How does one deal with/accept a loved one who displays self destructive tendencies?

This is the @tribesteemup biweekly question. The tribe is a beautiful and mutually supportive community. You can find our 8 pillars, as laid down by our wonderful founder, @kennyskitchen, at the bottom of this post.

Well, I've been avoiding this one like the plague. Like it's 2 am, and I know it's still Wednesday somewhere, but pretty much only the pacific islands. That level of avoiding. Two things, I guess. One is that this one is so personal and right now up in my grill. The other is that I know this circumstance I'm rolling with is not near so dramatic as many others have dealt with.

I'll start on that second count. I have a friend whose first born is a heroin addict. Her mother was the victim of a home invasion turned rape who now lives in her dog shit infested and otherwise unclean house and won't leave or accept help. I have friends who have dealt with spouses, children, and parents with terrible addiction habits. Both my grandfathers were career alcoholics. So I know shit can be worse when I tell you that my ex is now a trump supporting conservative conspiracy theorist.

Allow me to be clear here. I dislike the term conspiracy theorist. I think it minimizes people questioning the dominant paradigm. I have many beliefs that many would probably label conspiracy theories. We will skip that list for now, but I hope you can trust that I don't use those words as a slander lightly.

Fermi’s Paradox

This is where it all began. Very innocently, my daughter was talking about it, and my ex, who was not then an ex, asked what it was. So he began digging into alien theories, and I can roll with that. I'm pretty sure aliens have been here or are here currently. For certain intelligent life exists outside this planet. He got pretty deep in it, and it got a little weird, but honestly I didn't care because we had already decided to split, and that was not the only topic I was no longer interested in.

From there it devolved into weird theories about LGBTQ folx trying to infiltrate something. I'm not sure. I'd stopped listening, and as the mother of a bi daughter, I wasn't hearing that shit. Then it started to morph into support for Trump policies and believing he was going to make peace agreements with North Korea and find solutions for Syria. Then on to charming theories of border security. Again, let me be really clear that I am a radical left anarchist. I'm neither a Hillary nor Obama lover. I despise the oligarchy in all its detestable forms. And that made these arguments more complicated. I don't support the moderate left, hell, I barely can stomach the progressive left anymore, but Trump and the entire conservative right are a special flavor of dog shit.

Then it got real wild. He started in about how Trump was taking down sex trafficking rings. “You mean the guy who has at least 20 allegations of sexual assault and domestic violence?” He genuinely believes all those allegations are false. He genuinely believes Soros paid all those Hondurans in the caravan. He genuinely believes Kavanaugh is innocent. And he genuinely believes Trump is making a dent in sex trafficking. Yeah, wow.

I don't even feel I'm doing a good job of describing it. It's like that scene in Zoolander when Mugatu says, “I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!” Everything he says is just total absurdity. I'm sure Soros and the Clintons and Obama are rotten, but that doesn't mean this racist, misogynist sack of turds is any kind of answer. To literally any question ever asked.

Now, I believe that, as a white person in this world, I have a responsibility to deal with racists. POC have enough on their plate without having to educate dumbfucks. As a woman and mother, I feel compelled to combat misogyny. I've been assaulted. Both my daughters have too.

I just realized this week that I can't with him. It kills me to think of him helping raise my two younger children with the toxic attitudes he has. It burns my soul to think of my daughter being raised by someone who sits back and denies blatant sexual assault. It crushes me to see my boy pick up these misogynistic attitudes and have to undo them week after week after week. But someone else has to take him on. It's too hard, too muddled, too toxic for me. I only have it in me to educate and protect my babies.

So, that's my answer. He's not just destroying himself. He's also destroying others, but my only response, at least right now, is to completely separate myself from him and protect my children as best I can. I've banned him from my social media and cut off all communication that doesn't relate to parenting. A sad state of affairs for a man I was engaged to and had two babies with and really, truly loved once upon a time.

A long time ago, mama said, “you gotta pick your battles.” I gotta let this one go.

Much love, y’all!

As always, all pics are mine or pixabay unless otherwise noted.

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