Rubber Bands and Chewing Gum

I received a delivery notification last Sunday that my box from Anita had reached my friend’s house and was ready to collect. Anita hadn’t let me know that she had posted it so, whilst it didn’t come as a surprise exactly given I had requested things be sent two weeks prior to this, it was an impersonal shock opening up an email to see a photograph of my box outside my friend’s house.

I can’t really understand why Anita didn’t send me a message to say, “Hi RB, just to say I sent your things today so keep an eye out for them. Anita”. But we all know how detached and disconnected from the whole sorry affair she has got. To be honest, she was probably just glad to be rid of it all and didn’t give it a second thought.

I burst into tears when I saw the picture in the email. I hadn’t expected to but it was the small parts for sure. I think up until now those parts of me have been in a denial about the fact that Anita is properly gone from my world. I think whilst she still had my things, there was a little bit of hope for some part of me that one day we’d get together and sort this out to an extent.

I know we’d never work together again but I suppose part of me had been hoping that if I was patient enough and didn’t apply too much pressure at some point Anita would come to her senses, move far enough through the shit she was swimming in and want/be able to offer me some time to really close of the work. Like surely she’d want to say goodbye. After all, she had been so utterly horrified by the way that Em and I ended that she insisted we would ensure we did things properly. So much of our work was about undoing what Em had done and yet, actually, when it’s come down to it, Anita hasn’t kept her word on anything.

Fortunately, throughout all of this Elle has been completely amazing. She been holding my hand very tightly (both literally and metaphorically) through everything and has repeatedly reiterated that we can process all of this ‘together’ and that she’s totally here with me so that has felt really good.

I think the only reason I have been even able to go to this place, i.e requesting my things back, is because I feel so confident in the relationship that I have built with Elle now. I remember when I first met her, feeling so embarrassed even alluding to the work that Anita and I had done, mentioning the stories and elephant felt like I was swimming in shame, even saying that I loved Anita felt horrible.

But since Elle and I have done so much work at creating safety in our relationship, the fact that we also read stories, I snuggle into her on the sofa, that ‘love’ is very much part of the narrative between us, means that as painful as it was going to be receiving my stuff back from Anita, I wasn’t also going to have to deal with feeling ashamed when we opened the box. And it was ‘we’ rather than ‘me’ opening the box.

Elle and I decided that the best thing to do would be to bring the box to session on Tuesday and we’d figure out what to do with it together. As I say, Elle has made it very clear that I am not alone with any of this and that we can take it slow. She really has completely understood how big a deal this has been for me and the little parts of me and has done everything she can to make the experience as positive as it can be.

When I went to collect the box from my friend I was immediately alarmed. It was soooooo fucking heavy. Too heavy, surely, to be just my books and baby elephant? I started thinking of different scenarios in preparation for what might be inside.

My first thought was that Anita had probably just lumped all the books I’d even bought her in the box too, failing to differentiate between ‘our’ stories and books I had actually given her. I was ready for the possibility of ‘The Rabbit Listened’ being part of the package as even though it was a gift to mark our first year together it was also something we had read a lot. Another scenario I was prepping for was Anita sending back the egg crystal I had given her, stones, the ornaments, even possibly the dream catcher and windchimes… like honestly, there was the potential for soooooo much to be in that box.

I put the box on the passenger seat of my car and drove into town…

The sick feeling was hideous.

Walking from the car to Elle’s office was exhausting – the box was so heavy and felt actually like such an apt representation of just how fucking emotionally heavy this had all been.

Elle had moved the table to one side of the room when I arrived leaving the rug in the middle completely empty for us to be able sit of the floor with the box. We sat down together and talked about what to do. She had scissors ready and she asked whether I wanted to open the box or whether I wanted her to do it. I asked her to.

She sliced open the box and it was full of books. I could immediately see that ‘The Rabbit Listened’ was in there as it’s a hardback, as well as some of the books I had given her – ‘Big Panda Tiny Dragon’ and ‘The Journey’ – this felt like a bit of a kicker but at least there were none of the other presents I had given Anita over the years.

Lying on the top of the parcel was an envelope with my name on – so there was a note. I hadn’t been sure whether it would just be a parcel of my things and nothing more.

I reached into the box, quickly tore open the envelope to reveal a card… it was… umm…I dunno…not great, I suppose. Given how many lovely cards there are out there these days, how many lovely cards I have picked out and carefully written for A, it was a bit lack lustre – Elle even commented that she didn’t like it and that it felt like something you’d give to someone going into hospital.

I think given how much energy and thought I put into this sort of thing, once again it felt… just sad, really. I mean, I suppose I shouldn’t moan, it’s better than the ‘nothing’ I ever received from Em…but, then, Anita and I were so fucking close for so long – we’ve gone from beating heart necklace jewellery to this:

Dear RB,

I am so sorry things turned out as they did.

I know it’s been so very hard on you.

