Self Sabotage

Ok. I remembered something recently about myself.... I'll try to make some sense out of it.... ugh, here goes. This is going to be long.

I have a terrible memory. I don't remember my childhood, except for photos I've seen over and over since then and some painted in memories of random things. The few memories I do have are more like extremely old polaroids or very vague imprints of emotions and events that have no visuals attached. I usually only retain less than 5 of these snapshots and some separate imprints for each YEAR of my life before high school. Since I realized this was happening to me in middle school I started sort of telling myself a story of my life - creating my narrative if you will. (I actually sort of want to write a book of my life because it would be fictional even with a basis in truth.) It's helped to improve my memory of my life, but it's extremely difficult to remember lots of little things with this method and there is so much bias in remembering this way. I feel like it's contributed to making it so much harder to get to know myself as well as with learning life lessons... I feel like I have to relearn certain things 5 or 6 times before it sticks per se. What a pain in the ass.

Since I've started reading so much on training and memory retention and learning... I've actually begun to suspect that all of this is attached to what is likely a REM disorder (my sleep issue). Research is showing that without REM sleep things you learn and experiences very rarely make it into long term memory, and that without that REM sleep we retain very little and what we do retain doesn't always get properly connected so that we can retrieve the information later. Awesome huh? So maybe it's less a pain in the ass and more of a freeing way to live? I wish it felt that way.

Alright so now that you know this important issue I have.... it hit me recently that I had forgotten an important pattern in my first relationship. I was constantly creating escape hatches in the first 4 years of that relationship, out of words, constructed issues that I decided should break us up, by talking up all the negatives, convincing myself not to love him, etc.

Hmmm, sound familiar?

I remember one day in particular (vaguely) where A got exasperated with me (something he rarely did) and asked me angrily/tearfully: "Why are you always trying to run away from us?" or something similiar. What I remember clearly is that the sentiment slammed into me. I was always - ALWAYS - less in it than he was and maintained that vigilantly. Always looking for the out, making sure it was there. I didn't use it until he forced me to, but I had it.

This was.... poisonous in a lot of ways. In order to construct an out when the relationship is primarily good meant I had to do it with words - because he rarely gave me much ammunition. So I would go to my mother (my best friend at the time) and my sister and talk all about what I was concerned about and I would constantly sound on the brink of a break up with him. By the time we broke up they both hated him, with lots of good reasons. We were together 7 years. I think I did this almost the entire time. Poor A. He managed to fight me off on a regular basis and by the end of our relationship it was a running joke between us. He could say something about it, I would realize that's what I was doing, and I would stop. That's part of why breaking up with him sucked so hard - I had finally gotten IN after years of fighting it and then I was forced to leave.

So. I vowed not to do that with K. And I didn't, though I had built in the escape hatch of graduate school. I did give him the option of going with me to it though - which in light of our problems we decided not to go with (haha, I make it all sound like it was done rationally and painlessly.... it wasn't rational or painless at all - he wasn't mature enough for that and I was dying in agony from feeling forced to abandon his daughter). Lesson here: Didn't build in appropriate escapes and I devastated myself.

Add these two experiences to a lifetime of inability to trust and my history of being abandoned....
and I sincerely doubt my ability to be the least bit honest with myself in a relationship situation. I don't think I know how. And I have to admit that terrifies me.

I think this is part of why I like E so much and always keep him in the wings. He tells me what I feel - and that works for me on a lot of levels. I'm fine with believing him and it's much easier than trying to figure it out for myself. Still - I stay away from getting involved with him because he's not stable and that seems to be the #1 thing I crave in my secret heart.

Alright - so what does this have to do with now? SP. Smart, an active listener (now anyway), a good foil for my neurotic and dramatic moments, sexy, and someone I was very excited about dating before we put a title on things. As soon as that happened... not as much excitement, because I needed an escape hatch. So I built a GOOD one: well he thinks he wants his own children, I don't - so for sure we won't last. Then when he seemed a little malleable on that issue I grabbed another one: Well, when he's done with grad school he'll leave and that'll be that.
During this time I've also built lots of little ones: We're both too selfish so we must not be right because if we were then we'd immediately just be perfect and put the other first every minute of every day (even though we're both rabidly opposed to codependence) and it would be a fairy tale (but I hate clear shoes, they're ugly, and he'd know that so he'd have been sure to buy me the perfect knee high black leather boot instead) and we'd never ever get the least bit annoyed with the other person (even though we're both critical and smart and speak our minds) or be too tired to have sex (even though we both have medical level sleep issues and I'm constantly on medications that fuck with my libido and so is he). Right.

I took it steps further this time. I just kept parts of myself, large ones, put away into little boxes and over on one side of my mind, the side marked with: not pertinent to SP. Doing this ensured I would never feel like he really knew me or that he was close enough to me to devastate me. I told myself it was to make sure we weren't one of THOSE couples I hate who can't breathe without talking about it together. I told myself I did it to retain my sense of self. I shared enough that he would think I was open, and in it, etc. I'm VERY good at that, but in reality I kept the deep stuff, the important stuff, to myself. On purpose.

Laid out like that... well. I am the partner I would never want. How sad is that?? My mother is beginning to dislike him. My best friend is too good to do that, but she's so cautious about us now too because she holds my ammunition for a break up. I constantly make her new arrows to hold for me, just in case I need them.

What I'm having a really rough time with right now is deciding if those arrows are justified, or if all of them are shit because I haven't allowed myself to really participate in this relationship as one. I've made it a fauxtionship - almost entirely by myself too. I'm leaning towards the shit option. (And Sasha - when you read this - isn't it funny how you asked me questions about all of this right before I got slammed with a revelation about it from within that basically answered what you were asking?! We're mental twins.) If nothing else I feel that this relationship has more to teach me - if I will but let it.

I came home from my conference and had a 3 hour conversation with SP. I laid it all out there how I've felt - and asked what his plans were when he graduated. He said his plans have been for a long time to take me into account in whatever his decisions are at that time, but that he never talks about because he has no idea what the options will be and it seems silly to think ahead when you can't plan anything. He's so practical sometimes, he doesn't want to waste energy thinking about an uncertain future. But he wasn't the least bit uncertain about me. He loves our relationship, and he loves me, a lot. It really hurt him and made him very sad to hear how I had been handling things. He has never pressured for more because your future is inherently uncertain at the completion of graduate school, and because he was afraid I would bolt. To me it says a lot that he chose not to even get angry, but instead asked me what else he could do to make me feel more secure in the relationship.... He asked a lot of questions, made sure he really understood what I meant and where my little unhappinesses are occurring - then he told me what he thinks is great about us and suggested some ways we could make it even better for both of us based on this and other previous conversations. He also told me how vulnerable this made him feel because he had no idea and asked for some reassurances from me that I believed in things over the course of the next few weeks... if I did.

Then he went and has been doing these things we talked about since then (not to mention his past track record of changing his listening style, methods of dealing with annoyance, etc.). He isn't the guy who says he will change something to shut me up. He only says it if he means it, and then he does. I'm pretty impressed and I only hope I can do the same - because the changes we want are only the type that make you a better person - not the kind I hate where someone wants you to change to suit THEM better.

