We did some clean up of the hard drive on my computer the other night. Ron went through his folders and came accross a bunch of emails I had written him in January of 2000 when I was in Arizona and things were at their worst. At one point he had asked me to write him a letter about what was bothering me, if I thought it would help me to do so. I wrote a journal entry on the computer instead beacuse the letter format just wouldn't work. His face got real serious when he read it again the other night. He asked if I wanted to read it and I said yes. I started reading it and my eyes filled with tears. It still hurts a great deal. Not so much because of the specific actions on Jack's part anymore but moreso it hurt me to so visibly see the differences in me at that time and me now. My writing style then was stilted and the choice of words was very blatantly cautious. It still hurts me from time to time to see how deeply I had changed. How easily I let myself return to a state of despair, depression and self-loathing that I had sworn to never do again. That I had honestly believed I would not be a victim of abuse again, but I was. I think that in some ways my belief that it would never happen to me again is what made it possible for me to let it get as far as it did before I could finally accept it and face it. I know that I am lucky I faced it at all. I'm pretty sure that if I had continued to deny it, I would have killed myself before too much longer. Knowing that makes me angry at myself. especially since I first used the word abusive to describe Jack a year before I finally left. I used it in my journal and it prompted a major fight between us. Anyway...I am angry with myself for continuing to deny what was happening. Sometimes I think it will always hurt me on some level to look back on that time in my life. I do wonder if I am misplacing my anger onto myself rather than on Jack where it belongs. At this point, I am more upset wiht myself for letting it happen than I am at Jack for doing it. I wonder how much of that is because it seems he has made some fundamental changes in himself, so I somehow feel like I can't blame him or be angry with him now that he is trying to not only see why.

OK stopping here.