Tenacity and Hope

I'm sure I've mentioned before the once a month meeting for people with eating disorders and their friends and family. It's the only meeting in town that would be possible for Scumbag and I to go together, so he wouldn't have to brave a meeting alone.

I have gone by myself only two times (maybe three, I can't remember). I have invited him about five times. When he lived here it seemed more imperative to me, and it was good for me to go and learn a little detachment while his illness was so close to hand. After the last time I invited him, and we had all kinds of horrible mis-communication afterwards, back in August, I have not brought it up again. The whole idea of the invite became fraught with bad feelings and expectations. I know he feels guilty about his illness and his behaviors, he feels guilty about causing pain to his mom, to me. In not talking about the issue I've tried to just let him come to me if he wants to. I've kept my mouth shut quite a bit over the past several months, with only one exception after Halloween.

That's not to say I don't realize when it's the first Friday of the month. I ask myself if I feel like going alone, if it's necessary for me. The answer lately has been "no". I don't need to go. He's not living here and his illness is not affecting my life the way it did for awhile.

Today is the first Friday of the month. Yesterday I went fishing via text message. I sent a sweet little message saying the meeting would be happening, I had not asked in a long time so I thought I'd mention it. I said, "I know you will probably say no". I said just because I hadn't brought it up in a long time didn't mean I had stopped caring or worrying about you, I just try to give you your space.

I sent this text message at 11:00am. I got a reply at midnight. "What time is the meeting"?

A little more back and forth and the last message I received was, "well then I say we go".

If I had not been laying in bed with my phone you could have knocked me over with a feather.

That's not to say it's a done deal. He still had 18 hours from this exchange to change his mind and find an excuse. He still has 10 hours from now to change his mind, and I'm completely expecting that.

I'm writing this just because I feel like I have to get it down. I don't want to "jinx" anything so I'm not going to post this until later with an update as to whether it happened or not.

Update.....
We went. We really went. We stayed for the whole meeting. He did not speak, I spoke very little. But he listened, he really listened. When we drove home he said it was informative, interesting, and he would go again. He said some of the things that were said gave him comfort, and that it felt good to know he wasn't alone.
I feel like a burst of hope in my chest so big it's going to leap out of me and cause fireworks in the sky.
More later.