Nineteen YEAR OLDS ARE IDIOTS - #2

           Dear Reader
 
        Isn’t it interesting how you can go through life for years and years under the presumption that something is either perfectly normal, or possibly a tad unhealthy but ‘hey, we all go through that from time to time’, only to look back at it one day and think…wait, what?!
       In the previous part of this blog, I told you a bit about the start of my relationship with Ben and I allured to some shady-ass shit that eventually went on behind the scenes. I think now would be a good time to preface future parts of this blog with a trigger warning, because there will be some subject matter that I can imagine not everyone is going to be comfortable reading about. If you’re sensitive to topics that include abuse, either mental, sexual or physical, please take care. Same goes for topics surrounding mental health, self-harm, suicide, etc.
     Some parts have been really hard to write, let alone share. I’ve written about things that I’ve never disclosed to anyone, or at least not in detail, and it includes some sensitive and fucked up stuff, so please just keep that in mind.   
     Anywho, I guess I’ll just pick up where I left off, with the gradual discovery that Ben wasn’t really the person I thought he was from the beginning of our relationship…
 
     EGGSHELLS
 
     Ben was a very sensitive guy, which was something I initially liked about him. He felt deeply, and he could be so sweet, caring and understanding. I once ran off to his house after a stand-off with my father. I was so hurt and full of pent-up frustration that I’d developed a horrible stress-headache and by the time I made it to Ben’s place, all I could stand do was curl into a ball on his bed with my eyes closed. I was of no use to him at that point, but he spent the next four hours stroking my back and softly reading to me from a random novel that he’d plucked off the shelf. The novel was Jurassic Park…but still. When I finally felt better and I was ready to go home, I realized that it had gotten cold and I was only wearing a thin t-shirt. So, he gave me one of his vests for the short bike-ride home.
     His sensitivity, however, was paired with a fragile ego and a big sense of pride, rendering it very, very easy to unintentionally step on his toes or hurt his feelings. That would have been less of an issue had we been able to communicate about it, but his go-to response was to either get mad, or to shut down and sulk for hours to days on end. He’d get short with me, give me the silent treatment or the cold shoulder and refuse to tell me what was wrong until I’d dragged it out of him and done enough to make up for it. And mind you, it didn’t even have to be me who’d slighted him. It could just as easily have been something or someone else, but I’d sure as hell be the one paying for it. I didn’t have all that much insight into my own trauma responses at the time, but in hindsight this clearly triggered me to repeat the patterns that I’d learned with my own upbringing. Terrified of losing love, I turned to freezing and pleasing. Shutting down my own needs, emotions and opinions in favour of doing all that I could to appease him, I kept him, but I began to lose myself.
 
     To give you an example, there was a situation involving a talent show. My dad had spotted an advert about it in the paper, to which Ben and I decided that it would be fun if we both signed up. At the time, Ben was a professional vocalist/vocal coach, and I had very limited experience onstage. My singing experience was mainly limited to my bedroom as my band hadn’t really taken off yet, and the only voice lessons I’d ever had were the ones that Ben gave me. All things considered, it was no surprise that Ben won that round and was placed for the finals that would take place a few weeks later. I wasn’t bothered at all, I had fun and I agreed that Ben had done a better job than I had. But ben wasn’t comfortable with the situation, and the next day he emailed the organisation to ask if I could be placed instead, since he felt it wasn’t fair that he -a professional- had won against me -an amateur. The organisation declined, and I decided to try again in the next round because I enjoyed the experience. Funnily enough, I won that round, so we both ended up in the finals together. We battled it out, had a great time, and in the end…I won first place, with Ben coming in second. In the moment, he was very supportive and enthusiastic about it. But I was apprehensive, and with good reason; the second we left the venue and got into the car, his mood flipped. He went entirely silent and stared out the window during the ride home. Feeling a storm brewing, I tried to downplay my own victory, be extra nice and divert his attention. When we got home, I told him I was tired and begged him to come to bed with me, but he insisted on unpacking my prize (a brand-new DVD-player) first. When we finally went upstairs, he stopped talking to me, got into bed and turned his back towards me. In the days that followed, he only spoke in two-word sentences and ignored me as much as he could. Days later, he ended up coming over and crying in my arms about how it wasn't fair how hard he had to work for everything, only to be beat by a ‘bloody amateur’ -me.
 
