How to Heal? Use a Razor.

2nd night in a row unable to sleep.

I’m thinking more about the wire monkeys and Imago. I think the baby monkey with the wire surrogate is a pretty accurate model for the type of damage I carry. And I think the ideas of Imago make pretty good sense. That we find a partner that helps us recreate the wounds of our childhoods so we can find a way to heal those wounds via direct experience. With Imago Therapy, the idea is that you are in a committed relationship and you do various types of communicating in order to heal those wounds inflicted on you in your developmental years. In my case, I think the way to heal is different.

I believe, when I look honestly at it, that marrying Robin is not the right thing for my kids in the long run. I have 13 months of experience and more than a few journal entries that confirm this. I’ve put this nagging feeling aside quite a few times in the past and hoped for the best. But it just keeps coming back to knock on my door. We spent the evening at Robin’s mother’s house, celebrating her 75th birthday and I observed that, while Robin responded to requests from my kids for various nurturing, she didn’t initiate it once. This is consistent with my previous observations. That is to say it’s very infrequent when she initiates nurturing and she often declines opportunities to nurture my kids when they naturally present themselves.

The healing I did in my 20s had to do with letting go of my anger toward my stepmother and forgiving my father. The work I did last year helped me heal from the loss of Frances.

I think the work I have to do now to heal is to do what my dad couldn’t do. End things with Robin when I know it’s not right for my kids. That’s a crappy realization to come to, but it’s sort of Occam’s Razor for this relationship and it would be a waste of my and my kids’ psychic energy to pretend there’s a another way.