It makes me cautious now that my best friend is cautious. When he's with me though - and I'm not overanalyzing everything - maybe that's the place I can find the truth of my feelings? (I have to say there on the couch with my head in his lap looking into his eyes while we talked about all of this stuff I felt so calm and secure but even here I hesitate to say I love him - though I know I do and I tell him so regularly without qualms). I don't know what to do. I don't want to only notice the positive, that's dangerous. I don't want to keep building my hatches, I'm already sad and angry with myself for realizing how I do this and am dying to figure out how to stop.... but I don't know if I have the capacity to look at my relationship clearly. Fuck.

I guess a little part of me always hoped it would be like a fairy tale. Someone would show up and manage to get past all my barriers and I would just FALL and that would be it forever. I think my walls are much too strong for that. I told him all of this in order to force myself to make a decision, and I decided to stay in. So now what do I do? I wish I knew.

Busyness.

Oh, life.

So E has been in and out of late - he maintains a huge passion for me. It... both reassures me of my lovability and attractiveness in times of doubt (mental and physical), but also bothers me. I am in a monogamous relationship - no matter if I believe it to have a fairly proximate expiration date or not. I refuse to cheat in this situation. I also refuse to lead someone on or not be honest with them. Whenever I don't maintain honesty I get into trouble, often friendship sours, and everything gets messed up - sometimes beyond redemption. Friendship with him is difficult to maintain with his constant communication of his attraction, so we'll see how long our period of being in the in and out phase of talking to one another lasts.

I am going out of town next week for close to a week, and things are going kind of crazy in my professional/personal life. The boyfriend returned unscathed from his long trip to India.... but my underwater digital camera stayed behind on the bottom of the Ganges River. He ordered me a new one, haha. Our passion for one another was/is incredibly strong on his return, but our past sexual dissapointments soon returned as well.

Sex when I have any kind of ick going on down below (and my genetics ensure that even on birth control I regularly have what they call 'breakthrough bleeding' ) is not his cup of tea no matter what. BUT when that's why we aren't doing it he doesn't really want to touch me directly - just through fabric. Well... that's not enough to do a thing but leave me wanting more. I don't usually get off externally either without a vibrator - for me it's all about gspot sex not clitoral stuff. I used to... but the birth controls that work best also seem to lower both my sensitivity and my libido. Sadface. I can't get upset with him about this stuff though - I've never stepped up to the plate and solved the problem by requiring that I orgasm during these usually short times (I have a period only once every 3 months, and breakthroughs usually only last a day or two) or introduced buzzy things into our bedroom or anything else. Usually we're so busy it doesn't matter I just stick to my own schedule when he wouldn't want to have sex with me anyway - and the Hitachi keeps me happy enough until I can get what really satisfies again. This time it didn't quite work that way thanks to his jet lag. He awoke wanting sexual activity and I was also awake but groggy and knew sex wasn't on the menu that day.... We argued about it around 4 am when I didn't respond well to his fingers. However - we got past it. I was too annoyed to use that opportunity to explain my sexual take on things. I really should just requre what I want - but this leads to the next issue I have....

The word love has gotten very intense too of late, abscences can do that. I'm not really sure what I want to do about either - this relationship is clearly not my first priority and never has been. It's not for him either. We're ok with that - but that clearly is not entirely comfortable for me or I wouldn't talk about it so often and be so preoccupied with it on occasion....

Knowing that this relationship was somewhat transient from the start has really tainted it in many ways. Such as in my sexual satisfaction with him specifically (though not overall)- I never really bothered making it partly his responsibility or concern. Honestly, that was pretty short-sighted. If nothing else I'd have been doing a helluva favor for whomever comes next. He's very good at sex, but only ok at foreplay and for me definitely not so good at non-sex orgasms. He occasionally has lovely bursts of dominance, which I have been careful to nurture, but again they had nothing to do with knowing physically what I or most women would love (though he has learned more in that regard).

This is mostly just a bit of personal ramble for the moment... my school life has been absorbing all of my attention lately. There may not be HNT's for the next two weeks, but at least I'll be having some fun while getting some work done on my life, schoolwork, and career.

See you again soon, space cowboys.

Ouch.

8 days?? Oh my. Well... let's just say I needed/required the escape. My BFF lost another family member, I've had a fever, and Spring Break officially started - though for me that's meant lots of time alone with the pets. I haven't turned my computer on in several of those days... and only thought to come here tonight when I missed connecting with/checking in on those I've come to feel close to from the blogosphere (the lovely Sasha & Wilhemina most notably - but I also missed the wit of Roland & AAG, and the thought-provoking posts of Essen Em quite a lot as well). How quickly this place has almost become another friend - one who inspires me, comforts me, makes me laugh, and provokes me to new lines of thought. I did however find myself avoiding Merlin's blog... because I didn't want to think about love. No fault of those two - but I can't even seem to masturbate lately without getting mired in my own worries about my relationship.

SP being gone for 20+ days has set my mind on this odd tangent. I think normally I would have not thought much about him and would have reveled in my time alone - but having his dog here has made thoughts of him a very regular occurrence. I didn't want to think about US like this - I think I've very carefully avoided it for a long time. His and my relationship is one of potential - lots of unfulfilled potential (and it was a year in October - another thing I studiously avoid thinking about). Lots of not sharing our innermost desires, dreams, etc. Why? I'm not entirely sure... but I do know without doubt it's been a choice we both made. Perhaps this is one of those cases where the past hinders your future.

That train of thought always makes me crazy. The tracks go two ways: hope and recrimination. Hope that we're right for one another, that we want a future together, that if we confronted that all these trappings would fall away and we would really live that dream out fully together. Recrimination because I know in reality we probably are not right (the whole kid debate we stand on different sides of is a dealbreaker... and then there's a list of things including the ever-important: do I want to be with someone forever who clearly sort of finds it icky to finger me, one of my fave things ever?). I think it's kind of ridiculously hard on me to consider leaving someone who is so GOOD. He's a great person - someone I admire, respect, and sort of love. The passion hasn't been present of late - but I still can't see the forest for the trees with that. It could have been my scary physical concerns and other stressors as easily as it could be us. See what I just did there? I made another excuse to hope. DAMN IT. I wish I was the strong one who could point to the not-good-enough-for-me stuff and walk the fuck away. I'm not though - see the last post for more evidence of that. The little girl in me who is always dying to be loved just can't. She's so afraid no one else will... and she feels that if no one else ever could love her... well then she'd rather have mediocre with someone she really admires and respects than nothing at all.... How do I come to terms with this when there is so much good stuff here? It just hasn't materialized into anything like what I really want... or even some of what I have had before and know I am capable of....I already know I have to talk to him soon after he gets back. Ugh.

So yeah, the postsecret doesn't fit this post yet, but it will in a second. Today I hit a point of alone I didn't like. It wasn't happy anymore, I kind of wanted to kill the dog. And looking at the canvas I want and don't want to paint for SP was defeating me. So I gathered up my paints... and decided to watch The Tudors and paint. Just to get out of my head again (I read Duma Key by Stephen King in its entirety the day before to accomplish that goal) as fast as possible. Lo and behold I get an IM! I had sort of been waiting by the phone and computer for something from the BFF - she has been MIA and needing some space - however, it wasn't her. It was E.

