dead to me box

I have a box. Not in the physical sense but in the emotional sense. I keep all my emotional baggage in it. If it was a real box, it might be giant-sized.  It might take up a whole room or a whole house.  But because, in true socio fashion, I prefer to hide my emotions, it is a very tiny box, in my mind, that is rarely opened.

Once you get put in my box, you can never escape.  You are there, forever.

I hardly think about the people in my box, they get no attention from me.  I don’t know if the people in my box know that they are in my box.  I don’t think they care. I know I don’t care.  That’s why they are in the box because I have stopped caring about them. Or sometimes, but only for a few, they are in my box because it hurts too much to think about them.

The oldest person in my box, well he’s not the oldest, but he is probably been in the box the longest, is my ex-husband. There are many obvious reasons why anyone’s ex-spouse would be in a “dead to me” box. Just in case you were wondering, he’s in there for all those obvious reasons for sure.  Lying, cheating, being a deadbeat dad, and many more. Too many to list! He’s not in there because it hurts too much to think about him.  On the rare occasion that the box pops open and a tiny whiff of him sneaks out, it is usually because of all the hurt that he caused for my children. I’ve moved past him, everything and anything he ever did or said to me.  I have not moved past what he did to my kids.  “I’m divorcing you; I’m not divorcing the kids.”  Biggest lie ever. I will never get over that. Snap, close that box.

He is in there as “the unforgiven”.

I have other family members in the box. I am sure that many people have that too.  Is there some person in your family that you just cannot have in your life?  No matter what happens, where you are, what you are doing, they take every opportunity to just make it shitty. One time I thought I had planned the perfect family event, a simple get together with family for a holiday so our kids could hang. I knew he was difficult-ish (I am being kind here) so I let him make all the choices about the event.  He picked the day, the time, the place, the food, everything that seemed to be important to him, he chose. For me the only important thing was getting everyone together and being in the moment. Even though he made all the choices it was not enough, he was still not happy. Spoiler alert, he will never be happy. He last minute cancelled. Thanks bruh, get in the box.

He is in there as “the never happy”.

And then there are others. Nameless. Faceless. Many. They each played the same role in the movie called “Me, Myself and I”. Same leading role, different person, yet the angst they put on me was always the same.  Not cool. Not nice. Self-centered. Center of their own universe. Unforgiving. I knew very little about them personally, yet they took everything as a personal attack.  They got personal with me. Taking something that should have been simple, making it complicated and in all cases making it about them because they only thought about themselves.  All the time, the only person they cared about was themselves. Did I mention self-centered, no self-awareness, thinking only about themselves? Ha!  Guess I did. They spent a lot of time trying to break me down, make me feel less than them, manipulating me. They could have been an old boyfriend, a family member or even a former boss. I have put several of these people in the box. They go into the box pretty quickly and even though I try to keep them down, whack-a-mole style,  they don’t stay in easy.  They are always popping up in my life, almost reincarnated from the prior version, worse than the one before. Their bag of tricks is always the same. Tell someone who cares. Into the box you go!

They are in the box as “the narcissists”.

There is one more type in the box. There are many versions of this last one. They can come from any part of your life.  I have a former friend in the box, another brother in the box, former clients/customers in the box, and some work colleagues in the box under this last, very “special” type.  This one is probably the worst of all and unfortunately there is an endless supply  of these pseudo humans in the world. Yes, they walk among us, as in “there’s a fungus among us!”  LOL!  For every ten wonderful humans I meet in my life, there is always at least one “C U Next Tuesday”  in the bunch. They spend every moment of their life making my life miserable, unbearable, unpleasant, you get it. No matter how nice and cooperative I am with them, they are shitty. Extra shitty with a cherry on top.  Always trying to make themselves look better by making me look bad. Always picking at every little thing, no matter how small, to make it not their fault. Always defending themselves against an imaginary fight that they created in their own crazy mind. Yes, they are crazy. They make me think I am the crazy one.  I can do anything, everything to try to get along. It never works. It will never work. I GIVE UP! Open the box, toss them in and try to forget they ever existed.

They are in the box as “the assholes”.

I love my little box. In my socio mind, the box is magic.  The box protects me from bad humans.  The box helps me get on with my life. The box keeps me from jumping off a cliff. It’s a tiny box with enormous power. It brings me joy and peace.

“Hating people takes too much energy, just pretend they’re dead.”