So Much to Say, but Can't Seem to Say It!

Have you ever felt like you just couldn't get out of your head what you need to say? You know that somewhere and sometime it will all come spilling out and not be able to stop it. You know that when it does, things will be said--that you know you will mean, you know will hurt someone, you know that it is something that NEEDS to be said, but you possibley could (no you know you could) and probably should have said it differently. But no matter what you say or how you say it--it doesn't feel right that you said it--or worse, you feel right about it but you have made enemies for life of someone (and you don't care).

It is very seldom that I am speechless and unable to say what I want to. The weekend we went to Florida for the death of my father-in-law, was a weekend that I would like to erase from memory--and things that have since commenced have not made that weekend any better. Things were said that should have been said by someone other than me 20+ years ago--but weren't then, and I blurted them out. Things got said that now others are holding against not only me, but my family. And if that is the case, so be it. I said NOTHING that was not truthful. I have been accused of not having any restraint--I beg to differ with them. I've held my tongue for over two years--hoping someone else would say them. I held my tongue until the day before we left--and by the point I couldn't handle it anymore, I wanted the person to know exactly how she made not only me but also my husband FEEL. And I have to say, that for someone that accuses me of attacking her verbally--she has no room to speak as she attacked me even more so at the time and has since then said that "we are through, done, finished." She told me she'd deny that she ever said anything to me if I told my husband--how can she deny it when she puts the message on a recorded voicemail that is easy to play back and listen to?

Now I know that through all of this it has to do with the perception of the speaker and the one hearing--I won't say listening. The person listening has the perception of being attacked and that I had "no right" to say anything and my husband should have "spoken up to stop me." My husband had the perception that he was allowing me to say what he has kept bottled up for 20+ years and he was unable to say any of it. I had (and still have) the perception that if my husband is being hurt emotionally that I can only take it so long before I "defend" him.

Was I right or wrong? Was she right or wrong? Was he right or wrong? At this point I believe the correct answer would be that in all, all three of us were both right and wrong. So I am in the quandry of having an "olive branch" supposedly put out and I am "supposed" to take it. The problem is, I don't know if, at this time, I can do that. I am still extremely ticked off about it all and it is taking a toll on both my husband and I (as he had problems accepting the olive branch as well). I can't just say, "I'm sorry" as I am NOT sorry for finally bringing to light the way she has made my husband feel for years. I am NOT sorry for expressing the way she and two other women made my husband and me feel the entire time we were there.

I think part of the problem is that we are so much alike in so many ways--especially personality wise. We are both, as she calls herself, the "alpha bitch" in each of our respective families. And when you get two alphas together, you know that there is bound to be a blow up sometime in the relationship. Now will the relationship ever return to the one that we shared before the blowup between us? I don't know. Am I supposed to just go "running back to her" and just apologize until I can no longer speak? I don't think so--although that is what she is expecting and what my husband sort of wants me to do. As he said, he wants me to do what I can, must, should, will--but he doesn't want it to take away from the person he married. I can't cower and take being made to feel worthless and a nothing any longer--I was made to feel that way for way too many years.

So how do I go about taking a step towards the "olive branch" and meeting in the middle? And for that matter, if she IS holding out the olive branch and saying that we should meet in the middle, why didn't she say it to me? Why did she call him and say we need to work this out and not call and leave the same message on my phone--she usually calls both phones and leaves a message on both if we are unable to answer phones at the time. So is she only extending the olive branch towards him or both of us?

OK, so for my title to be "So Much to Say, but Can't Seem to Say It!" I seem to have had a lot to say here. But the ability to say what all needs to be said to her eludes me in a way that won't make matters worse. What was said then, in my perception, is still true, is still there, is still in tact. Yet her perspective of it is totally different.

She says, "you weren't here" and "you don't know what actually went on" Well that is true--for everything she has told my husband and I was totally opposite of what we are now finding out was "true." But then, what is truth? Is truth reliant on someone's perspective? Is what is true to me in all actuality not truth? Is it only truth to the one that sees it or tells it? Isn't that why people claim that someone is "living in a fantasy world" when they say things that they believe is truth and everyone else sees it as fantasy?