All my character list says about E is that he was a fling from years ago. Well... he might have been a bit more than that - and we've always been the kind of friends who can pick up where they left off. He was my rebound from my 7 year relationship with my so-called soulmate. He was the 2nd person I have ever had sex with. My first sexual experience with a woman was actually a 3some involving him. His penis is almost beautiful, and we all know that's rare. I've never understood it but I have always liked him - first as a person, and then as a sexual partner. No one else ever thinks he's good enough for me or seems to like him very much... but I do. I always have, and yet I've never taken him seriously as a possible partner either. He's never been ambitious enough beyond wanting to get me naked. I don't want to drag someone through life - the first boyfriend would have required that and I learned my lesson well. However, I know very well that E views me in near-soulmate territory. The guy gets me, and is highly capable of getting me off too.

I haven't talked to him on the phone in 2 years, though we IM regularly. But today... I did. I have to say in the past my willingness to talk to him on the phone has been a precursor to the death knell of my relationships. It's weird the patterns we create for ourselves. I made the excuse that it was because I can't type and paint (I can't, but still) and that I was sick of being alone with my thoughts. I don't lead him on, because I'd hate myself if I did. Yet I know he really and truly thinks that one day I'll be single again and I'll think of him first.

Will I? I don't know.

All I know is that I let him back in a little bit more because... it is so nice to have a champion. He is my champion. He's smart, funny, calls me out on my BS, sexy, and more than that he never seems to think a bad thought about me - even when he's calling me out... it's kind of scary actually... Support, unconditional love, intellectual and sexual stimulation, humor, creativity, etc.? I also know that as of tonight I can't get off if I'm thinking of SP at all, but when E crept into the brain there was no problem. That's probably what made me write this post - and what will have me sticking to porn rather than my imagination for the next 10 or so days.

Chicken?

My last post was a bit disjointed (and that was after edits)... like my thoughts often seem to be. They jump and twist and move and ramble around one another in bright ribbons that in no way resemble the 'train' of thought I have been taught I am supposed to have. They're unruly and mercurial and rarely end up where I expect them to.... much like me.

One of my best friends, the BMF aka Frances, broke up with me yesterday. Or did I break up with him? I really don't know. Hey, at least this time I didn't inherit a cat - that's a first.

What I wish could have happened - that we could have scaled back the friendship and let it grow in a different way... didn't happen. I didn't ask for that though- the words failed me. It hurts, and it hurts to know I hurt someone I care for. The worst part is that in trying to get what I did want but in not communicating it - I ended up with nothing and he got to sort of say the final things you would say in these moments.... but I didn't get that chance. I didn't get to say I hope his mother is ok, that he finds the happiness he's looking for, that he gets that job he wants, etc. All the nice things you wish for those you love but may not get the chance to see them succeed once you burn the bridge that connects you to them.

...all I see in your response are excuses. Don't have time? That's bullshit and you know it. You just don't want to deal with something that is somewhat uncomfortable. And I don't agree that you respect me. This whole process has shown that you respect me so little that you can't be the least bit honest with me or yourself...I've watched you dismantle friendships with everyone and outwardly I thought I was immune, but I always knew it would happen to me. I gave you an opportunity to redeem yourself in a respectful manner, but instead you have chosen the easy way out...I hope you succeed and someday have enough confidence in yourself that you stop looking to others to provide it for you. I hope you someday realize that what you want and what you need are two different things. I hope someday you stop using the bad things you do to gain attention.

Mostly, though, I hope you find love and leave your cynicism for the dreamless.

Goodbye and good luck.

I only included the parts that stung a bit, or puzzled me in some way. It's also hard to not explain yourself to someone who has always understood you when you did. There are things in his good-bye e-mail I'd like to respond to, but it feels like egoist posturing to do so - and I'm not going to do that.

This is another pattern of mine in a way - it seems like when things end where I am involved it's often messy. After the end with my first ex which was a pretty clean break, all the rest of my friendships and relationships have ended more messily than I would like. Many were unnatural endings. I am not sure if it's due to my inability to communicate in these situations or due to the fact that I have changed a lot over this time - which means patterns of learning and painful growth. It could be because I do choose the easy way, or because I have become more indecisive in these situations. In any case this is not something I want to continue.

I'm an agnatheist - meaning I don't really care right now how we got here or where we go when we die. It's just not important to me right now. Maybe it will be again, but considering it's unfathomable... meh. So I don't know if I believe in the above in THOSE terms... but I do believe that maybe I haven't earned my own rewards yet.

This week was full of fail. FULL OF IT. However, now.... it's more than fine, it's lovely! So let's play a little game of catch-up. (I'm sorry I didn't get in here sooner - life refused to give me the opportunity.)

Monday... it snowed here. Which is not normal, trust me. Soooo when I went to the doctor to my appointment - they were closed. They didn't bother to call - so I braved the ice, downed power lines and trees, and was PISSED to have done so. They remained unreachable until Tuesday afternoon when they then informed me it would be FRIDAY before I could see the doctor and that she had not yet reviewed my results. Which of course they could only tell me in the middle of my teaching a class. Sometimes I get so annoyed at the complete lack of professionalism present in some small-town businesses. I grew up in the big city - I liked it.

Friday rolls around - I had to rearrange my entire schedule to make the appointment - but I had the best possible results! My cells are stage 1 - meaning 70% chance of no further negative developments and all I currently need is a check up in 6 months. The longer I had to wait the harder it was getting to believe things would actually be ok for some reason. So this was more than good news.

Other funny fails of this week: I fell off the bus rather than stepping off of it properly, I threw a bowling ball behind me rather than down the lane, I put on a pair of pants that had a bug in them and subsequently killed it with them on, removed the bug, and then was forced to wear them for the rest of the day, the cold made my car radio turn the volume off by itself repeatedly one day further adding to the insanity that was everything I touched this week, and subsequently well... yeah.

So now that we've gotten all of that out of the way you can see why there was no HNT this week, haha.

Snapshot of this moment: The sun is out, it's 72 degrees and breezy (yes, after snow on monday and hell yes I plan on debuting a bikini top for hiking tomorrow!!! SCORE!) . All of my windows are open, and the main doors, letting in as much light and breeziness as possible. I have an orange kitten on my lap, a black one laying next to me with her paw over her face, and a medium-sized cute black mutt on the floor at my feet. There's a massive canvas leaned against the far wall with canvas on the floor... all ready for me to paint on it. All in all, it's a beautiful day.

- My thesis draft is out and it should only be 3 weeks or so until I get my proposal date set. It's really happening this time!! I'm so happy and excited! This is my focus at the moment - getting it done by August to ensure my future.
- SP, the boyfriend, got out of town to India for 3 weeks a-ok. He had some help from me on that one, and of course the mutt on the floor is his. Or I should say mine for almost a month! Luckily she's a wonderful dog. She and I are going hiking tomorrow! I'm interested to see how his being gone is going to feel for me. Our relationship has been such a different one ... one of initial attraction and liking but then a slow, hesistant progression to a deep connection. Now we regularly tell each other we love each other. I've gotten pretty used to his place in my life and talking to him daily (a habit he started that I didn't even realize I got used to until lately), sleeping wrapped up completely in each other, and our 3 nights in a row seeing each other (2 with friends, 1 just the two of us) every week. Still - we never talk about the future and I think we both feel that next December when he graduates we'll part ways. Even though we've never talked about it, and I don't think I want to. My being willing to paint something on that canvas meant for him is a bigger deal than anyone could understand. I have never done that for anyone but my mother without payment involved. It's odd - and it has had me thinking more about what I bring to the table and about working on what it is I really want to give and to get. Does this even make sense? Not in terms of SP per se, just in terms of life. I want/like certain things in a partner and in my friends... do I give those things? Am I a good partner? Or is it me that limits my relationships? Something to ponder while I do some much-needed spring cleaning around here and perfect questions to have swirling between my ears while I'm painting. There's nothing better for that besides emotions and wonder.
- One of my TA assignments has been completed for the semester, I won't have much more to do for it in the future. Which is insanely exciting - hooray for putting in almost 60 hours on it in the last week so I don't have to deal with it hardly at all for the rest of the semester! (It's only supposed to be 10 hours a week.)
- I finally have a little time and space to get some sleep. I had a bought of sleep paralysis yesterday - so clearly I need it!

