Post-Narcissist Paranoia?
I got soap in my eye while showering yesterday. And who would have thought that this simple error in shampooing would create such a dramatic explosion of emotions?! As I rinsed the shampoo out of my left eye, I was instantly returned to a time in the recent past, back at the house I shared with my former partner…and as I say that I realize that “shared” isn’t really the appropriate word because that makes it seem like there was a mutual agreement to share the space and that each of us was equally welcome there but it was not like that — it was more like the bully taking 9/10 of your lunch money and leaving you ten cents to work with — and the only reason he didn’t take that ten cents is because it was in that weird little pocket in your jeans and he couldn’t see it, or it didn’t fall out when he dangled you upside down by your ankles. “Partner” might not be appropriate either.
Anyway, the time I instantly recalled and returned to was last spring…I had just opened a new pair of contact lenses, wore them once, and put them in my usual lens container to store overnight. I left them in the bathroom as I always had. The next day, I got ready to leave for work and decided to use my new contacts — I didn’t always wear contacts — whether or not I did was based solely on my mood, sometimes the weather — if it was sunny, I would wear them because I’d want to wear sunglasses. I put my contact into my eye and instantly felt the burning of that shampoo in my eye. I tried blinking it away with my tears but that didn’t help. It burned so badly, as if I had soaked the lens in acid rather than saline solution. I took it out and put it back in the container, assuming I must have had something on my fingers (lotion? soap residue?) that caused the burning. I washed my hands vigorously and tried to remember what I’d touched that morning that could have burned so badly. I couldn’t come up with anything — I’d just taken a shower and got dressed, didn’t touch anything, didn’t put any products into my hair yet, nor lotion on my hands. After I washed my hands and squirted some (a lot of) saline directly into my eye, I put the lens back in again and burned my eye again. Took it out again. This time, I dropped both lenses into a container from the kitchen and washed out my lens container, put new saline in with my contacts, put my glasses on, and left for work with a burning bright red left eye…
I didn’t remember that day until yesterday when I got the shampoo in my eye in the shower. And I can tell you, you feel like you’re losing your mind half the time. I pictured one of those mf’ers (the “partner” or the son?) putting drops of hand soap or hand sanitizer into my contacts. I quickly recalled hundreds of other times that something hadn’t been quite right in the house, when something of mine had been ruined, lost, maybe tampered with. Being a pretty stable person, and still thinking that I was a welcome part of the family, I didn’t consider that someone would deliberately try to melt my eye or hurt my dog or hide my shoes. I always thought that I was becoming progressively more and more careless and just couldn’t remember wtf I was doing.
Once I left, I started finding my things exactly where I’d left them. And even that normalcy is something that requires an adjustment in your mentality. It might not be something you’re conscious of — you don’t make mental notes of where you left your gym shoes or car keys, you just leave them where they are. The hard part, the adjustment, is finding them exactly where you left them all the time! Then you begin to realize that the people you loved may have been (were) sabotaging you, and that feels awful. It makes you feel crazy — why would someone do this to me? Why would someone put soap into my contacts? Why would they let my dog starve or cry to go out until I got home? Why would they ruin my clothes? Why would they put motor oil in my coffee cup? Did they do all of those things deliberately, to make me lose my mind? WHY?
What still happens for me is having the expectation that something will be gone or ruined, and I find myself always rushing home to make sure my kids and pets are protected and fed. When I get home and find everything is good, it’s still an adjustment. I still haven’t deliberately left the house for anything other than work, leaving anyone alone in the house. The isolation continues, but now that I believe we are okay and safe, I might be able to go out somewhere, wearing contact lenses that don’t burn my eyes.