     Over time, I became an expert on dodging sensitive topics and reading his body language. We could be in the middle of a chat with friends and he’d be outwardly jovial, but by the way his jaw ticked I could already tell that someone had said something that didn’t sit well with him and he was cooking up a storm inside. My stomach would knot with anticipation, knowing that he’d be throwing a tantrum or sulking like a three-year-old once we were alone, and that it would cost me hours and hours of placating and consoling him before I finally had my boyfriend back.
After a while, I dreaded being around others with Ben. I was already walking on eggshells and with other people added to the mix it was just too hard to control all the variables. I guess you could say I was regulating his emotions for him, just like I’d been conditioned to do at home.
 
     Given the whole ‘us against the world’ narrative that was woven tightly into the fibres of our relationship, all of this didn’t really bother me in the beginning. I felt like I’d been tasked with a special mission; to prove to Ben that not everyone was out to get him. If he learned to trust me, he’d eventually heal the wounds of his past and we would skip off into the sunset. Oh yes, I totally fell face first into the bottomless pit that is the I-can-fix-him cliche. I really believed that things would get better with time. Spoiler alert: they did not.
 
     INTERTWINED
 
     Hand in hand with his insecurity came his neediness. Like most couples, we spent those first few months unable to keep our hands off each other and wanting nothing more than to be together constantly. But when the time came to loosen grip and come up for air, I noticed that symbiosis was Ben’s default setting. Ben clung to me much more than I felt comfortable with. At first it was kind of cute, but it soon got old. Not only did he want to do virtually everything together, but he also took great offence if I ever declined or wanted to do something alone or with my own friends. He’d beg and whine until I gave in, starting an argument or giving me the cold shoulder for days if I didn’t. And he’d always text or call multiple times if I did go out, getting irritated or sulky with me if I didn’t respond as quickly or extensively as he’d like.
     Ben required more undivided attention then I could reasonably provide, especially given my own need for space to recharge and reconnect with myself. I remember our first camping trip, me reading a magazine with Ben sat next to me on the airbed. He was pretty meticulous about staying on top of our expenses during that trip, and so I’d asked his permission to buy that magazine with my own money, which is kinda weird, but whatever. Anyway, as I sat there reading, Ben would keep slipping his hand underneath the booklet and whacking it out of my hands as he nagged “Hey, hello, hey, heyyyy…”. You know, like that scene with Stewie and Lois in Family Guy. It was done jokingly, but if I would have kept reading, it for sure would have ended in a fight. This is so illustrative of his incessant hunger for my undivided attention and his need to satiate that hunger immediately.
 
     I remember a situation regarding concert tickets to The Who, one of Ben’s favourite bands. He’d bought two tickets without consulting me first, and asked me if I wanted to join him after the fact. I declined, as wasn’t really my thing and I knew he had friends who would enjoy it more than I would. Ben was not amused, and after unsuccessfully trying to win me over, he stalked off angrily and refused to talk to me for the rest of the day. Weeks later, on the day of the concert, he asked again. He hadn’t bothered to try anyone else yet. Apparently, he’d just assumed that if he waited until there was enough pressure, I’d eventually cave. But by then, we were already a few years into our relationship and I was starting to push back. When I declined yet again, he started sulking about how he didn’t have many friends or know anyone with the same taste in music. He couldn’t possibly go alone and I’d be ruining his only chance to see his favourite band if I didn’t come with him.
     I stood firm in my decision, and gave him some ideas for people he could ask. Eventually, with no other options left, he called a friend who was really excited to go. Refusing to look at me,
he said to his friend with a sneer that was clearly directed at me: “I might as well stay at your place then, because there’s no point in going home tonight.”  When he hung up and I asked him: “Will you text and let me know if you decide to stay over?”, his face turned to stone and he stormed out.
 
     Now, I’m someone who needs a lot of space just to function. Ben was my polar opposite in that, clingy and in constant need of reassurance. After a while, it was like a dance where he would grasp for me and I would pull back, triggering him to grab on even tighter. And with him holding on to me so tightly, it meant that I couldn’t find the space to breathe, think or feel anymore. I felt like I was being swallowed whole, but it all happened so gradually that I didn’t realise I’d lost myself until it was too late. It also meant that I became even more isolated than I already was, my own social connections diminishing as my world revolved more and more around him, and his life. 
 