And that's my life in all it's glorious inconsistency.

Well, the waiting for the letter is over. My first official thesis draft is written and turned in, and until I get notes back - I'm actually caught up in everything grad school related. For the first time in 2.5 years, yay! Now I just have to get myself through to tomorrow and go to my appointment to find out what the results of my biopsies are.

My BFF Anne's father died this week. She's dealing with a horrible mess. SP is heading out of town for 3 weeks on Friday and is swamped in general. And I feel like I'm being silly by feeling so restless and antsy and on edge today - I feel like I need them but I don't know what I even want from them. Thank goodness for fluffy cuddly kitties. And maybe ice cream later..... :)

All of this is just making me think about choices. I dreamed about them all night last night. I think one of the odd side effects of living the life I did was that growing up I always felt like I was on the outside... looking in at a different world. I never really got to do the things all the other kids were doing, I rarely got to indulge my own whims - except for reading. My mom found ways to be sure I had books, yay libraries!! I sought a secure, well-paying career that was based solely on individual effort... I chose to get a PhD because it's something that to me gauranteed security in this world. Once I have it, I can never UNhave it.

My childhood has also left me with this almost desperate need to indulge my desires now. I hate being left out when my friends/loved ones are having amazing experiences. I always want to be a part of them - to see them happy and to share in it rather than just doing things alone all the time. I constantly worry that I'm not doing enough - having enough experiences. I want them NOW. I like to be alone, but the really amazing things I'd prefer to share. 'Experiences' bring you closer to people, help deepen your bond, and I think it's sad I have few of those with the people who matter most to me... the people I would most like to share them with. (I am not downgrading the value of just being able to exist with those closest to you though - to sit and understand one another without saying a word - that's invaluable as well.) I hope this is the good kind of crazy - the kind that just spurs you to be more and better and to 'follow your bliss' per se.

I wish I had chosen a job that allowed me to have more of the types of experiences I crave - but I didn't even know there were jobs like that until it was much too late and my feet were too far down this path to turn back. Now I just want this job to allow me options to make/have the experiences I want: time and gifts/care for those I love and value in this world, travel, animal conservation/experiences, the chance to see/feel different things and places.

I've actually started evaluating what I want to do with my degree based on the opportunities it will give me to fulfill this idea.
Teaching: More time off, flexible schedules, more eternal impact with students, more intellectual pursuits, etc.
Consulting: My money, possibly travel involved, more variety of projects and people.

I think all of this babble is really just a result of me wondering if tomorrow I will be asked to make a choice that affects the rest of my life. Or if I will be presented with something straightforward, or if my body has already made choices about my future for me. I'll find out soon enough.

The letter.

You look down and see an old envelope, with a yellow rose of Texas stamp on it that cost $.32 cents. The envelope has a little splash of gold glitter on it, like it's been stored in a junk drawer somewhere. As you flip it over, you see the flap hasn't been sealed. Inside is a self-sticking mailing label - so old that the glue is a deep antique gold color and has become useless. On the front is an address - your address from years upon years and moves upon moves ago. The handwriting is distinctive... but feels oddly childlike to you. Oddly large letters, mostly capitals... and yet you'd swear you write your own N's just like that.

You put the label back in the envelope and remove the letter hiding behind it. One piece of paper, removed from a legal-sized pad. Folded 6 times longways, and once down the middle. It's dated clearly on the top right... 2/15/98, Sun. You start to read...

Hi [Your Name],
This is your long lost DAD, a... father a.... or whatever you want to call me; Hey watch it, you know what the Bible says about that. Watch your tongue, oh well! OOPS!
I certainly am looking forward to meeting you. I've always loved you and sensed a longing for all the things I missed ^experiencing & seeing as you've grown up. I just recently acquired a photo of you when you were 13, it looks like a school picture. My my you have gotten big. The other or last picture I had of you was of a snaggle-toothed 4 yr. old. A tiny little thing!
Thanks to ^Aunt Cindy I also got some pictures of summer 96 when that you and [your mother's name] came to the Ganty House. Thank God for small favors! Also Brooke & Cindy, and Ashley's feet are in the photo too!
It appears to me that [your mother's name] has done a good job of raising you and that God has had his hand on you too; or maybe their in unison. Anyway you look like a million to me and my hopes for you span the universe. That's just the way us daddies think! You were a delight as a child and I'll bet you always will be.

A true friend forever,
Daddy [Your father's name]!

You feel... nothing as you read the words. And that spurs a rush of relief. As you refold the letter some other emotions begin to trickle down. A little bit of grief over the fact that he never understood you, and clearly did not want to - no matter what he thought he wanted. A little bit of thankfulness surfaces - that he stayed out of your life when you would have let him in. A bit of wonder for if the drugs forced him into what seems to you like an oddly surface and childlike response to what you wrote... but in all honesty deep down the main idea running through the back of your mind while you read was: BULLSHIT. Every line felt like one a salesman would tell you as he tried to convince you that his snake oil was different - it would finally do what you had been promised all the others would do. You begin to refold the letter, placing it back behind the label, in the glittery envelope with a stamp that will never be used. As you walk into the room where you keep your important papers and mementos in a filing cabinet, you ponder just where to put this one. You don't want to put it with the cards you get - you like to look at those when you have a bad week. As you open the file drawer you decide to just put it in a blank folder in the back behind the other memento folders. Once that's done, you head back into the rest of your little apartment - back to your life.

***

When I was 14, I wrote my father a very deeply thought out letter, that I drafted over and over. I labored over it longer and with more thought and care than I have any paper I've written up until my thesis. It did begin with me saying I felt that the title Daddy needed to be earned. He spat on that idea twice in this letter. I knew that might hurt his feelings... but I can't say I cared then or do now. I was only interested in getting to know someone who would accept the truth of my life without him, and choose to overcome it or start fresh. This man took all of my mother's money and all of their things in the divorce (he was quite the charmer from everything I hear... silver-tongued, charismatic, etc.), he even went back and took the money given to the funeral home so my baby brother would have a headstone. I understand that was an addiction thing... but I honestly don't care. He chose to try a drug known to be that addictive - heroin. He was clearly dumber than I am. He never paid child support - not once in my entire life. I have lived in someone's garage before, suffered verbal and emotional abuse at the hands of family members we've been forced to live with (not talking about my mother - she's a different story and she never abandoned me). There were times we only had donated food to eat, and donated clothes to wear, and donated roofs over our heads, but we had them and we had one another. I had a stress related ulcer in the 3rd grade. He made sure the one thing he did have when he killed himself (which I strongly believe is the coward's way out... it's much harder to live than to die) - a house my mother paid for - went to his mother and my aunt. I didn't want it - but it was sneakily done to make sure his only living child would get nothing from him.

