Monday, December 05, 2005

"Calling to Validate Your Reaction"

Ex called me last week. I haven't seen nor heard his voice in about a year and I heard it on Friday. This is what happened...

I was invited to be my friend's date at a wedding this weekend. Last week as we were finalizing things, my friend mentioned that he left me a voicemail at work. I thought it was odd he did that since my voicemail should say that I can't check messages since I'm on leave. So after my IOP sessions, I called my work voicemail. I heard that I hadn't actually activated the new voicemail, so people who called got a message that sounded like I was still working. Which meant I had to check all five messages to see if any of them needed a response.

Ex's message was #4. He called to ask me for the name of a restaurant. What!?!?! Surrounding the request he hoped I was doing well and "understood" if I didn't want to call him back. How nice of him. He also assumed that I still remembered his number. It's true, but why would you assume that?

I stopped in my tracks in the middle of the sidewalk. I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. I started shaking and crying immediately. I called my friend, but she was in meetings, so I called my therapist. I didn't need a session or anything...I just need to share what just happened with a person who would understand my intense reaction to it.

My therapist called me right back and said, "I got your message and I'm just calling you back to validate your feelings and your reaction. Don't call him back." She said other things, but that was the essence.

So I didn't. I feel much better about the whole thing, but it rocked my world for a while. The catalyst to all that I'm going through now just popped up. He better not call me again.

1 comment:

Melissa said...

For the record, I can totally understand your reaction and I don't even know the whole story. That was Ex's way to have you call him back and tell him everything's fine. Or worse, his way of calling you and making himself feel better with no regard for whether or not it made you feel worse. Jackass. Your therapist was right. I'm glad you didn't call back. Wanker.

P.S. I wish I was making up a dialect for those folks in my blog - but I could hear them. Their windows were down. :( Makes me sad, but it's true... More of a rant against a lack of education than anything else.