     EXPLOSIVE
 
     Ben had big emotions, and when it came to anger, he could go from 0 to 100 in the blink of an eye. Looking back, there had been tip-offs when we first started dating. I just didn’t think much of them at the time. I remember meeting up with him in a rehearsal studio at the conservatory about three weeks after we first met. He took the cd-player out of its nook in the wall and showed me a giant boot-shaped dent in the metal casing, laughingly explaining that when the device wasn’t working properly, he’d gotten so frustrated that he yanked it from the wall, placed it on the ground and stomped on it. Afterwards, he’d carefully put it back in place so that no one would notice the damage until he was long gone. He told the story in such a funny way that I laughed along with him.
To be fair, who hasn’t contemplated thrusting some unruly device out the window at some point?
                I also remember him telling me that once, as a teen, he’d gotten so angry that he started smashing up the house and his parents ended up calling the cops on him. He cried when he told me, and I felt awful for him. Knowing his parents and some of his history with them, I could understand what had potentially caused him to snap like that. And how horrible a feeling it must be to have your parents turn on you like that. I really felt for him. I didn’t think it was something that could happen again. He was regretful and ashamed. And I was his girlfriend. I wasn’t the one who’d hurt him, or pushed him to that point. He would never direct his aggression at me, right?
               
                Yeah, here’s a plot twist so big it’ll give you a whiplash. You never saw this coming, right?
As understanding, calm, sweet and gallant as he could be, after a few months, his other side began to shine through and it popped up more and more often over time.
Ben could be extremely attached to his views, however unfounded, short-sighted or black and white. Now, I’m not saying that I was always right, at all. But I appreciate a good conversation in which there’s mutual respect and space to explore the different angles. What bothered me the most in discussions with Ben, was that if I presented a contradicting idea or added food for thought, he’d often laugh at me, act condescending or talk down to me. Suddenly, I was just a naïve little girl and whatever I was bringing to the table was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever heard.
     Both Ben and I were incredibly stubborn. When we were on the same page, that brought us closer together as we merged and pushed away from the rest of the world. But when we disagreed, there was drama. Ben had a habit of making things personal, probably as a means to protect himself when things touched on his own insecurities. If I tried to talk about my feelings, or any issues we ran into along the way, he’d instantly feel attacked and instigate an argument.
     For instance, in the start-up phase of his business, we saw much less of each other. And when we were together, Ben was on the phone constantly. It didn’t matter where we were or what we were doing, if his phone rang, he’d drop everything and he’d be off. Although I understood very well how important it was for him to be reachable in this phase of building up his business, I also really missed my man. But when I tried to communicate this with him, not even expecting a solution but solely wanting to share how I felt, he immediately went on the defence and shot me down. And of course, that earned me a couple of days of silent treatment.  
     It didn’t have to be something big, though. Maybe I’d asked him to help with the dishes. Or maybe I wasn’t available to drive down to the train station to bring him his forgotten wallet, or wait at the station for two hours in the middle of the night after getting back from a long workday, just so that he could ride home with me. Maybe he had been blasting the same cd on repeat over our living-room speakers for the past three weeks, and I’d proposed that we listen to something else that day. Or maybe I wasn’t in the mood to be intimate with him. Whatever it was, he was quick to take it personally and get defensive, starting huge arguments over nothing, hanging up on me or shutting me out for days.
 
     Ben had a habit of resorting to passive aggression when he felt slighted or didn’t get his way. Even if something or someone else was the culprit, or if he was in a bad mood for whatever reason, he would take it out on me. The aforementioned cold shoulder and silent treatment were a common occurrence. Sometimes, though, the aggression was not so passive. Although he never hit me, he could get very loud and there many situations in which he no longer had his anger under control. He often broke things in the process. Once, for example, in the middle of the night, I was jolted out of my sleep by the sound of glass smashing to smithereens against the door of our alcove. I damn near had a heart attack, and when I saw his bedside lamp laying in pieces on the floor, I frantically asked him what had happened, to which he exclaimed: “I couldn’t find my hair tie.”
     I also clearly remember a discussion with Ben about household chores. When we moved in together, I took on the majority of the housekeeping. We simply fell into that pattern because Ben was used to his mother doing everything. And so, I would clean the entire house each week, and the only thing I asked of him was that he occasionally help to dry the dishes that I was washing, and that he’d take out the garbage when the can was full. However, he’d sometimes leave it for far too long, up until a point where trash would be stacked up on the floor next to the bin, or it would be crawling with maggots. Needless to say, this bothered me. Just like it annoyed me to wake up in the morning to find the kitchen counter that I’d just cleaned, covered in cracker crumbs and wine stains he’d left behind after his midnight snack. Apparently, opening a conversation with him about this was a bad move, as he quickly got so mad that he launched a bowl across the room whilst yelling: “And don’t you dare think that this conversation will change anything!”
     Throwing things was a bit of a theme. In another situation, I’d come home from a long day at work and found Ben sitting at his computer, as he was working from home that day. Walking in to the room, I greeted him and he ignored me completely. I noticed that he hadn’t started dinner yet although it was his turn that day, but given his apparent mood, I chose not to ask about it just yet. After a while, having put away my stuff and changed my clothes, I carefully inquired about his plans for dinner. I would have gladly started on it if he’d have told me what he had in mind or what was going on, but he ignored me again, so I sat down at my own computer and did some homework. About an hour later, I decided to ask about dinner again, but he still didn’t so much as acknowledge my presence, let alone answer my question. Then, after about 15 minutes, he angrily got up out of his chair and demanded “Well?! What do you want to eat then?!”. Caught of guard, I said “Ehhhh” and he shot back with “Well?!”. I took a deep breath, replying with “Hey, calm down, you’ve been ignoring me for over an hour, you can’t expect me to have an answer ready in a split second”, to which he got so angry that he flung a stack of cutlery across the room and stormed out. I then got up and left to have dinner at a friend’s house. When I got home a few hours later, he was in a total frenzy and his parents were there comforting him. He wailed that he’d been searching everywhere for me and that he was scared I’d gone and hurt myself. He'd called my parents, his parents, my friends (apparently not my best friend), he’d even called the hospital. Then, the rest of the evening, he was as sweet as ever and he pretended that nothing had ever happened.
 