I know that he got photos of me, I saw them when I was in the Ganty House. So... he also lied... or he was such a ruin of a person from the years of hard living and substance abuse that he didn't even know. From the sounds of things he was really only clean when he was in prison - though I can't be sure of that. My only real information source about him are his mother and sister... and his mother regularly crafts her reality out of smoke and mirrors (she blamed my father not being in my life on my mother... there's not a thimble of truth in that). My aunt I just don't know well enough to know.... but she went along with the stories my grandmother told the two times I spent any time with her.... and well, I'm not one who likes to deal with that. If my life taught me one thing - it's that trust must be earned. Liars don't tend to do very well at that one - no matter how well meaning the lie is... I have no desire to embrace a false reality and won't put up with one just to humor them either.

I don't blame him for anything negative that has happened in my life, and I am extremely grateful for the experiences that I have had (now that they're in the past)... but once upon a time there was a creative imaginative little girl who truly believed she was lovable. Who never had a shadow of a doubt about it - and he killed her... he killed her every time she tried to come back to life. He ruined my belief that anyone can provide me with security, that anyone will ever actually love me above others - like I would like to do for someone else someday. Combine him with my mother - and I am not sure I can ever believe in relying on someone else. It's sad in a lot of ways.

The final part of all this is that my aunt got my mother's e-mail hoping to get my e-mail from her later. But she hasn't used it. I told my mom if she asked to talk to me, I'd be happy to talk to her. I'm not trying to make them work to get to know me... I'm just looking for proof that they're not using me to make themselves feel better. That entire family seems to be all talk. My aunt has reached out twice... but even when she does it always feels like they want something. They wanted me to come to the funeral... why? To remind me that they have a fantasy of my life? To give me the blanket my father had on his lap when he shot himself in the chest, what was the purpose of that? To parade me in front of all his friends and family who never knew me? To make me wander the house I was born into, where my room still looked the same and my mother's handwriting was still on the walls in the laundry room.... why?? What was the point?

THIS is why children are so important to me. I've been the eternally unwanted. That sounds so dramatic, but it's pretty true. I kept looking for a good male figure as I grew up... I don't know if that was instinct, reaction to my mom's sometimes abusive ways, or what. I wish I had found one.
- The man my mother was with that raised me (he had a huge impact on me and was always the man who was my mental father)... eventually left her, but not me for a while... but then he also left me, because his new girlfriend didn't like me.
- After that she eventually married my stepfather. He and I hated one another.... openly. He openly disliked me. Very pleasant 5 years of my life there. His 3 kids moved in, I got to share my mother and my home with them, and the man hated me. I gave as good as I got.... but he was a nasty loud fighter. When he and my mother would fight I would sneak out or hide. I can't say he did anything good for my ideas of men.
- My grandfather verbally and emotionally abused me when we lived with him to the point that it was years before we could talk again. I watched him physically assault my mother. He took everything we had including our current home, and he made sure we lost everything we had in storage when he left too- bye bye childhood. That was the 2nd time I had to give away my pet because we lost our home too - because of him.
- I've had not 1 but 2 pastors turn on me. I trusted my youth pastors, I was a girl in trouble looking for guidance who was too serious for her peers. One ended up being a wonderful figure in my life for a while.... then he began to embezzle money.... and things got weird both with me and in the church. The other did much the same thing. He used me as a poster child to bring people into the church, tried to convince me my 'gift' was hands-on healing (I was a praise singer) and then when one of the older boys tried to molest me at a function and I told him about it - he told me to stop being so welcoming of attention.
- There are lesser incidents, many actually, but yeah. It's all a pattern. A bit of a sad messy history. And all through it there were moments where I saw real dads around me, and wanted, but it's just not something I'll ever have.

Reading this letter made me feel so much better in a way though - I didn't short him by not trying harder. In fact, I probably saved myself from just being more disappointed and crushed than I ever was before.

Double ewe tee eff.

My mother didn't bother to send me the letter until Saturday - and then she sent it regular mail. How nice. So I'll just continue waiting....

Isn't it nice when people in your life remind you that what matters to you doesn't make much difference to them? /sarcasm

(I'm not as bitter as this reads, I've known for years how I am not a high priority for her... she is, then her boyfriend, then me. At least I'm in the top 3 right? This does play into why I'm not super interested in having my own children though - if I ever do even adopt or foster I want to be sure I can give them as much of myself as they deserve. I mean, I matter to her... but it's in a distant way. She takes care of me some monetarily - now anyway - and does what she thinks she should - but all I really ever wanted was love, consideration, and emotional support. Those are the hardest things for me to get, and always have been.)

The Mistress of Diversion.

I've let E back into my life just a little bit, and I realized today that it's because I have total control over him and I. For every action there's a reaction. That's me. That's what all these long, rambling, overfull, over-sharing blogs have been about this week. I am overthinking what I can/cannot do in the only situations I have any control over at the moment. The blathering is to keep me from thinking about all the waiting and uncertainty that plagues my existence this week. I'm about to go edit and clean up those posts a bit - if you read them, wow, I hope they didn't annoy you as much as they're annoying me right now.

I'm feeling extremely STUCK and I can't get into my work. Hence the daily visits around here, and the purging of just about anything that's bugging me. Waiting does not suit me. Waiting for results. Waiting for a letter from my father who abandoned me - from beyond the grave. Waiting to find out what in the hell I am doing for Spring Break - and deciding I definitely will not be able to see Sasha like she and I had dreamed about recently once upon some IM's (damn it all to motherfucking hell). Waiting to feel like having sex again, since I got some gorgeous sexy things for myself with a gift card, finally got them in the mail, and wham haven't felt like wearing them... Waiting for my boyfriend to leave for 3+ weeks to go on an amazing adventure I'm jealous of -to work on tiger conservation in India (which I am more passionate about than he is)-, haha, right when I just might be willing to lean on someone. Granted I probably only feel like I'd be ready to because I know he won't be here for me to lean on.

In some ways, I miss being a bottler. I feel like it would be so comfortable to be in complete control of every minute of my feelings... For most of my life I was like many others and I took everything and smashed it up small and bottled it. Then for good measure I threw it behind an internal cellar door and locked it all up tight with several locks. I was nicknamed the Ice Queen in high school. I was a virtual unknown to most people who knew me for a lot of my life, by my choice. It was safer....

Then I painted for the first time (college). I also had my first serious relationship developing. I learned that maybe someday someone will actually really love me, for me, unconditionally (besides the kitties of course). Somewhere in my 2 years getting my art degree I broke the habit of bottling. I still do it some, but not nearly so much. It feels healthier to me (I am in NO WAY condemning those who do so, whatever works for everyone is fine with me), and while it can be inconvenient to feel things on a regular basis.... I usually revel in the honesty. I like emotions. I sort of think my rebounds after my breakup with A (my first real boyfriend) had a lot more to do with exploring allowing myself to feel deeply than anything else, my sexuality emerging was just a part of that. I think I only want to be a bottler again today because I'm feeling forced into numbness against my own choice. I do think it speaks to the improved state my life is in (funny how that happened once it was primarily in my control not my mother's) that now I can afford to feel 90% of the time.

Today I need to do some schoolwork, but I think I'm going to take a mental health day from it. I'm going to paint some furniture, work on a canvas I've been pondering working on for a long time, watch some really dumb movies, and eventually go bowling. I'm only going to do the one assignment that is due tomorrow. I'm also going to clean the house and use that time to think. All in all, that should be a prescription for some mental balance.

The Sky is Falling!

