How Dare You?!

How dare you? How dare you make my autism, anxiety and physical health all about you. Do you hear how tone deaf your message reads? I have been unwell because of you. You are so controlling it is insufferable! I can’t take it anymore.

I am not allowed to go home, when I want to go home. I am not allowed to walk to the train station on my own. I am not allowed to walk on the side of the road by the curb. I am not allowed to cross the road without your permission. I am not allowed to buy myself a cup of tea, when we are sat outside, at the airport for six whole hours in the freezing cold. I am not allowed to then get the bus home without you. You dictate to me what bus I can and cannot get onto based on how you think I will cope. I have to wake up at 5am, to walk two hours to meet you, and you make us meet up 45 minutes before the coach leaves. Why? Then you keep buying me things. I don’t want you to keep buying me things. The more treats you buy me, it isn’t going to make me like you more.

Three weeks ago was very hard for me. It was wet. It was cold. There aren’t even many aeroplanes to watch now that airports are running to their winter timetables. And I am going to remind you, this is your hobby, not mine. Me tolerating it, is me masking and being a nice person. Wasting my entire Sunday, every Sunday has had me dreading weekends. I dread the week, because I have been trying to get another job all year long, and I have only managed two interviews all year. This workplace is draining me and you know it, which is why I need Saturdays as my autism overload recovery days. They are not “Lazy days,” as you word them. They are essential for my recovery. And I am not staying in bed all day, just because I am at home all day. I have chores and DIY that need doing and I have to cram it all into Saturday, because I spend all day Sunday with you.

You could see that I was struggling, yet you dragged it out and dragged it out. When you suggested cutting our usual six hour airport watch to four and a half hours, I was very grateful. All I wanted to do was to go home, put on more layers, make a hot water bottle and put on my electric blanket. I had been shivering so much during the past three weeks of our airport visits, that I have further damaged my knee, and will not need that knee operation sooner. But no, leaving the airport early did not mean that I was allowed to go home.

You had already tried to get me to set your phone up for you, while we were in the middle of nowhere. News flash, there is no public wifi in the middle of Birmingham Airport Car Park! How was I supposed to set your phone up without wifi? Then you kept growling like a frustrated child at me, because I couldn’t do the impossible task that you had given to me.

Then, when I thought I was free to go home, you made me walk around town with you to all of the phone shops, asking them if they stocked a phone case for your phone. You wouldn’t listen to me, when I told you that they wouldn’t, as the phone is second hand and not a new enough model. But you eventually listened to the four shop workers, after you made me do all of the talking.

Then, you made me go into CeX with you, where you bought the phone from, and you made me do all of the talking again, when I had to tell them you had no idea how to set it up. We were in there for over one hour, talking to the guy who worked there. One whole hour. I could not cope. I don’t do confrontation. If the phone didn’t work, well you only spent £75 on it. Throw it away and just buy a new one! But, no, you wanted to be that difficult customer. So, not only did you make me stand in a noisy shop for over an hour and you would not let me wait outside or even look around, you made me do all of the talking, then, when the customer service assistant didn’t help fast enough for you or simply because it wasn’t done right the first time, you spoke to them in a condescending, patronising and spiteful tone. You caused confrontation. I do not cope with confrontation. I do not cope when two people are having a confrontational moment on the opposite side of the room that has nothing to do with me. This confrontation had nothing to do with me. I won’t even join my mum on confrontational conversations like this one. I won’t even endure this type of conversation for my own purchases. But here we were in the centre of the tills, with you causing so much upset to the person that was kindly serving us and who kept his patience with you, and those around us. I kept having to apologise to the person helping us.

You put me in such a horrible situation. I couldn’t cope. By the time we left, I had become mute, was sucking my thumb and rubbing Snuffles across my face. You could see that I was struggling. You even said, “You’re struggling, aren’t you?” As we left, rather than helping me, you scolded me for not telling you the scale of which I was struggling, and you were determined that I was struggling because the nice person who has just been helping is for over an hour wasn’t being helpful enough. You keep telling me that I have to tell you, in detail, when I am struggling. You do not accept when I keep telling you that I can’t. You keep saying that because we are friends that I have to tell you, or else it means that I don’t trust you. No, it doesn’t. When I have become mute, I have become mute. There isn’t a specific, magical lead up to becoming overwhelmed, especially not when I am with you, where I can just say, “Hi, I am overwhelmed now.” That is not how being overwhelmed works. And you make things worse when you think that you know everything that is best for me. Just because you have read a book about autism does not mean that you know me nor what is best for me.

