And now for the most ridiculous story you'll ever read

It was late March and Scott and I had just come back from my mother's house. At around midnight he left again for the store for beer. The 15-minute trip had lasted over an hour, judging by the number of Grey's Anatomy episodes I watched on DVD while he was gone. Then I got the sinking feeling he had taken my car, which he does not have permission to do. He doesn't have a driver's license. He will go to jail and my car will be impounded if he is ever caught, not to mention I'll be liable for any damage he causes while driving. We've had fight after fight of him taking my car in the middle of the night, and this time I just happened to be awake.

I got out of bed and searched through my purse for my car keys, telling myself I was going to unload the trunk which I was too lazy to do after I got home from my mother's. The car keys were missing and I checked every spot I could have left them in and found nothing. Finally I open the door to go see if the car is in the parking spot and I see Scott standing out front smoking a cigarette.

"Do you have my car keys?" I demanded.

He reached in his pocket and pulled them out and handed them to me.

"So you took my car?"

"No, I left my cigarettes in the car and went out to go get them," he explained

"Before or after you went to the store?"

"Before."

"So you took your scooter to the store with my car keys in your pocket?" I clarified.

He agreed.

I marched down to the parking spot and saw my car was in the same space, but this time the car was straight in the space. When I came home from my mother's, I had parked crooked and even made a comment to Scott about it. When I turned the car back on to adjust my parking job, Scott protested and said it was fine, so I left the car parked crooked.

I opened the trunk to get the rest of my things out, and saw the boxes weren't lined up neatly like I left it. Scott had driven my car so hard that my boxes had tipped over, spilling the contents everywhere. I. was. furious. On a level of 1 to 10, I was a solid 8.

Back in the apartment Scott was showering. I didn't care. I stood outside the shower curtain and called him a liar. Not only did he take my car, but he lied about it to my face. He ignored me and I fumed. When he got out of the shower, I resumed yelling and he admitted he took my car. He said he did go in there just to get his cigarettes, but he already had my car keys and temptation was just too great. Then he said he lied about it so I wouldn't yell at him. That he was protecting me from things that will make me angry and I shot back that the only one he was protecting was himself. And then I probably called him selfish and only looking out for Number One.

The next morning I was still angry with Scott and his lack of boundaries. That mine is indeed not yours whenever you want it. We've had this exact fight over him taking my car at least eight times. I decided to employ some retail therapy to calm down and I get in my car and drive to a local home goods discount store.

As I pull out on the road, my car stinks. It smells like shit. Literally. The smell was so overpowering that I pull over on the side of the road in a bad neighborhood just to get out of the car and inspect it. And there, on the driver's side floor mat, is a pile of human shit. Corn and all. Not only did Scott steal my car and lied about it, but he also took a dump in it. (He says he has IBS, but I say he has a drinking problem to explain why he can't control himself, but this is so not the point here.) There are human feces left by my boyfriend, the person I have sex with, in my new car.

Luckily for me on the same street is the car wash Scott used to work at long ago. I pull up and ask how much it is to get the car shampooed. It was too expensive even if I did have a job. Then I ask about getting just the mats washed. It's still over $20. Defeated and tearing up a little bit, I thank the teenager for his time and begin to turn my car around. He runs after me. It's raining outside and I'll probably be his only customer for hours.

"Hey, what do you need?" He probed.

I start to cry. "There is shit in my car. Human shit. It's not my shit, it's another person's--it's a long story that I don't want to get into it--but there is shit in my car and I want it out." My tears match the speed of the rain by now.

"We'll wash just that one mat for you for 5 dollars," he gently responded.

"Okay," I sniffed.

And so with the looks and stares from every employee at the car wash who by now has heard of what's going on, I get my car mat cleaned.

When I arrive back at the apartment, the car wash incident has removed my want for shopping. Scott is awake and watching TV on the couch. "So you're not going to talk to me?" he asked.

"I'll talk to you. I just paid to have my car detailed because you took a shit in it!" I yelled.

He got up from the couch, all of a sudden giving me the silent treatment, and showered again for work. I know now that the reason he showered the night before was to wash himself after crapping his pants, and I think of him just standing outside our apartment door last night, smoking that cigarette with shit in his pants, and I'm disgusted. I'm beyond disgusted.

After his shower he walks in the closet where I'm folding some clothes. He pulls open the drawer to his dresser and pulls out an undershirt. "You know we're over, right?" he mutters.

"Fine," I respond coolly, "Go take a dump in some other girl's car."

And that's when he did it. He choked me. He extended his right arm, grabbed my neck and pushed me back against the wall of the closet, my hanging work blouses draping over my shoulders. I was halfway expecting it; it's not the first time he's done it. In the past I've experimented with the best ways to react to him grabbing my neck and pinning me against the wall. I find that acting submissive will make it over faster and fighting back just prolongs it, but he needed to know that this was not okay.

So I punched him. I've never punched anyone before and still didn't have it in me to punch him in the face or stomach, so I went for the temple. And I punched him until I broke his skin and my knuckles turned blue, and until he let go of me.