Have you ever met a Chicken Little? Do you even know what I'm talking about? When I was a little girl, I was a voracious reader. I knew how to read by the time I was 3, and was reading upside down to my class in Kindergarten just to keep me occupied. My teachers said it was the only time I wasn't a handful. They wanted to skip me straight to third grade... I was just too far ahead to be engaged in class, but I was so physically small... and already had loner tendencies (I related to adults, not children) with my social group - so my mother wouldn't allow it. I hated reading books on my level, but every once in a while one would get to me. One story that did was the story of Chicken Little. (I swear all of this will come together eventually.) There's a pretty good entry on Wikipedia about this story too, I read it as one of the fables. Here's an excerpt from the wiki:

There are many versions of the story, but the basic premise is that a chicken eats lunch one day, and believes the sky is falling down because an acorn falls on her head. She decides to tell the King, and on her journey meets other animals who join her in the quest. In most retellings, the animals all have rhyming names such as Henny Penny, Cocky Lockey and Goosey Loosey. Finally, they come across Foxy Loxy, a fox who offers the chicken and her friends his help.

After this point, there are many endings. In the most famous one, Foxy Loxy eats the chicken's friends, but the last one, usually Cocky Lockey, survives long enough to warn the chicken and she escapes. Other endings include Foxy eating them all; the characters being saved by a squirrel or an owl and getting to speak to the King; the characters being saved by the King's hunting dogs; even one version in which the sky actually falls and kills Foxy Loxy.

Depending on the version, the moral changes. In the "happy ending" version, the moral is not to be a "Chicken", but to have courage. In other versions the moral is usually interpreted to mean "do not believe everything you are told". In the latter case, it could well be a cautionary political tale: The Chicken jumps to a conclusion and whips the populace into mass hysteria, which the unscrupulous fox uses to manipulate them for his own benefit, some times as supper.

In my office there is a girl who you've read me complaining about much too many times before. Officechick E, who should have always been referred to as Chicken Little. Her sky is ALWAYS falling, and she constantly wishes to get all of those around her to believe along with her and join in her hysteria. The self centeredness is palpable when she enters a room. She's someone who reminds me anytime she's around that she's just waiting for her turn to speak 95% of her life. (And makes me revow to not be like that! In this way, it's nice having her around.)

I've vented to others when I need to, written some e-mails I never intended to send to ward off any sniping I might have done, explained to Favorite Officemate what the deal was and cleaned up any ugliness with a minimum of fuss and bother. My feathers haven't appeared ruffled once. However, while I think superficially this resembles taking the high road.... I'm just allowing it to draw out because it gives me somewhere else to look and something I technically control (because it's unfinished business) and I'm using the situation to distract myself from much more important things in my life. I'm also in violation of my own resolution to Be True. I will address this with her, tomorrow, in a casual friendly way - face to face. That's the real high road in this situation - the moral of courage.

Waking up.

I wrote this on january 24th... and didn't post it because I wanted to find a better headspace about this.... and I may have, finally. I wanted to post it now to get it out and to work through it further, and so my rebuttal to these feelings will stand out in appropriate contrast once I get it nailed down.

Sometimes I wake up feeling lost in the realms I walked the night before, as if they're superimposed over the real world. For me those dark halls between wakings last night were places of pain, of darkness, of regret... places from a time past. I still seek resolution from unfinished business. Dealing with one of my friendships (Frances) that has spanned that time and this newer time in my life is part of what has brought it all back to the forefront. So has Facebook, oh good old Facebook. Knowing that one of my remaining friends is taking a trip to Providence - and that trip that I took 4 years or so ago to Providence was ... well... providential. Not in a good way though. My first serious boyfriend (7 years) is now married. My first female experience (who I was so infatuated with it didn't even make sense) is also now married. It's odd how you find these things out, and how they feel like they shouldn't matter, and yet the knowledge seems to play peek-a-boo at the most random moments.

I mean... everyone goes through their own private hells. I thought when I was younger that it must have been my childhood which would always stand out as my hell. My father's drug addiction and brother's death left an initial stain, my mother's rages, the repeated abandonment and betrayal and verbal/emotional abuse from all parental figures in my life, the almost sexual abuse from within my church and the subsequent dismissal of it by my pastor leading to my subsequent break with Christianity -which had previously been my lifeline-, deaths of friends, my own self-imposed isolation due to trust issues, but.... no.

What ended up being my own true hell was when I had to learn who I had been denying I was for years. When I recognized my sexuality for what it was and realized who I assumed would be the love of my life couldn't accept that part of me was the first hint of the brokenness to come. I shattered us. Walked away. That was the easy part.

Before that the only real thing I regret is saying something horribly unfeeling to my family after a member of it passed away in a horrible accident. I learned then that while I may choose to laugh to relieve pain, others don't always want to do that and it's not the right thing to share sometimes.

Then I had my first sexual fling with a guy, my first experience with a woman, and fell for someone new. After that is where I really have my first deep regrets.

After that though... there's a list. A painful list I don't think I can ever atone for. A list I never saw myself having. It's funny that I woke up this morning feeling those old, deep wounds aching as if they were just inflicted last week. So I came here...to my reader and then to my blog. And in my reader I found some wisdom.

I.. I can't say sorry... Because I know sorry isn't enough...
But I can say thank you.
Thank you for showing me who I really am.
Thank you for showing me that light in my life.
I'm ready to change now. For the better.
Thank you.
- Paraphrased from Sunny on So How Was Your Day?

That's all there is from those times for me to do, and I have. I have changed so much since then. I know things now about myself and know what to watch out for to make sure I never become that insane, unhappy, jealous person I remember (with horror) being. Sure, circumstances helped to push me to be that way, but I can't believe I didn't find some other alternative to the things I did and ways I acted. It's not like I want those friendships or my old relationship back, because I don't believe they were good for me at all, or that I was good for them... but I also don't want to be a stain on anyone's life. I don't want to be that ugly memory, and if I am for me I can't even imagine what I am for others. My biggest hope is that by now, years later, I just don't matter at all anymore. That time will wear my memory away for them, but not for me. Not for me. I have to remember to make sure I am NEVER like that again.

There are still things I could work on... but I don't always know how. What I console myself with is that I try, and for now I guess that has to be enough.

What it is, and what it isn't...

I'm aware that no relationship is effortless. I never expect them to be... especially with me involved. I have trust issues, commitment issues, and can be demanding (since I'm demanding of me I expect a lot of someone else too)... I'm also snarky which sometimes just means I'm a right bitch. However, knowing these things about myself actually seems to have made me much too accommodating in my relationships. I accept much too little for much too long. Still, how do you know when it's time to throw in the towel? And how do you do it gracefully? How do you know when you're sticking for the right reasons??

One of my current concerns with SP is that he is much more emotional than he knows how to articulate - or even wants to articulate. He's been in 6 or 7 serious relationships by the age of 27. He's never broken up with anyone. They've all broken up with him for one reason or another but usually because they 'wanted something else'. Which is exactly what I am and have been feeling with him. I want more. Is he capable of more? He doesn't seem to want it at all. I am still not sure he knows me very well, after over a year now, and it seems like if he wanted to... he would. I'm not that hard to get to know once I choose to open up, and I have. I'm to the point where I am boring myself when I talk about all of this, I can't even imagine how Anne feels, she's the only one I really talk to about him. It feels like the same conversation, over and over and over and over again. I hope it's not and it just feels like it. I just wonder if he's capable of love the way I want it. His family example certainly wasn't very good.

