:)

The World Needs More Love Letters

That is all...

Happy Thanksgiving!

Today I am thankful to be alive and loved.  And for my fluffy cat.  :)

Reasons to not be dating right now

1. Lack of trust.  I don't trust anybody new right now.  I used to operate under a pretty broad level 1 clearance with new people.  I've always said I'm generally an open book.  I'd talk frankly about my divorce, my sex life, my wacky stories about camping in flooded creek beds & being pulled over by the Secret Service, my opinions on health care, politicians, organized religion, etc.  Right now?  I doubt I'd even tell a new person my cat's name.

2. Safety.  I think this is subtitled to 'Lack of trust.'  I just don't feel as safe as I used to around new people.  It's one of those "I've been burned horribly, I'm not going near anything that seems warm" type things.  I feel like I'm going to get hurt by anyone I don't already know and trust.

3. Still on the emotional roller coaster from break-up with S.  I think I thought I was close to getting off a month ago but when my dad died, I really realized I'm not even half way back to the exit.  Like I mentioned before, I know I have issues with "just fun, don't love me and I won't love you" (aka commitment-phobia).  I need to work on that.  Cause it's not really fair to another person for me to go out with them and then immediately put the brakes on if anything seems like it could turn into *gasp, the horrors!* a relationship.

These are all completely different issues from those I dealt with after the divorce.  The divorce involved more "stuff" (money, child custody, etc) plus some emotional turmoil.  Most of that came from my identity at the time being a married stay at home mom and now what?  I did feel betrayed, I gave up this for the promise of that and now I'm down two strikes.  It was a lot to work through but  I did.  After the divorce, I felt whole enough to be open to dating and possibly relationships.

Right now?  I feel very very broken.  S had all the security level clearances in my life, past what my ex-husband ever had.  And now I don't feel safe, I don't trust anyone, and I hate dealing with the emotional quagmire I'm in.

I miss a lot of the good stuff that goes into being in a relationship.  The 'good morning, my love' texts.  Hugs.  A shoulder rub after a long day.  Being in the presence of someone I love and who accepts me for me.  Looking someone in the eye and trusting that they have my back through thick and thin and them knowing that I'd do move the earth, moon, and stars if it would make them happy.

I want to get back to being mostly whole so that I could possibly go out and look for that again.  I've always been an impatient person and so the fact that this type of healing takes time adds to the "crap, I need to deal with emotions, ugh!" issue.  I just feel so very fundamentally broken, since trust and safety are the most basic human needs, that sometimes I worry it's not even possible.

I don't know.  I'm working on it.

My Dad died Friday

I wish I had never had to type those words.  I doubt I would have ever been 'ready'  to let him go.  He was only 59 years old, it was way too soon.  Coroner's report (I took the phone call so my mom wouldn't have to) was enlarged heart (undiagnosed), it just stopped.  No signs of heart disease or a heart attack. I guess they are right when they say our hearts only have so many beats in them.  He had reached the end of his.

The viewing is tonight, the funeral tomorrow.  I have clothes for the kids and me, hotel reserved, food for the family to eat at the viewing, HR & manager at new job informed, all those other random loose ends tied up that mean I can ignore my normal world for 2 days.

(In case you didn't know, I get very tasky 'must check off To Do list' when I'm stressed.)

I hate crying, I hate missing him, I hate thinking about all the stuff we were going to do together and can't now.

Most of all I don't like knowing that I'll never get another blog comment that ends with "Love, Dad".

On being a Special Snowflake and relationships

So I'm really trying to avoid being a Special Snowflake with my self contemplation on the blog because those type of people are extremely annoying.  I'd like to think I can find the balance between "I'm so awesome, look what I did, let's talk about me, me, me!" and the other cynical side of "life is meaningless, who gives a f*ck about anything ever, the world sucks."  I know my small insignificant problems don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world but there's probably a little room for me to do some belly button gazing occasionally.

I remember years ago some random troll posted a comment on my Ramblings of a SAHM mom site about something kinda special snowflake I had written.  Honestly it didn't bother me, obviously because I don't even remember what the comment was now.  The troll was just being a troll and trying to stir up controversy.  That's what they do.  But my best friend got all up in arms on my behalf and it was kind of amusing to watch them duke it out in the comments.  And then I went back to playing Mom Taxi or scrapbooking or something and forgot all about it.