When he released me I ran past him and grabbed my phone. I told him if he didn't leave right away I was going to call the police. He retorted that he would lie to them and tell them he didn't do anything and they would take me to jail. After all, he had a cut on his head and my skin was just red. I had a cut from him on my neck, but I hadn't exactly taken the time to inspect myself yet. Then he told me that the police told him if they had to come to our apartment again, they were going to take both of us to jail. I didn't know what to believe. I did hit him back. My hand throbbed.

And so did my neck, considering I just had surgery on it.

Instead I called my mom who rushed into the city. She asked Scott to his face if he stole my car, took a dump in it and then choked me over it, because the accusations are just to fantastical to believe. He agreed with the first two, but then told my mother that I attacked him and he did it out of self-defense to me.

I couldn't believe he would lie to my own mother. I was broken. The rage in me subsided and I was just overtaken with sadness over my life predicament. I left the room and sat in the corner of my bedroom and cried. I heard what Scott said, "See this is what she does. She yells and then she cries." My mother collected me and we left for dinner. She ate; I didn't.

She told me the relationship was dead and that I did everything I could, but there was nothing left. How disrespectful and out of his mind must someone be to crap his own pants and not even be embarrassed about it. I was caught up with my apartment, the one I had to work for the last time I was laid off and got dumped and had to move home when I was 24. I couldn't do it again at 28. I should be able to take care of myself and not be weak. This was my apartment, my deposits that I put down years before I even met him. I shouldn't have to give it up.

My mother said she was worried for me. And all the men who found out what happened all said they were going to drive over and talk to Scott about choking me, but no one did anything.

And neither did I.

My mom calls them the Collectibles

Today I officially became a girl with her own private therapist. It was awesome. I paid her $100 and she gave me the name of a book to read and told me that I need to journal more. Shit, I could blog and buy It's Called a Breakup Cause It's Broken off Amazon for $11.99.

Her main point was that all the symptoms I'm struggling with is due to me holding things in and never asking for help and never releasing whatever I'm feeling. She even picked up an Incredible Hulk doll and pulled the string. "I'm about to get angry!" shouted Bruce while his plastic eyes blinked red.

"If only someone hugged him more and told him to write his feelings down," she cooed while cuddling with the awkward-looking doll.

So, whatever, I'm going to try it. I'm going to write it out.

In other news, I'm experiencing a Facebook phenomenon called All of my ex-boyfriends see that I'm single and have contacted me again for the first time in years. So far I've heard from commitment-phobic Conor, self-absorbed Jack, emotionally unavailable Christopher, and manic-depressive Poet.

The one that I'm excited about? Hot Christopher. But I'm not supposed to be thinking about boys. I'm supposed to be absorbed in some serious me time, reading my therapist-approved self-help book and acting all nun-ish. And not having dinner with Poet tomorrow.

Which I am.

Things You Need To Know

1. I was laid off from my job on February 4th, 2009. If I hear "Due to the poor economic climate..." one more time, I'm going to rip my ears off and shove them in my mouth.
2. The day after, February 5th, 2009, my third biopsy of my thyroid came back inconclusive again. The big C-word was being whispered around. I was scheduled for immediate surgery to have my thyroid removed. When I cried (about paying for the surgery. The idea of spending money while unemployed freaked me out more than the big C-word did.), the doctor said this would be a great time for surgery "because [I] had nothing better to do." 
3. The pathology lab came back a few weeks later and said that all the tumors on my thyroid were benign. I finally had a diagnosis, but it didn't really make me feel any better. I sort of feel like I went through the whole thing for nothing.
4. I had to stay with my mother following the surgery to recuperate. Scott didn't have a driver's license or a car, nor did he schedule the day off for my surgery, so he was pretty unfit for taking care of me. When I ended up in the emergency room for complications of surgery, he told me that my problems were psychosomatic and that I needed to snap out of it and come back to the apartment. He said that his surgery was worse and more painful and he got through it, so I shouldn't be such a wimp. I tried telling him that this wasn't a patch job, that my entire endocrine system was screwed up, but he hung up the phone on me. This had no bearing on why we broke up, but it always gnawed on me that when I needed surgery, he wasn't capable of taking care of me.
   

Flames

When issues with Scott and me became public to friends and family, they rallied around me and literally packed up my apartment in 3 hours. I was too hurt--too out of it--to be much help. "Well breathe for you," said my closest girl pal Harvey. I just had to point to what was mine and it was gone.

Two days later everyone sighs and smiles. "Sarah is safe," they congratulate themselves. But the phone is silent and all of a sudden, no one is here to breathe for me anymore. They forgot about me. I'm supposed to be feeling better and I've never felt worse, or lonelier, or more confused. I listened to them and I lost my best friend, the one who always would call...

And it makes me want to run back as if I were on fire. Because the devil you know is better than the devil you don't.

*Sigh*

I have about a million long stories to how I got here, but this is the gist: Scott and I are no more. I had to do a quick move to my mother's house yesterday. I'm 28, unemployed, and living at home. Sexy.

I'm about as okay as I can be, and thanks for your thoughts.

Hi.

I'm sitting here trying to figure out when exactly did things go horribly awry. My heart is pounding so hard that I don't know if I'm going to vomit or have an anxiety attack. But I do know that today will be the hardest day of my life, and by night I'll be safe. And possibly on my way to being happy again. But that's going to take a little while longer.