It's not the way we fight, because we don't really.
It's not that he doesn't hold me, because he does.
It's not that he's a bad person, because he's a great person.
It's not so many things that I could point to and go AH there's a reason to leave... but it's the lack of other things I can't even always put my finger on.

That lack of specificity makes me doubt myself, doubt that I can EVER be satisfied and happy. I've never been broken up with, it's always me that does the breaking. So I have no proof I can ever be happy at all. I'm not built for much contentment somehow, I'm a striver, a bit of a restless spirit. I always want more, better, or just something else. Yet I crave security and steady support and understanding deep inside.

I want someone, anyone, to love me unconditionally, someday... So far no one's been able to, often including myself. Except my darling kitties, the furry loves of my life. And THAT is why every guy I've ever been with has been jealous of them, I'd bet a million on it.

And with that, I finally feel a little purged. A little cleaner mentally. Maybe now I can get some sleep and get back to my thesis with a clean slate in the morning.

I want to write...

but today there are few coherent words to be said. I'm not sure exactly where the pain is yet, but it's there. I'm searching for the source. I'm hoping to find it and root it out and remove it. Maybe it's just the down on the coaster, it's been a while since I experienced one so profound... but this feels like one. 3:20 am and I have gone to bed and come back to the computer due to my inability to silence my mind? Possible.

Is it my relationship? Possible. I'm afraid I may be giving myself and someone else a broken heart for Christmas. Something's got to give, I've been settling for so long and I should know better. If something won't give, well... best not to make my plans yet. Or alone when they affect someone else. I don't want another non-civil break-up, but that's not a real reason to stay with someone is it? I genuinely LIKE SP, but... oh but, I'm in no way in love with him. He doesn't make room for me in his life. I know the things I really want... and I want a little space, because I like to make space for someone else within me. IF I'm going to commit to someone then I want: Support, trust, sex, love, understanding, creativity, and humor. Not sure what order I want them in, I just want them all in some form or fashion. I feel like we're missing a few of those, and that's just sad. I do my best to give those things, why is it so hard to get them? I sometimes wish I wasn't attracted to these independent men who don't know themselves at all.

Is it my distancing from my friends? Also very possible, though it still seems like the right idea for now.

Is it the impending holiday 'vacations'? Also also wik. They've gotten so much better in the last few years, but not enough that my impending sense of possible doom is alleviated. Especially this year with the SP trip tacked on and the quality of things between us lately.

Is it the continuing weirdness of just being me in my grad program? Continually possible, but the real fear there is that it's ME causing what could be a non-issue to be an issue. That my perceptions of myself as the outgroup are making me into the outgroup. Though even I doubt I'm THAT neurotic, it's possible. (At least this is a more distant fear thanks to the current break in classes.)

Sometimes I have so many fears that the barrier to changing myself and overcoming them seems insurmountable. Lately in the top tier has been knowing that I've learned so late what it really means to be a good friend - and praying I've really finally learned that lesson well. My childhood was one of... well. It taught me not to trust, to lie, to hide, that no one is safe... that loyalty only exists in the movies. That anyone truly caring for, supporting, and trying to understand someone else is impossible. I have proven that's not the case finally in my own relationships. Now I just need to believe others can do it, besides myself and Anne. She's my one true friend, my soulmate without the angst and heartache. I'd probably be in an institution without her.

I'll be back, and Dear Sir simmers in my mind but for now I can't focus to force it to make a coherent shape. Soon hopefully.

My Post(ed) Secrets

Right now they would be as follows....

I'm scared that grad school is making me someone I don't want to be. Though I hope it's giving me the tools to be who I always wanted to be...

I'm scared the economic crisis is going to force me and my kitties to move, force me to find another way to live my already frugal life.....
I've been homeless before, I vowed that once my life was under my control I wouldn't have to be ever again. I know it won't come to that this time... but... it's getting scary.

I am the first in my family to ever be educationally ambitious, and I'm scared it'll all come to nothing when I finally get out of school. That I put the other experiences and life I could have had on hold for this dream... only to have it be just that... a dream that fulfills nothing I believed it would.

Some of this is just the pain and agony of finals week talking, mixed with my finally getting a touch of the myriad of illnesses that pass through college campuses. I'll be officially done with my classwork Wednesday night, then after that it's Thesis specific time. Some of it is worse than that. It's the fact that it's time to start deciding what I want to DO with this degree, be a consultant or a professor.... and knowing that my school and my department are suffering now. My summer funding is gone. All of our summer funding is gone. My normal funding remains... but this added uncertainty and now pressing need to find some kind of future-enhancing employment for myself over the summer is just more than I needed right now. I've already spent too much money on Christmas, of course (I just LOVE buying presents, I can't help it!), and now I'm scared of what my future holds in the next 6 months. Not to mention the next 3 years.

These are my deepest fears, and I know they're likely mostly unfounded. Now that they're out I'm hoping to get back to my work, get it done, and get on with solving my problems. Here goes nothing....

Heroism

Have you ever done something heroic?? I imagine that surprisingly... we all have... in our own way. We may not know it, but we probably did. (The point of this is NOT to toot my own horn per se, but just reminding myself that some things are extremely hard for me personally to do. They are hard for anyone to do. We should all recognize when we do these amazingly hard things.)

I've loved with everything I had, whether someone deserved it or not. I've loved enough to leave and take that burden of pain for both of us, so that they might become who they said they wanted to be.

I've run across a deck and then jumped into a pool fully clothed when a child's waist float tipped over, holding her head under water, her little legs flailing in the air. I got the water out of her lungs, and took her over to the trampoline to help her calm down, and then just held her for a while. Her father was standing right next to the pool the entire time. When he saw her flipped over in the water, he didn't move a muscle. Neither did any one of the other parents or adults at the party. I think I knew that day I would have to leave them both, no matter how much I loved her.

I've forgiven those who asked me to, every single one of them. I've also forgiven almost all of those who haven't asked, and the hardest thing of all is that occasionally I've managed to forgive myself for mistakes I've made.

Perhaps it's just that you choose life. That you choose to live despite pain, despite confusion about what living means to you, despite whatever it is that you face.

Today, I'm here. Working HARD to achieve the goals I set for myself, even though I had no real understanding of what they entailed at the time. I don't give up. Despite knowing that I have so many unexplored passions, I try to fulfill those while still completing the path I am already on. That's just how I feel I have to live my life. There are other things I could mention, but really I just wonder what I will do from here....

"It never occurred to me before today that perhaps I felt invisible because I was acting that way. I wish someone had said something. Then again, if they had I probably wouldn't have believed them." - Kat

GRRR.

Things have been better lately in general with my boyfriendtypeperson, SP. However, we're on different pages when it comes to how we deal with stress. I want sex, all the time. When I get stressed I want it to be harder - more mind destroying - and I want it more. That could be translated to more often or just more mind blowing. It's on my mind constantly. Masturbation is still nice, but it isn't the same. I can still think when I do that, I need sex when I'm this stressed.

Him? Not so much. He'd likely choose not at all when he's stressed. He'd choose TV first. A movie. Going out with friends. Getting too drunk when he does go out to really want to have sex later. Seriously, who doesn't pause a movie if their girlfriend gets horny during it? My boyfriendtypeperson doesn't.