The reason the troll's comment didn't bother me because it wasn't something that was even remotely true about me in my opinion.  Like you could call me a 'slug licking scrawny green mermaid' and I'd be like "uh, okay" and easily move on.  Because I'm not any of those things so the whole thing is silly and I could care less.

On the flip side, I've learned that if someone says something about me that I immediately strongly disagree with, I need to examine this a bit more closely.  Cause there's usually a glimmer of truth in it and it's probably something I don't like about myself.

During the last few months, I was forced to take a hard look at myself and how I approach relationships.  A lot of stuff was said and while some ideas I threw out pretty quick because it was blatantly obvious projection  (after 4 years of psych classes, you aren't going to pull any Freudian moves over on me), a few items have stuck with me.

One of the things that has been the hardest to comes to terms with about myself is that I'm really scared of romantic love and commitment.  But you were with S for 2.5 years, you say!  Yeah but he's just as scared of romantic love and commitment as I am.  If you put two of those type of people together, it kinda sorta works for awhile.  If I'm avoiding falling in love and also avoiding someone else falling in love with me and he's doing the same, we have an unconscious 'not falling in love and avoid being loved by others' requirement in common.   And that's a pretty strong trait that can bring two people together as oxymoron-ish as that sounds.

Of course we did fall in love anyways and into some sort of commitment that mostly worked for us most of the time.  It was like that poem about the little girl with a curl in the middle of her forehead:  When she was good, she was very very good.  When she was bad, she was horrid. When we were good, it was the most amazing time I've ever had in my life.  When we were bad, it was horrid.  And then some.

I'm not going to go into our fights here but on my end going forward, I'm going to try to learn some better "this isn't going well, let's figure this out" skills.  My usual MO is either ignore the problem (I do kinda like denial, it's one of my bigger character flaws) or attempt to hit a 'relationship reset button'  (which also has an element of 'ignore' built in).  Secondly I'm going to try to not be so extreme with "okay don't love me and I won't love you and let's just have fun!" in new relationships.  But I'd like to delve into the second point deeper in another blog post mostly because today's dating world is so full of amusing advice to discuss and dissect.

Naval gazing done for another day.  :)

Some Quotes

Subtitled: I probably think too much

It amuses me that you can always find a quote that fits your current attitude. And then find one that means the complete opposite of it. Like ‘Love means never giving up’ and then there’s the opposite, something like ‘Giving up doesn’t always mean you are weak, sometimes it means you are strong enough to let go.’

Okay so I have to pick between love and being strong? I can’t do both?

Recently I’ve felt myself turned upside down and inside out and I don’t know which way I’m heading anymore. There are three things that I know for sure right now:

I love him. I’m hurt. I have no fucking idea where to go from here.

So being the literary nerd that I am, I went searching for some answers. These quotes speak to me. And aren’t too conflicting with each other.

• Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. (Course no one ever said I was sane in the first place.)
  
  
• Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime and falling into at night, I miss you like hell. –Edna St. Vincent Millary (I identify VERY strongly with this one right now. During the day, I’m mostly okay. But then I dream about him and us all night long. Thanks, stupid subconscious…)
  
  
• Every man needs a woman when his life is a mess. Because just like in a game of chess, the Queen protects the King.
  
  
• Everything happens for a reason. But sometimes the reason is you’re stupid and you make bad decisions. (I know this is true about me occasionally. I’m working on it.)
  
  
• I swear to you, there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell. –Walt Whitman
  
  
• As soon as I saw you, I knew an adventure was going to happen. -Winnie the Pooh
  
  
• Truth is, everybody is going to hurt you; you just gotta find the ones worth suffering for. –Bob Marley
  
  
• Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worse kind of suffering. –Paulo Coelho
  
  
• Love me when I least deserve it because that is when I really need it. –Swedish Proverb
  
  
• Everyone says that love hurts, but that’s not true. Loneliness hurts. Rejection hurts. Losing someone hurts. Everyone confuses these things with love, but in reality, LOVE is the only thing in this world that covers up all the pain and makes us feel wonderful again.
  

I want to feel wonderful again.