After you could see that I was struggling to contain myself, as I was on the edge of a meltdown, you still wouldn’t let me go home. You insisted that we had to go for a cup of tea and that a cup of tea would make me feel better. Are you completely mad? Going somewhere with more people, more noise and delaying returning to my safe place is supposed to help a person with sensory autism? Is it?

If you hadn’t have stopped outside to have a cigarette, I would have been trapped with you for even longer. It is only because the religious preacher, on the microphone, was so loud that I completely snapped, couldn’t take it anymore and I burst into tears that you finally let me go home, however, you were still insistent that I stop with you for a cup of tea. I couldn’t say no, as I have already pointed out, I had already become mute. I managed to shake my head and finally, you let us get the bus home together.

After that ordeal, I still had to go to work the next day. The one place where my anxiety is constantly high and I do not feel safe there. You know this. I struggled all week at work, but I was still able to text you multiple times every single day.

On Saturday night, I texted you saying that I still felt really poorly from last Sunday and I was going to stay at home. I did just that. I didn’t respond to anyone’s text messages.

I do not believe your daughters are real. They only text me from your phone. They text me exactly the same way that you text me. They are in their 20s yet they have no social media, they never use their own phones, they have zero presence online. They don’t even have a Spotify account or a YouTube account to listen to/watch things. Does it not seem a little odd to have a 26 year old daughter who is a musical prodigy, has taught in universities all across America and Italy and is now the most sought after university music lecturer in the whole world that she is moving to Australia, in January, and has already bought a five bedroom house over there and she owns a house in Worcester, which she is keeping, when she migrates to Australia. I do not believe that your 24 year old trans-son exists either, because they only existed when I opened up to you about my struggles with gender identity and that if becoming transgender was more heard of when I was at secondary school then I would be male right now. He apparently only turns up to the airport on days when I am sick in bed and they bring a llama with them everywhere they travel, yet no one in Worcester has ever posted a photo online of seeing a young man with a llama, just walking around. No photos of either exist. I do not believe your £7,000,000 bank account is real. I do not believe you bought a three bedroom house, around the corner from work, for £75,000 two years ago. Every single story you tell, you change it slightly when you repeat it to other people. You even forget that you have told me the same story before, however, this time it is different. I do not believe that your one-of-a-kind British Racing Green Range Rover exists, as I have Googled it and there are plenty of Range Rovers that exist in that colour. I don’t believe that you have met Damen Hill, as you were only interested in Formula One after learning that I used to follow it from the age of sixteen. I do not believe that you ever had a canal boat, as when we all planned to take you up on your offer for the ride, you had conveniently sold it.

Nothing you say adds up. It is all just a fabrication in your mind.

Now we get to the part that pushed me over the edge. I didn’t text you, or anyone, on Sunday. I arrive at work on Monday morning and you had texted two colleagues, asking them if I was at work, if I was okay and if I needed an ambulance. I had one day to myself. One day. I was going to reach out and message you, only to find you had texted me saying, “Are we not talking anymore? Going to tell me what I’ve done wrong?” I didn’t text you on Sunday, because I had taken migraine medication and was sleeping on and off all day. You knew this! So, on Monday, I ignored you. I took a piece of my life back. For the first time in a very long time, I felt like a really heavy weight had been lifted and I had a piece of my life back. Yet, you chased multiple people at my workplace about me. You had your phone number passed to others. The one lady that I can trust, you bombard her with text messages between 10pm and midnight, demanding to know everything about me from the past week.

Then, I woke up on last Saturday morning to the postman bringing me a giant box. Guilting me with Temu junk is not going to make me want to talk to someone who has been so controlling. Still, I reached out and thanked you for the kind gifts, explained that you didn’t need to, and told you that I am struggling with my anxiety, autism, job search and how much I still have to do to my maisonette, that I have been in denial about being in autism burnout for some time and I just need a little space. Your reply made me angry.

