Ook Ook 🦍

"Psychologically speaking, vengeance rarely brings the catharsis we hope for."
-- Dr. Harleen Quinzel

Let's find out.

The third week of July 2018 I told the Brit I had fallen in love with him and he said he had fallen in love with me too. We had some rough patches but we worked them out together. I proposed marriage the first week of October 2018 and he accepted. Not long after that we started to go off the rails. The Brit dumped me and didn't want to talk about the why and how, period.

For the record, I have a mild seizure disorder in my right temporal lobe. As a result I am prone to bipolar disorder and difficulty telling the difference between silmilar faces. But it also gives me an extensive, detailed, and well connected memory. I can quote back to the Brit what he had said or written years ago.

And then there's my anger, another temporal lobe thing. I've worked hard for decades to vent and gripe when I'm angered rather than do something stupid and mean. I complain a lot to vent so I can get past whatever irritant pissed me off. A coworker once described me as a "disappointed optimist," I believe people can be kind and fair and rise to their best selves but I get angry when they get lazy, sloppy, and selfish.

"The worst part about having a mental illness is people expect you to behave as if you don't."
-- Arthur Fleck in JOKER

August 2019 I joined a bipolar support group. A couple of things happened in group that helped me embrace my anger with the Brit.

Another group member was still bitter about an ugly divorce from a few years ago. The therapist had us all read an article from GQ Magazine about being a "good ex". The author's perspective was that the dumped person should pretty much let the dumper call the shots, decide what was acceptable. The author seemed to ignore that both parties in and after a relationship should have equal rights.

I didn't want to be a "good ex".

In group I expressed that I was still hurt by how the Brit treated me. The therapist told me I was letting the Brit control me. She said I had to let go and move on.

I quoted Rube from the Dead Like Me episode My Room: "I just don't get our culture's obsession with moving on. I mean, what are we afraid of? Being sad? Remembering?"

I continued. "That's what the Brit wants, for me to let the memories fade and move on, just like he wants to do. If I give him what he wants then I would be letting him control me."

The Brit may want to let the memories fade, but the internet never forgets.

This website contains all emails between the Brit and me and the few Skype IM's I could save spanning from just before our week together when we fell in love to 15 months after he dumped me. I've tried to keep annotations fact-based and my interpretations clearly interpretations.

I'd like you to be my witness, please. I always suspected the Brit took advantage of the 5,061 miles between us to keep me a secret. No one would see us together around town. No one would know we were partnered unless he chose to tell them. No one would overhear him condescend to me. No one would see him treat me passive-aggressively. No one would know our story unless the Brit chose to tell them.

You'll read how the Brit and I changed over time. Exactly when does it look to you like I shifted from supportive to codependent? Does the Brit really transition from timidly optimistic to viciously unkind like I think he did? You be the judge. Perhaps you could use all this as source material for your doctoral thesis on long-term effects of dysfunctional families on their adult children.

Archivist: "And what if no one believes this truth?"
Sonmi-451: "Someone already does."
-- Cloud Atlas (movie version)