                Here’s another example that’s still fresh in my mind. We’d been dating for almost a year when we decided to go on holiday together. We’d both just graduated, and I couldn’t wait to claim my freedom. I had taken up a summer job at a cosmetics factory alongside my paper route, both of which I hated with a passion, but my parents didn’t want me hanging around the house all day and they were of the mind that I didn’t need a holiday (“Tired? You’re too young to be tired”). At the same time, Ben was setting up his own business as a choir director. In an attempt to attract new participants, we decided to go on a two-week busking tour. We’d travel to three relevant cities, pitching our tent at a nearby campsite and then we’d spend our days playing songs on the streets while handing out flyers and simultaneously earning back our camping expenses.
Obviously, we had to prepare a repertory. Now, I’m a pretty quick study when it comes to vocals. I’ll hear something once, and be singing along to it before the song is even over. Ben, on the other hand, usually needed much more repetition. For weeks leading up to this trip, every minute we spent together was dedicated to practice. There was no space for anything else, and after weeks and weeks of running the same songs over, and over, and over…I started getting pretty sick of it.
     One day, after a long, boring day at the factory production line, I went over to Ben’s place in hopes of sharing some quality time. Ben proposed a run-through of our repertory, and I reluctantly obliged. Sitting on his bed, I sang my way through each of the songs until we’d finally reached the end of the list. But to my annoyance, Ben immediately circled back around and started strumming the intro to the first song, prompting a second run-through. In my frustration, I sighed heavily and fell back onto my pillow. Before I even realized what was happening, Ben shot up out of his chair, cried out something incoherent and smashed the guitar onto the ground next to my head. I was so startled that in a reflex I curled up into a foetal position, covered my head with my hands and began shaking and hyperventilating. This, in turn, snapped him back into saviour mode as he crawled up beside me on the bed and started to console me, apologizing and telling me that we’d go to my parents and tell them I needed a day off from my job because I was clearly overstressed. He then proceeded to cry over his broken guitar…I shit you not.
 
                Full disclosure, I certainly wasn’t perfect either. Aside from the level of maturity you can realistically expect from someone who’s still going through puberty, I didn’t exactly have healthy examples to base my relationships and interactions on. I had plenty of emotional baggage of my own and in such instances, Ben and I brought out the worst in each other. Inevitably, resentment brewed under the waterline, only to rear up later in the ugliest ways. Ben mastered passive-aggression, but I was a pretty good contender. After all, I’d learned from the best. We both spoke that language fluently, and it was a familiar pattern that we dragged each other into.
 
     Over time, I learned that voicing my own thoughts, needs or feelings was a risky thing to do, and more often than not, utterly ineffective. There was a leak in the boat, so much energy draining away through walking on eggshells, trying to find non-triggering ways to communicate, absorbing constant blows and repairing each inevitable rift that was torn. If I wanted to be heard or get my needs met, I had to find less exhausting and less damaging ways. I had to get creative. This led to some very strange, yet interesting habits between us.
     To give you an idea, after a few months together, we almost exclusively talked to each other in a child-like voice and we often communicated through meows. Yes, you read that right. Meows. We even had this weird shared obsession with all things cat-related. And I’m not even a cat person...
I have no idea exactly how or when this began and who started it. It likely started out as a joke, or with one of us trying to be cute. But I soon found that it had some kind of a buffer-effect, making it easier for us to say things to each other without setting the other person off. It’s like when you want to say something that someone could take offense to, and so you use a quote instead. That way, it’s not really you who said it, and somehow, that just goes over easier. But as you can imagine, there’s only so much you can say in a kiddy voice and after a while I really missed the real conversations. I felt increasingly frustrated and lonely. I did carefully bring it up at some point, to which he agreed that although it felt so safe and comfortable to talk that way, we should probably give it a rest. That resolution didn’t last long, though. We were back at it in no time.
 