First of all, two weeks? You say you hadn’t heard from me in two weeks? It was one day. I didn’t text you back for one day. And how dare you make my struggles all about you! You have been worried sick? I am a bad person for not constantly updating you on my mental wellbeing? I need to tell you these things? You even confirmed that you have been texting and phoning everyone you can to find out about me, when it hasn’t even been a full week yet. And ending your message with, “So does this mean I’m not going to see you then?”

ARGH!!! I have never been so angry or so infuriated with anyone. Ever. I literally just told you that I am struggling with my mental health, and I need some time to recover. And you twisted everything I said to make it all about you. You are the reason why my mental health has been suffering. You are the reason why I am struggling to cope with everyday things. You are the reason why I am so incredibly tired and drained all of the time. You are a fully grown adult. You need to learn to handle your own actions and emotions. I am not being held responsible for you waking my colleagues up in the middle of the night and for not being able to cope with me not messaging you for one day, when I told you I would be heavily medicated and sleeping.

You have pushed this communication beyond controlling now. It feels scary, stalker-y and dangerous. I even had a colleague, who is one of your friends, quietly tell me not to talk to you anymore, because he was worried for me. I then opened up to him about how I feel like I am going mad, because everything feels so controlling and so scary, and he said that I confirmed what he was worried about. I have barely explained half of my concerns to people, and I have done it because I feel so trapped and scared by this, that I don’t know what to do. This is controlling. This is stalking and this is getting really scary now.

Please, leave me alone. I do not want any more text messages from you, or from your supposed offspring, from your phone. I do not want any emails. I do not want any phone calls. I do not want any gifts. I do not want you turning up at my front door. I want to be left alone. You have no respect for my mental health, my privacy or my wellbeing. You showed that in your email. I have never, ever been more disgusted by the manipulation used in your email – and I thought my father was a controlling and manipulative man. In the words of Benedict Cumberbatch’s Sherlock Holmes: you repulse me.

 

- Josie -

Six Months & Thirteen Days

(Josie Sayz: I had to write something special today. It is part of my new poetry anthology that I am writing (Thirteen Miles is a part of this same series). I am in love with this. It came to me rather quickly. I had to write it and post it today, because today is six months and thirteen days).

Six Months & Thirteen Days
It’s been a while since I’ve seen your face.
I’ve been counting down six months and thirteen days.
The number’s repeating for a reason.
It feels like so much more with each passing season.

Thirteen minutes, thirteen hours, thirteen days,
Since I said goodbye, it’s all just been a haze.
Thirteen miles, thirteen steps, thirteen ways.
I’ve dreamt of the reunions, love, collision and delays.
Do I text, do I call, do I write, do I stall?
Or do I stay tight and say nothing at all?
Do I reach out and tell you I still care?
Or do I leave that to you – is that what’s fair?

I’ve been moving on. I’m doing fine,
But every once in a while, thoughts of you cross my mind.
Exciting news, thoughts, ideas I want to share
Come crashing down, knowing you’re not there.

Thirteen minutes, thirteen hours, thirteen days,
Thoughts of you mean so much more than just a phase.
Thirteen miles, thirteen steps, thirteen ways.
My thoughts have been running wild, like I’m lost in a maze.
Do I text, do I call, do I write, do I stall?
Or do I stay tight and say nothing at all?
Do I reach out and tell you I still care?
Or do I leave that to you – is that what’s fair?

Thoughts of love float like a feather.
Reminiscing of us together.
An anchor of hate has my heart sinking.
There I go, keep overthinking.

I’ve been counting down six months and thirteen days.
Wishing things were different. Wishing we could change.

Thirteen minutes, thirteen hours, thirteen days,
Since I said goodbye, it’s all just been a haze.
Thirteen miles, thirteen steps, thirteen ways.
I’ve dreamt of the reunions, love, collision and delays.
Do I text, do I call, do I write, do I stall?
Or do I stay tight and say nothing at all?
Do I reach out and tell you I still care?
Or do I leave that to you – is that what’s fair?