And I don't know how to deal with it, I've gone through this before with him. It gets old coming onto someone to no effect, or feeling like I have to talk him into it. It gets old only getting sex when I pursue. It gets old FAST too, three days of this and I'm getting angry and wishing I had an open relationship. Lately it seems like the only guarantee is if I wear something intentionally provocative (and not just a sexy outfit but a costume or explicit lingerie or an apron with nothing but tall socks, you get the idea). Even if he is the aggressor when I am wearing that, I still did the work of being provocative, and while it's FUN work, it is work sometimes. The whole thing gives me some small twinges of occasional feelings of being a 'bad' kind of dirty pervy person, just like I would feel anytime I was trying to seduce someone who seems unwilling. That's not ok with me. Consent, consent, consent.

My inner two year old is pissed off. She's being denied what she wants and she wants to stomp her foot and say, "I am not seeing you again unless you guarantee me what I want." That doesn't seem very productive though, or fair, or like an adult reaction in an adult relationship. My inner two year doesn't care.

I have said how I am. I have said what I want. I have said it many times. I have tried being more aggressive, it works when I wear the clothes, it doesn't seem to work when I don't. That makes me wonder if he doesn't have sex with me because he has to or it would be very rude, when I clearly put that on the agenda with the outfit. I've asked if that's true, he laughed at me but didn't really answer.

This crucial difference in style is one of the ways I don't feel we are compatible. I don't want to date someone hornier than I am, because I would hate to be turning them down all the time. So in reverse, I don't understand how this is for him, and he doesn't tell me, even if I ask. Holy hell, am I - ME - dating a prude?! How could I let this happen???

This frustration is why I've had so much time to be here lately, which is nice, but sad.

Loom

A long time ago, when I had a stepfather, in the brief period in my history (4-5 years) where I had siblings, I played a certain computer game. Well, ok, so I played a lot of them and the first one was Wolfenstein 3D, one of the next was Richard Scary's BusyTown with my little siblings, but the one that made the stronger impression was Loom. I finally completed the game (I say completed because it was a story style rpg, not a game you 'beat' in my opinion, you just find the story's ending eventually) years and years later once I no longer had siblings after I rediscovered it in a box.

The premise of the story was that life is a weaving. There's a pattern to it that you weave, you can break the pattern, you can change the plan, and you can also look to the tapestries of your life to see the patterns of your past.

It's the patterns of the past that concern me. I have a history of having wonderful beautiful special children come into my life, both of us being important to one another.... and then something coming into play that keeps me from being a part of their lives any more. I personally prefer boys, and yet all of these children who have meant the world to me have been girls. I miss them all. Now I find that I wear armor where children are concerned, partly because I hate that I could not stay a large part of these children's lives as they grew up (partly because parents today don't know the meaning of control, :D). I was abandoned repeatedly from 2 on, in very significant and painful ways. It destroys me that I have been forced by circumstance, and in some cases been forced to choose, to not be a part of these children's lives.

Patterns freak me out in some ways in general, simply because they imply an underlying order to either life or my thinking or the choices I've made that led me to something that happens.... larger order or deep underlying things that I don't see in my day to day decision making process. Have I led myself to abandon these children? Have I led myself to be the one doing the abandoning (I've never been broken up with, etc.) because I can't stand the idea of being the one abandoned again?

I don't honestly know.

It's 3:48 am, do you know where your brain is?

A professor is someone who talk's in someone else's sleep.---Wystan Auden

I can't sleep. Of course. This hasn't happened to me in a while...lately it's just been trouble staying asleep, bouts of sleepiness every afternoon, sometimes inadvertent naps, weekly at minimum bouts of sleep paralysis and hallucinations....nothing unusual. This is unusual. I just reread my last two posts, and the one I wrote to publish later... and they anger me. My thoughts are a jumbled mess. I'm going to use this wakefulness to try to edit them. :( Orgasming myself to sleep didn't work either. I see a serious crash in my future, I just hope it's at a time I didn't have something planned and didn't need to be at school or something.

Sunday Speculation: The nearly broken children

Here's a message from postsecret that really touched me:

-----Email Message-----
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2007 9:16 PM

Frank,

I saw you speak this week at UK. You said "the children the world almost break become the adults who save it". That is my secret. Thank you for giving it voice. I did not break. I did survive and now I am a therapist working with the most disturbed, most abused, but the most incredible children. I believe they can all be saved. I believe they are all worth saving. I am trying one at a time.

My therapist wants me to work through some family issues, in order to better understand myself, some patterns in my life, and to make it easier for me to get to the place I want to be. I want to be someone who is honest and who honesty comes easily to, with myself, with others. Who is herself, deeply, and is happily that way. Happiness and positivity breed the same, and I want to be someone who sows happy in the world. I want to poop rainbows.

Engrish: I rack disciprine

Whew, it seems like my system may be clear from the antidepressant. I'm so relieved!! I have gotten 3 amazon orders since I started taking it. I didn't remember ordering all of these things either, I remember the family book because my therapist wanted me to order it, but the rest? Apparently, in my state (probably when I was so upset) I decided to order a psychological book on understanding men and relationships with them, one on what to do once you fall in love (not sure I'm 'in love'), one on female orgasm (not something I have an issue with), a new vibrator and an attachment for it - keeping that! - , a book on sexual positions - also keeping, Ride 'Em Cowgirl and it's awesome! -, one on happiness, and finally one on family issues. At least I still picked books by doctors and professionals with credentials.... but can I claim temporary insanity to send them back? There is one I would likely keep, just because it was a good compilation of findings in research literature and therapy on the subject.... but the rest? Haha, I wonder how I can say: I was on an antidepressant that made me horribly depressed, I don't need these now, thanks. This does explain why I had read all these odd book reviews and made posts about them too. That's weird, and I didn't fully remember writing them. Creepy!

Sadly, even though I would love to blame everything on taking this medication there were some definite grains of personal truth in what has been going on with me while I was on it this past week. What is nice to know is, as soon as I have a few hours of 'normal' sleep where I actually make it into the REM cycle and Stage 3 & 4 sleep, I am ME again. I'm ok. I'm bright, witty, optimistic, confident, love what I do, all those things that I always thought made me ME. Unfortunately, I think this downward spiral of the last two years has had some lasting negative effects. My self esteem and trust in my own ambition and ability to do what I want to do have taken a serious hit. My self discipline has eroded as well. I can't see how all of this would not affect my relationship too. It's not him, it's me. And unfortunately, after having problems for so long, it's not sleep deprivation, it's me. I might find after a few weeks on the right medication that this isn't true, but I'm pretty sure it is. Here's to going after fixing things either way, being proactive in my own health, and loving being alive again.

I talked to SP about the medication last night, it was nice because he laughed it off a bit and said he was definitely glad I figured it out and wasn't it nice that he hadn't stopped calling even if I was crazy? Which underscored the fact that he clearly wants more of a friendship+relationship with me and for me to trust him with things. I've kept myself from him for so long he had no clue that WASN'T normal me, which is kind of sad. After the lackluster morning after our post my breakdown talk sex which left medicated me completely convinced he was cheating on me, we had a reunion of sorts as well. The med also threw my body out of whack, but hey, there are plenty of things you can still do, and we did, lots of them. It was hot, very hot. It helped stop some of my brain's little voices about my body not being good enough right now too. I hate when I need my relationship to make me feel healthier though. Not cool with me.

So I'm still going to keep seeing the therapist about rebuilding my self-esteem and self-trust. I remember how it felt to have my entire life in my control, and it was good. I'm excited to get back there.