     By now you may be thinking, why on earth did you go along with all this. Why not just leave?
That’s always a complicated question, but I’m aware of quite a few contributing factors. As I stated before, a lot of these patterns and behaviours that you might consider red flags, were my normal. I grew up with dysfunctionality all around, so my idea of a healthy relationship was severely skewed. If my current relationship was as good as it was going to get, why would I give it up?
     Also, my own childhood trauma had me convinced that I was inherently wrong, flawed and undesirable. I was unconsciously terrified of abandonment or loss of connection and my experience was that exerting my own will, opinions or needs often resulted in the threat of abandonment. I was conditioned to respond to any type of conflict or disagreement by assuming that I was in the wrong and that I had to repair the connection by any means necessary, before I was cast out. Ben showed toxic patterns of behaviour that were very similar to the way my father treated me, and it triggered me to respond in the way I’d been conditioned to.
     Furthermore, let’s not forget that there were also good times. In the beginning, things were amazing. And although things got more difficult and toxic with time, we still had our moments. We had fun, we still had shared interests and inside jokes, and Ben could still be very sweet and caring.
When times were good, I’d forget how bad things could get and assume that we’d fixed the issue.
 
                MINOR CRUSH
 
     I’ve been debating whether or not I should share this, given the sensitivity of the topic. To be honest, I’m mostly scared. Scared of what people will choose to do with this information, scared of what Ben would do if this somehow got back to him, scared of what people will think of me for the way I did (or didn’t) handle the situation and scared of being seen as complicit and somehow being held responsible. It still baffles me that I didn’t just up and leave when I found out, but looking back, there were so many factors that contributed to my staying as long as I did, swallowing his story, his rationalizations, his downplaying and his promises. Loving him, trusting him, wanting to protect him.
I’d never heard of grooming back then, but looking back with everything I know now, it’s plausible that that’s what was going on.
 
     This is hard to talk about. But here goes.
 Somewhere along the line, Ben confided in me that he was interested in younger girls. As in, much younger. I’m talking girls in early puberty, or blossoming flowers as he called them. He told me that I was technically too old for him in terms of what he found attractive, but he’d consciously favoured emotional connection over physical attraction. After all, he understood perfectly well that ethically and legally, he could never date a thirteen-year-old and he never would.
                The way Ben explained it to me, he’d been dealt an incredibly cruel hand and it weighed him down every day of his life. His brain was pushing thoughts and feelings on him that he didn’t want to have, and evoking desires for something that he despised. Something he couldn’t and wouldn’t ever act on, meaning that he’d have to suppress and hide a part of himself for the rest of his life so as to avoid doing harm. And living in a constant fear of being exposed and lynched, just for his existence. Because even if he hadn’t actually done anything, he’d still be cast out and his life would be over. Ben felt ashamed and alone, he didn’t even dare to talk to a therapist for fear of being judged at the very least, exposed and reported at worst. So, in a nutshell, no matter which route he chose, there was pain on every path. Either for himself, those around him, or both. He’d be on his guard forever, never being himself entirely, and he’d never feel completely fulfilled. Not without becoming the monster he feared, and then he’d either destroy himself, or the world would do it for him.
     Ben explained some of the things that he did in order to keep his desires in check without having to act on them in real life. He liked to use materials that were already in existence and that he was convinced were not abusive or exploitative. For example, he’d once made a video recording of a tv-commercial about a nudist campsite, showing a split second of naked girls running across the screen. And there were movies that he liked, such as Blue Lagoon, Pretty Baby, Lolita and Thirteen.
I’m sure that while reading this, alarm bells must be going off in your head. And I’d always expected the same of myself, especially given my own history with childhood sexual abuse. You’d
think that I would see a massive red flag like that and make a run for it. Yet, though I was absolutely taken aback by this new information, the thoughts and feelings it evoked in me were so much more layered and complicated than you’d expect. First of all, when we’re taught about abuse, and when abuse, abusers or sexual predators are portrayed in the news or in other media, it all looks so clear-cut, blatantly obvious and black & white. But somehow, when Ben told me his story, it’s didn’t look black and white at all. Maybe it was the way he we telling it, along with the point in time and the nature and dynamic of our relationship. Maybe I was just blinded by infatuation, or biased by my own life experiences. Maybe it was all of those things. Either way, this thing that should have been straightforward black and white, was this weird shade of grey that I didn’t know what to do with.
                But I knew Ben, and I loved him. And so, I trusted and believed him when he assured me that he’d never act on those desires. He showed insight, morals, shame, pain…and he seemed genuinely determined and committed to leading a normal life, managing his affliction with grace and ratio so as never to cross the line. Let me tell you, never in my life had I expected to hear something like this and feel compassion…but looking at it from the perspective he’d just painted out for me, I could only imagine how difficult and painful it must be for him to live like that, and my heart ached for him.
 
