11 years...

I lost my husband 30 months ago. He chose to leave me in January 2013, 9 years after we were married, just 6 months before I was CT’d with my brain aneurysm. Two months later I lost my job, terminated after 7 years with my employer, just 2 months after I was CT’d with my brain aneurysm. Neither my husband nor my employer gave me excuses as to why I was cut off. I have found out that these sort of circumstances can destroy how you live, who you live with, how you can or can’t accept your life.

Perhaps some others would agree with this, most would not as they have never been in this kind of situation. If you have never been somewhere like that, I can guarantee that you will not understand without talking to someone like me. I know, at that time, I dropped very, very low. Sometimes, in my now-brain, I have very lows and some very highs. Sometimes I simply don’t understand my short history.

Last year, 13.5 months ago, I had my brain operation and a stroke. Twelve months ago I came out of hospital. I can’t work any longer as my brain just won’t function as it had, normally, when I was married and worked. My income dropped to zero until I ended up on the Centrelink DSP, half from Australia and half from New Zealand. That is less than half that I was working for.

When my husband left me I entered into a mourning period. I tried to understand why he chose that, why he wanted to move back to New Zealand without me, why his children had talked him into that. I had never had a real relationship with his kids. In Hamilton, New Zealand, before we moved to Australia, we would drive down to their homes in New Plymouth. They would occasionally come up to Hamilton to visit us, but they kept a distance between them and me, and them and my daughter. After we moved to Brisbane they came over to visit us – paid for by us – and showed that they didn’t really care for me. I couldn’t really like them. Who likes people who don’t like you?

My husband moved back to New Zealand a year after he left me. I found out that he had talked with my employer, something which he should not ever have been able to do. He was very much in debt, and yet he told my employer that I had a “big” debt. I was, of course, a woman. He didn’t consider that a woman should have any debt. Mine was less than half of his. I was aware that I had lost a lot – an awful lot - of property and funds due to his debt.

I had taken my employer to Unfair Dismissal and they paid me a very small amount. The lawyer had asked them for a reasonable amount, but they cut it. I was convinced that $15,000 was taken by them to pay for my Graduation Diploma of Occupation Health and Safety. I had no income, and I drew my small superannuation which has now gone. I was paying my bills at this time when I could afford them. I was still in debt when I went into hospital for my brain aneurysm operation.

Only 2 days before I had been terminated, I had lodged a claim with Q-Comp because my employer really hurt me. Q-Comp turned me down, I appealed. They sent me to a psychologist who agreed with me. Q-Comp turned me down again. I went into hospital before I was able to fight them legally, and my lawyer dropped me. Six months later I found out that I still had an opportunity to legally fight them, and it took me 6 months again to do that. I am still waiting for the decision from there, still waiting for my income, still waiting to be able to pay off my debt.

Just before I’d gone into hospital I had sent my first book to a publisher. This was accepted, even when I told them after I got out of hospital that I was on a Centrelink income. I expected it to be published somewhere around 8 months. After my operation I was no longer able to work in WHS – or anywhere else - due to my brain injured from the operation and stroke. This kind of situation can really destroy a normal person who is no longer normal. I began my second book on my aneurysm, had to re-read it every night, re-write it, correct my language, do it again. A month ago I contacted the publisher to ask when my first book be published, and they replied very rudely to me, and told me I could take my contract and shove it. I did.

My husband was given a document for divorce which I expect that he would be able to pay for it – get some funds from his kids, perhaps – in New Zealand. It was 3 times less cost than Australia, and I certainly could not have afforded it. I am still waiting.

I had never seen his kids on Facebook – and yet, only two days ago, I saw his daughter responding to my Auckland friend’s post. I found out that she was now a Facebook “friend” with my own friend from 13 years ago; my friend who had come to our wedding, who always treated me well. 13 years after I had met my friend. 11 years after I met my husband. 2 years after he left me.

My personal history is so webbed and bent and fucked, and sometimes I wish, truly wish, that I only had a normal life like most people I have met over my lifetime. Yet people like that, who have never had any problem in their own lives, blame me for my own history. Perhaps I caused a problem with my husband’s kids when they’d very rarely visit but never respond to me; talked my husband into coming to Australia even when he had asked me to come; cost my husband when it rained even though I was working every week; upset my employer when I was CT’d with a brain aneurysm after 7 years even though they did not ever give me any written warning before they terminated me; upset the whole world when I was riding my motorbike because I was (*gasp*) a WOMAN!!

How do I react to this? How do I live? Sometimes I have looked on my past history as only 30 months, back to when my husband chose to leave me, and yet I can go back further than that: further back when my son and his wife took their kids back to New Zealand and cut me off, further back when my husband got knocked off his motorbike, further back than we moved so many times after we had sold our own house, further back before the rain started. Should I blame that rain?

I live alone, with my beautiful adopted American bulldog. She is now 13 and has been with me for 7 years. Dogs live wonderful lives or very, very bad lives. I never thought of humans living their lives like that. Now I know the difference, and yet I don’t know how to get around it. I need to write for an income, but I can’t pay a publisher. Right now I am waiting for a decision, one that I believe is really something I should get, because I can’t work any more. Without a decent decision for me I will still be broke, with no more income. My debts, which have simply sat there, waiting, for the last year, might end up in a bankruptcy court.

So, what will I be doing in a week, two weeks, six months? My life seems to be in 11-year batches. I have figured this out about it. My first 11-year married to my first ex was poor. Second 11-year bringing up my kids on my own was good. Third 11-year married to my second ex was poor. Now I think I have started my next life. It should be good for me.

It has to be.