...but I know he was on line with his phone sex women. He didn’t even call until 10:30 to tell me he wasn’t coming over. I was so excited thinking about the evening. I was on cloud 9. My biggest wish was coming true. I was going to spend New Year’s Eve, 1999 with P. He had bought us little decorated bottles of champagne. I got dressed…lit a million candles. I was so excited.

As the hours wore on….a grayness began to settle into my heart. I lay down on the couch and gave in to the sadness. I was heartbroken. It was not a new feeling. I went all-empty inside. It was preferable to the pain. I have to remember how those times felt. I can’t let myself go back there.

Remember: The second night ‘Little’ was here. We were all sitting around waiting for P. He never showed. The weekend I drove over from Montana. He never showed. Last year at the Lincoln Park in Mandan. He showed once…but then not again. How that felt.

But the mother of all heartache, was the time he did not show in Seattle. I was excited beyond all belief. I had kept our re-vitalized relationship in a good place in my mind, until he sent the e-mail where he told me of the top three things that he was looking forward to when we met. Me burying my head in his shoulder as he held me in his arms…and sitting next to me and having our hands intertwine as one.

THAT was more than friendship. And that sent me over the edge, heart soaring again.

He never showed up. He never called. And when I got on his case about it, he tried to make it my fault. I should have had faith. Yeah, right….a year later I learned he was with a Harem ‘wannabe’. He was with another fucking woman…and I was supposed to have faith.

So, the question becomes: why have I done this to myself over these long 4 years? What is the lesson to be learned? It has to be more than what initially meets the eye. How will I grow from this and not be bitter?

And how will I live without P in my life? How will I make myself WANT to live without P in my life? What do I do now? And maybe that is the lesson. Maybe it’s not the pain of the past, but how I deal with it. How I get myself out of this hole I have dug. How I rebuild my life.