                So, Ben had just opened himself up to me entirely, entrusting me with his deepest, darkest secret and his worst fears. Effectively, he’d just placed his life in my hands and given me the power to determine his fate. After all, if I did spill the beans, his life would be over. And yet, somehow, he had enough faith in the strength of our love and he’d deemed me trustworthy, understanding and open-minded enough to be utterly vulnerable with me and hand me that power. I’ll be honest with you, that made me feel pretty special. He must have thought that the sun shone out of my ass to trust me with something so huge.
     Considering how understanding and accepting Ben had been of me with all my flaws, I felt like I owed it to him to return the favour and hold space for the massive burden he was carrying. The least I could do, was give him that same level of trust that he apparently had in me. I wanted to be the person he needed me to be, and help him be the best version of himself despite the odds. I did not want to be one of those people who would automatically nail him to the cross, just for existing. After all, he hadn’t done anything wrong, other than being born with a brain that plagued him with unwanted thoughts. Ben needed someone to confide in, to help him carry this burden and keep him on the right track. And being the only one in the loop, I was the only person in his life who could fulfil that role. I had to be the one to see the best in him; a great guy with a good heart, holding his morals firmly in place as he honourably carried that heavy cross he’d been forced to bear.
     Eventually, from this confusing grey soup, I concluded that as long as he kept his promise, we were in the clear and I would continue to be there for him, support him and protect him. At the same time, I knew what people would think of him, and I feared that they condemn my acceptance of him. We both knew the world would destroy him if people found out, and they’d probably take me down too, by association. And so, I kept my lips tightly sealed and I stood by him.
 
 
     Having a shared secret, fell in place perfectly within that ‘us against the world’ thing we had going on. Now that we were sharing this burden together, it was like our bond was tighter than ever.
Don’t get me wrong, I understood that Ben’s predicament was a problem, and why. But at the same time, I was convinced that Ben was different. After all, he had insight, and he’d made a vow. Also,
his attraction to minors could actually be a direct result of the abuse he himself had experienced, more like a projection or a trauma response, and I couldn’t possibly blame him for that, could I?
Clearly, my adolescent self had yet to learn that blame and responsibility are two different things, and that boundaries and compassion are not mutually exclusive.

                Anyhow, over time, Ben became more comfortable with sharing his thoughts and feelings with me. Boundaries were pushed, inching forward so gradually that just like the frog in the boiling pot of water, I didn’t realize at the time how fucked up things really were. Now let me be very clear, to the best of my knowledge, Ben never acted out. Unless of course…you count me. After all, I was still a minor, and a pretty young looking one at that. It’s not entirely outside the realm of possibilities that Ben found me and figured that I was the closest he could get to acting out his fantasies without getting in trouble. And if that indeed is the case, it sure changes the meaning and the validity of his promise. All that being said; whatever way you look at it, boundaries were definitely pushed and the further I sank into that relationship, the blurrier the lines became.
 
     For example, Ben had initially told me about the existing material that he ‘used’, but I found out later that he actually did visit certain websites, and that he had some of his favourite pictures printed out and stashed in a plastic bag under his mattress. Granted, he still wasn’t physically acting out his desires, but we all know that children are harmed in order to create those pictures. Even his favourite ones, which he justified as being pictures that didn’t show abuse. He didn’t like that stuff, he said. He was only interested in pictures of girls who looked happy, healthy and who seemed to be enjoying themselves. At some point, he even shared his favourite pictures with me, almost in the way that a giddy schoolchild would show you their Pokémon card collection.
     I wasn’t comfortable with this, but being as shitty as I was with boundaries back then, I had no idea how to handle the situation. I mean, I’d already accepted so much in my mission to prove my love and devotion to him and live up to the trust he’d placed in me, I couldn’t just change my mind and decide that I was no longer ok with a part of him that I’d previously accepted. I’d encouraged him to be himself and requested that he always be open and honest with me, and now that he was finally doing it, I couldn’t just backpedal because I didn’t like what I saw. That wouldn’t be fair. Or at least, that’s what I told myself. As long as he wasn’t breaking his vow, I had no reasonable excuse to go back on my own promise to stand by him. And I couldn’t ask him to stop doing what he needed to do in order to keep his demons at bay, and somehow still expect him to keep his vow. Even just imagining bringing this up with him, I could already hear the inevitable argument in my mind and feel the guilt and anxiety creeping into my bones. And so, again, I stayed as neutral as I could and I kept my mouth shut.
 