- Josie -

Rant

I shouldn’t have to write an essay defending a piece of fictional writing or a random poem that popped into my head, but with two controlling men, who specialise in being mentally abusive towards me and my creative outlets, while on my five mile walk to work this morning, it occurred to me that I have to defend myself in order to prevent your mentally abusive comments, text messages, phone calls and/or signing me up to humour writing courses.

Alternatively, why don’t you both grow up and leave me alone. I know you are both still there, despite my attempts to make you go away. I do not stalk your social media or your personal lives, so stay away from my corner of the internet. Unless you are going to be nice, leave me alone.

My ‘Thirteen Miles’ poem, that I wrote yesterday, is part of my Peter and Jane story series. It is not directly linked to you. I am allowed to fictionalise parts of my life, in order to help tell a creative narrative. Yes, I was influenced by you, however, this does not mean that I am crying every day because I miss you, nor am I desperately trying to get your attention or to win you back. It is simply a creative writing piece that I had a lot of fun writing.

Nor does the reference mean that I was upset because you moved away. You never seemed to get it into your head that I was happy for you and proud of you for buying your own place. You said that you needed somewhere with enough space so that you could have a home office, as you work remotely. Now you have that.

I could not cope with your communication, or lack thereof. No one is ever, “too busy,” especially for their partner. You just placed me so low down on your priority list that I was just a thing that was supposed to sit around twiddling my thumbs, waiting for you. When you are in a relationship, you cannot make life changing decisions without including your partner, because said life changing decisions affect them too – often more so than you.

In a relationship it is crucial to communicate. When you live together, you do not need to physically message each other often, as written text only contributes to 10% of your intention. When you live together there are your actions, your posture, your tone of voice, just your presence can indicate how you are feeling. However, you cannot have the no written communication part of a relationship if you do not physically see one another. Your parents, siblings, friends don’t need to check in on their partner via text message or emails, because they live together or see each other every day. When you do not have that, written communication daily is crucial.

Putting in effort is just as important. Sending a few words saying, “I thought I sent it. Have a good day,” show that you are not emotionally invested. If you do not care how your partner is, can hang up mid conversation after telling your partner how you are then saying, “So how was your day?” then instantly hang up, when a better offer can along and leave your partner waiting for you to not be, “too busy,” anymore to call them back, only for them to reach out and you say, “I’m good. Playing a games with friends,” and you do not care if your partner has no idea if you are okay, then that is not a relationship. If you put in 20% communication effort and your partner has to put in 180% communication effort in order for you to be bothered to message them at all, that is not a relationship. If your partner feels so mentally and emotionally exhausted that they start mirroring your texting style and putting in the exact same amount of effort that you do, you say, “There’s no point in texting you. We only say the same few words,” then you are not in a relationship.

Relationships are hard work. They take effort, from both parties. It is not a single sided thing, while one person cries constantly every single day, waiting for you to remember that they exist and show them five seconds of your time. And when you say you are too busy to show the person who is supposed to be your number one priority five seconds of your day, that is not a relationship.

A relationship is not, “Winning you over,” and then putting in zero effort after three months, because you have a girlfriend. If anything, the first three months are the easiest bit, then you have to try harder after that.

We were never really together after three months. It was a real relationship to begin with. Normally, people grow to that point of a relationship within three to six months of getting to know one another, but from the first date, you acted like the exact person that I wanted to be in a serious, long term, forever relationship with. You wanted something serious. You wanted commitment. You could communicate properly. You wanted to settle down and be together. You wanted to live together and get married. Those are the things that you need to know if you are compatible with. And we were. You wanted all of the same things I wanted. And you wanted them soon – okay, so maybe I was a little scared that you wanted it too soon, but I have known people who got engaged after two weeks and lived happily every after. But after three months, this all went away. You weren’t that persona anymore. You didn’t want those things anymore – any of them. You turned out to be my shortest relationship. You changed the most the quickest. You lost interest the quickest. You stopped communicating the quickest.