I truly wish you the very best for the future.

With love and care, Anita x

I quickly scanned the inside of the card and passed it over to Elle, saying “it could have been worse”. She read it, audibly groaned when she read the words and said, “could it?” I think in the moment I was just trying to get through it all and didn’t really take it in too much and cut off from the feelings a bit. Elle said I have a much more developed scale for shit than most and so the fact that this feels like it “could have been worse” really just shows how much I have had to deal with in my life because it was crap. That felt like a really kind thing to say and also really showing she understands that this IS a huge deal and is giving me permission to feel the feelings when I am ready to do so.

We sad laughed a bit about ‘things’ like how vague and lacking it was. It’s almost as if the ‘things’ that have happened were completely outside of her control- accidental even and that she had absolutely no agency in the events that have unfolded just by chance. Elle has a thing about people taking accountability and responsibility and she said it felt like Anita was completely abdicating herself from taking any responsibility for how shit it has been. She said it feels a bit like Chat GPT wrote the card and another friend of mine said it read like a card you’d send to a work colleague who was leaving. I added, “One you don’t like very much!”

Still, quoting Em in our last session together, “It is what it is” and I guess now I know exactly what I a have to deal with.

Elle asked me if I felt numb and I said that I did. She said she would too and then told me about some of how she was feeling about it all. It all felt really connecting. I didn’t want to go rifling though the box and all the books then and said I wanted to sit on the sofa. Basically I really just needed to be very close to Elle (even though we were sitting next to each other on the rug) I had had just about enough exposure to the pain of it for the moment.

So, we got back up onto the sofa leaving the box in the middle of the floor and I cuddled into her for a bit. We talked about what it was all feeling like – pretty shit- and then I moved and reached into the box and handed her ‘The Rabbit Listened’ with the front page open and said, “The other gifts coming back don’t really hurt but this one is a real kicker…” and Elle read the note I had written all those years ago to Anita and put it down and then held me close.

She picked up Baby Elephant and held him and asked him how he’d been and then did his voice replying saying that he was really glad to be back with me now. Then she sat him next to Monty on the couch and said that Monty would have to be careful with him whilst he settled back in and that he needed a lot of love after what he’d been through. Honestly, it felt really just so holding for the little parts.

I’d actually brought some new books this week and I asked if we could read those. I wanted to do something that was not ‘the box’ and connecting for me and Elle because I had been really conscious of how easily I can drift away when I feel scared and upset, and so even though none of the upset was about Elle I knew I needed to keep her close because it wouldn’t take much for me to go into hiding when actually I needed to stay as connected and present as I could.

In getting out the books, I also grabbed Big Elephant from my bag, which is maybe the first time it’s come out, and I showed it to Elle. She put baby elephant and Monty inside her (Big Elephants’) arms and said how happy Baby Elephant looked, and then we had a really lovely time reading, giggling, and talking about the book and the characters and it gave a bit of a respite from the box.

A little bit later I pulled a book out the box ‘A Shelter For Sadness’ and showed it to her. She read it to me. And said that we could read all the stories and give them new associations if I wanted. I told Elle I was struggling to understand how it had got to this place when nothing had gone very wrong between me and Anita and yet it was all playing out like this now. Elle said she thought that something had gone “very wrong” but with Anita and not me, and maybe that might feel in some way comforting because what’s happened has nothing at all to do with me.

The session seemed to fly by – even though I was there for nearly two hours. I guess, there’s a lot to delve into and through, it’s been eighteen months to get to this point. Elle asked me what I wanted to do with the box. I said that I wasn’t sure. She said that I could leave everything with her and we can come up with a plan on what to do together next week. She asked if I was taking Baby Elephant home and I said “not yet”. She said that he wasn’t to go back in the box and has put him somewhere safe in the room where he can be with her. So… yeah…Elle rocks doesn’t she?!

This week has felt pretty tough, of course it was going to be a big one, but Elle has been really ‘there’ with me and we have touched base each day and then again through the storms that have hit the UK this weekend. She emailed me on Friday night telling me to keep safe and again on Saturday morning checking things were ok. We live rurally and were without power from midday yesterday until mid-morning today so it’s been a bit bleurgh but fortunately no damage to property this time…and that’s why this blog didn’t make it up online yesterday. No internet!

So, Elle honestly has been great. I mean, part of me would like to have spent the entirety of last week in the room with her but I do have a life I have to get on with, and so having finger tips touching has been almost enough.

Anyway, this isn’t the end of this saga. I haven’t taken everything out the box yet… I have merely opened it up and glanced inside, really. I think this next session on Tuesday may be hard, although Elle says she’s had an idea about what to do with the books so… at least I am not on my own flailing around with it all alone. I have three more sessions before Christmas break so I figure two weeks on unpacking Anita and then Christmas Eve session to be with Elle, do festive fun things, maybe Playdoh and stories….and then try and get through the holidays in one piece. x