     After a while, Ben carefully proposed watching some of his favourite movies together. To me, they were just movies. But to him, they were porn. And watching them with me was basically foreplay. This was yet another one of those things where technically, he wasn’t really doing anything wrong and he hadn’t broken his promise. After all, we were just watching a movie together. He just happened to enjoy that movie a lot. Yet, to me it also felt icky and uncomfortable. But once again, I didn’t want to trigger him, and it wasn’t a big enough deal to call him out on it, whatever ‘it’ was.
So, I let it go.
 
     At some point, Ben introduced me to a friend who had a girlfriend my age. He actually had quite a few male friends with younger girlfriends and I remember being surprised and somewhat intrigued by this, since as someone with an interest in older guys, I had never managed to find one who was interested in me before. But now, with Ben pointing them out to me, I could only conclude that I just hadn’t been looking in the right places. There were so many that I wondered where they’d been hiding all this time, but maybe I’d have done better to ask myself why they had been hiding.     
     Anyway, Ben introduced me to Peter and his girlfriend Anne, and after chatting back and forth for a while, we befriended each other. Soon thereafter, one of the guys (I can’t remember which) proposed that we have a double-date via the webcam, if you catch my drift. In all honesty, I didn’t actually find either of them attractive, but I wasn’t opposed to the idea either. I was curious, and it was kind of exciting to be doing something I probably shouldn’t, given my age. At seventeen, I thought I was pretty grown-up and I wanted others to see me that way as well. I wanted people to take me seriously and treat me like an adult. So, I would gladly take any opportunity to do something that was reserved for adults and flip off anyone who told me I was “too young”. I know, real mature.
     After that webcam-session, Peter would approach me privately over MSN on numerous occasions, semi-jokingly asking me if I was in the mood to turn on my webcam again, just for him. Thankfully, we were miles apart and communicating through text on a screen, I because of that, I had no problem rejecting him. I wasn’t interested, I thought his advances were awkward and kinda gross, and I wondered why he was asking me for sexual favours while he had a girlfriend of his own right there. When I told Ben about it, he just sort of laughed it off and called Peter a weirdo.
     At the time, I didn’t think much of this whole situation. In my mind, I was old and wise enough to consent and I knew what I was getting into. Well, sort of. I was inexperienced and it was all pretty awkward and nerve-wrecking, but I was also curious and excited. I didn’t think it could do any harm, I hadn’t questioned either of their intentions and I hadn’t considered the risks or possible consequences. All I can say is, I’m glad that I did have the mind to say no when more was asked of me than I was willing to give, and I’m glad that Ben didn’t push the matter any further. 
 
     Another memory that pops up as I write this, is that at some point during the time we were married, Ben had a crush on a younger friend of mine. This girl lived in our neighbourhood, and as Ben later told me, he’d felt things for her and her younger sister for quite a few years. He’d never acted on those feelings, just shoving them all down and hiding them away, but when we hit a rough patch in our relationship, some form of escapism took hold and that crush began to grow. The way he confessed it to me, it was just a meaningless crush like any other. The only obvious difference, of course, being that it was a twenty-six-year-old man who was infatuated with a sixteen-year-old girl who he’d been eyeballing since she was a pre-teen.
He’d been trying to find non-creepy ways to befriend her for years, so when he found out that we actually knew each other, he pretty much used me as a way in. You know, like how a random dude adding you on MSN would be creepy, but if it was ‘your friend’s husband’, it was not weird at all. The same went for inviting her over to hang out with the both of us. I don’t think he had any intentions of making a move on her, it was more like he was trying to satiate his obsession by taking whatever he could legally and morally get. Just being around her and being friendly with her were the metaphorical breadcrumbs that he settled for.
     When Ben confessed this crush to me, my response was rather flat. Aside from the fact that I was trying to be calm, rational and understanding about it the way I always did, the fact that I was doped up on medication at the time probably didn’t help. I wasn’t surprised or angry. I didn’t act jealous or freak out and I wasn’t concerned. I knew it wouldn’t lead anywhere, so I figured that the best thing I could do was just let it blow over. I guess my response caught Ben off guard, though. He’d expected me to flip my shit, and when I didn’t, he flipped on me instead. He was deeply offended. To him, the fact that I didn’t get mad was just proof that I didn’t love him enough. And you can bet your ass that he held that over my head for weeks as I scrambled to patch things up again.
 