 

We were a relationship for three months. After that, it was a situationship. The fourth month was hard, the fifth month was harder. It was the end of the fifth month that you broke my trust so much that I deleted and blocked you online and never undeleted or unblocked you. Christmas was painful. Poor communication on my hardest day of the year, mixed with being forgotten and not remembered until it was too late and I was already a crying mess was too much. Then, from the 2^nd January, I have never felt more lonely and unwanted in a relationship. It is less lonely being alone. It is less painful being alone. Having a doctor tell me, in February, that my partner is mentally abusive hurt. I didn’t believe him. I refused to. I made so many excuses for you. I wanted it to work so much. I wanted the old you to be real so much. I believed that if I just held on long enough that he would come back. And one day he did. You proved that you could do it. You wanted a relationship. You communicated with me. You messaged me just like you used to. Then the next day, you took it all away from me. You left me with absolutely nothing. That is what broke me. The next day, when the Sales Director said morning to me, I burst into tears. He could say morning to me, but my own partner couldn’t. I couldn’t keep living like this. I had already done this in a past situationship. I could not have you controlling my emotional wellbeing, making me so anxious that I couldn’t speak to anyone. Situationships are mentally abusive. That type of love bombing and withdrawing is mentally abusive. That is not a relationship. That is not the way that a loving, caring partner should communicate.

I was never asking for much. Just the basic communication for a healthy relationship. I wasn’t asking for money to spent on me, gifts all the time, to go on holiday, to go places, or even to see you daily. I wasn’t asking to take you away from your friends or family. I was just asking for the minimum communication for a healthy relationship, and to not be treated like a situationship.

I have never felt more alone and worthless than with you. I was so low down on your priority list that for two weeks, I didn’t even hear from you, aside from your two copy/paste text messages. As soon as you moved away, you were a completely different person. And do not use the excuse that you were buying a property. When I bought my maisonette, I had so much free time that I wrote a 60,000-word novel and walked 32 miles every Saturday, while working full time and visiting the elderly lady, in her 90s, that lived around the corner most Sundays.

Once you moved away, you stopped sharing your day with me. You stopped checking in. You stopped wanting to know if I was okay. Your promise if seeing each other every other weekend never materialised. You only wanted to phone me when it was convenient for you. You were against planning a phone call to look forward to together for a specific day/time. You wanted me to drop everything whenever you happened to have a spare few moments free. When I suggested organising/scheduling a day and time that works for both of us, you said I was being controlling. When I asked to hear from you, you said I was being controlling. When I wanted the person back, who was the man I fell in love with, who wanted the same things in life that I did, you said I was being delusional, living in a fairytale and trying to control your life. I wasn’t trying to do any of those things. It is not controlling to want a neutral, agreed time to phone each other, so that neither of us have to stop what we are doing. It is not controlling to want the exact same relationship dynamic that you gave me, when we first met. It is not controlling to point out when you are doing something mentally abusive, controlling, immature or something very hurtful and to ask you to be more mindful next time. I spelt it out to you, multiple times, exactly what I needed from you and each time you said, “I don’t know what to do.” If you don’t know how to text me good morning, let me know that you are okay, tell me a little about your day and text me good night, then I can’t help you any further. I wanted to be more than just some girl on the sidelines of your life, who you said, “Yeah, I have a girlfriend, look,” to, to make you feel big, or accomplished or whatever ego boost you got from it. I wanted to be your loving, lifelong partner, who you share your life with – not who you push away and do everything independently from and am expected to just turn up and be your unpaid prostitute and escort.

When I did meet up with you, after close to zero communication from you for six weeks, it was a struggle, because you were a completely different person. You became a different person when you moved away. You didn’t like the same things anymore. You weren’t interested in the same hobbies. When I met up with you, you got rid of the things that you told me you weren’t getting rid of, because they were part of your personality. You spoke differently. You acted differently. Your personality was different. Every single thing, person, object, information that you interact with every day changes you. You might want to see a new film, hate a genre of music that you used to like, have a very strong opinion about a new political event. A person with my type of autism notices the changes in a person more than most people do. You were not the same person, when we met up. When you said, “Why was it so awkward?” it was because you were a complete stranger to me. It was like meeting you for the first time. You no longer had the same relationship ideologies, you no longer had the same hobbies, you looked different, you acted different, you sounded different. We were two strangers meeting for the first time, on an eight month anniversary day date.

You dismissing my wants and beliefs, as, “You shouldn’t care what everyone else thinks,” when living with my partner and getting married one day is not what me caring about what everyone else thinks. It is what I want. It is what you said that you wanted. It was our future that you had painted in my head. It was what you made me believe that we were working towards together. I was not being delusional or living in a fairytale for believing you, when you said that you wanted that. When you took my life, my future, away from me, it hurt a lot. It was scary. Very scary. Everything that I knew had changed. But most importantly and scarily, the person that I loved had changed. We no longer wanted the same things, and you saying that I shouldn’t want them anymore, because you didn’t care about that sort of thing hurt more than breaking up with you did. You dismissing my wants, beliefs and ideologies and comparing not living together with your partner to not being able to go to a restaurant was beyond hurtful. And you are the delusional one if you think those two things are remotely similar.

My autism is not the same as his. I found a whole community of people, around my age, who have the exact same struggles that I do. They are not intelligent at maths, struggle with understanding emotions or whatever else the stereotypical Asperger’s diagnosis is. Autism is a spectrum, like a rainbow. If he is red, then I am the polar opposite, at purple. I have a relatively basic IQ at 136. I am not an expert at Maths. I have high attention to detail. I have very strong emotions. I need structure, stability and a plan. If plans change, I cannot cope – that is not me being difficult. That is what everyone who has the same type of autism that I have si like. If you say you are going to be there at 5pm and then you are not, I cannot follow through with the plans that we had for tomorrow, because you are not here now, when you said that you would be. It doesn’t matter that you will travel over in the morning. I cannot do what we were supposed to do, because you said that you were going to be there. I cannot cope with loud noises or busy places with too many people. You like going to restaurants. Well, there is the sound of the traffic outside, footsteps, cutlery, people talking, every single conversation in the entire building, music playing, food being prepared out the back, I can’t understand what someone says when they are a new voice to me, let alone having all of the other conversations playing at once, there is crockery moving, drinks being prepared. Every single sound, movement, light is like a new tab being open o Excel, or a new app being open on your phone. The more things you open, the less RAM you have remaining. The louder the noise, it is like an app is flashing constantly for your attention. The more frequently I do these things, it doesn’t get any easier. It isn’t like learning to ride a bike. Each time is just as uncomfortable and hard to cope with as the last.  No matter how many times you take me to a restaurant, I will always struggle. I will always have to pretend and fake being happy, that I am enjoying myself. I will always hate it. I am happy to try, and I have tried. Suggesting going during a quiet time and not the busiest time on a weekend didn’t fall well, but if you want me to do something that will always be overwhelming and hard, I will try. I did try. When I said that I wanted to go to the new Italian restaurant near me that served tapas style dishes with you for my birthday, and I found out the exact day and time, from the restaurant when they were least busy, you pretended that you didn’t hear me and started talking about something else.

And I have to write all of this just because I wanted to write a fun little poem.

This doesn’t mean I hate you. I don’t. This doesn’t mean I want you back. Situationships are toxic. It doesn’t mean I don’t want to be a part of your life. I know that you had someone else in mind, and I hope that whoever you were talking about when you said, “We need to decide our movie posters,” makes you far happier than I ever could. Yes, I still hold onto that little bit of hope that you might want a real relationship and with me, like the old you did, but I’m not delusional. You deserve to be happy, and that is the most important thing. I still love you and care about you, but the old you, who I fell in love with. If he still exists, and if he still wants all of the things that he said that he wanted over a year ago, then that is wonderful. But I am not holding onto that. If you are the same person that you had become, back in April, who does not want to communicate, has no time for a partner, has completely changed his personality from the person that I knew, and who only wants communication to happen on his terms, then I wish you all the best. I hope that you find a person who also does not want a relationship, who can cope with the mental abuse that is a situationship, and that the two of you love each other and live happily ever after.

All I wanted is to write my fiction, whether it be for fun or to help me process things, without the fear of being verbally attacked. Creative writing is all about writing what you know. If I write a poem, a piece of flash fiction or a novel about a person or a situation that sounds similar to you, that does not mean I am trying to get your attention, that I haven’t moved on or that I am desperately wanting to be with you. It is just a piece of fiction. And that goes for both of you.