     At this point in our relationship, I wasn’t happy with everything that was going on, but I also felt like having gone along with so much already, if I started to protest, he would fight me on it. And not only that, but if I told anyone about what was going on, I was sure that I’d receive an equal part of the blame and I’d been considered complicit. After all, I chose to stay. I protected him. I enabled him. I even took part in some of his undertakings, like when he showed me those pictures or when we had that webcam date with Peter. If I really disagreed with all this, and if I was a good person with good morals, I would have left the second I found out and possibly even reported him, right?
     So, in a way, I was no longer just protecting Ben, I was also protecting myself.


     HEADACHE
                 
                When it comes to intimacy in our relationship, there were some things that I look back on now that were definitely not ok. Now let me state for the record, the first time Ben and I ended up sleeping together, he was a perfect gentleman about asking for consent, and I gave it willingly. But I soon learned that Ben’s difficulty handling rejection in daily life, also translated into the bedroom. When you’re in an intimate relationship with someone, no matter how crazy you are about them, you’re bound to encounter moments when you’re just not in the mood. Whatever the reason may be. Now, throughout that early can’t-keep-your-hands-off-each-other stage, there were no issues. We didn’t run into problems until a few months later, when the initial craziness tapered off and we settled into calmer waters. Ben was quite a kinaesthetic bloke, always wanting to physically be with me, holding hands, cuddling, and his sex-drive was a lot higher than mine. And then there’s me; I’m not a very physical person at all, I don’t really like to be touched very much and although I’ll take your hand if it makes you feel better, I’ll also drop it at the first chance I get because all that touchy-feely business just makes me squirm. As for my libido, ever fickle and usually on the backburner, it was no match for Ben’s. Especially when my mental health took a nose-dive, my libido following suit and my anti-depressants stripping me of whatever little bit was left.
                The thing is, if we were walking around town with Ben’s hand in mine, and I eventually let go, it would hurt his feelings. Same thing if he wanted to kiss or cuddle and I eventually disengaged.
If Ben tried to initiate sex and I wasn’t in the mood to be intimate, he’d get frustrated and cross with me. He’d angrily turn away from me and lay there quietly sulking until I’d grovelled long enough to make it up to him. I felt like there was always a pressure on me to be available to him, and to enjoy myself or at least pretend to, so as not to hurt his feelings. But the pressure made me dread those intimate moments even more, and combined with my depression and my dwindling contentment with the relationship, my interest for being physically intimate with Ben soon dropped below zero.
But I couldn’t just keep pushing Ben away, as that only made him grasp for me even more. And no matter how carefully I went about rejecting his advances, it always led to drama.
                After a while, it got to a point where I just didn’t have the energy to deal with that anymore, it was easier to just go along with it. And so, sometimes, I’d just lay there and let him do his thing. Or I’d try to get it over with quickly by pleasuring him first. I pretended to be enjoying myself, though as dark as it was in our alcove, he couldn’t see my face anyway so he was none the wiser.
                I clearly remember one of the last times, because it’s carved into my brain. Laying there in pitch blackness with Ben hunched over me. I felt like he noticed that I wasn’t really responding to his advances, I wasn’t really feeling it and that it wasn’t going to be a mutual thing that night. And so, he stopped trying and just rolled over on top of me instead, letting me finish the job. I robotically went through the motions and the second he was done, he wiped me down, rolled off me and fell soundly asleep. And I just lay there in the dark, tears rolling down my cheeks, quietly frozen in place so as to make sure that he didn’t see or hear me.
     Ben was none the wiser, or at least, that’s what I assumed for a long time. Sometimes I think it was unfair of me, because he didn’t know. But when I really think about it, I realize that he knew a hell of a lot more than I give him credit for. He just chose to dismiss that information. After all, I had communicated with him that I wasn’t in the mood, on numerous occasions. Initially, at least. I only stopped communicating with him after my first dozen messages had been dismissed and he’d guilt-tripped me until I gave in. I stopped communicating when it had been made discouraging enough to do so, and when the space for being open, honest and vulnerable with him, no longer felt safe. And that was his doing. He’d worn me down until I no longer pushed back. It was easier to give him what he wanted and keep quiet about it.
​     Clearly, neither of us had heard of ongoing consent…

To be continued....