stop pushing people away

I’m having a real hard time coping right now and in situations like this I have a tendency to withdraw into myself. I want to be left alone to figure things out and when/if I get better I’ll come back out to play.

Earlier this month I cancelled meeting up with my former co-workers, (at the time feeling it a good idea to not subject them to my miserable rantings. I’m a fucking downer to myself I can’t imagine how awful it must be for anyone else to be around me) but they’ve left several messages suggesting alternatives and I’m starting to feel like an ungrateful cow for not answering.

I suppose, in all fairness, it should be up to them whether or not they want to be around me in my current state but it makes me feel worse knowing that the way I am right now will make them feel bad. ARGH.

I chatted with every one of my job hunting classmates on Thursday, and after class when one of the classmates offered me a lift home I agreed. Yay.

I had a friend visiting from Seattle and for one entire week, with her by my side, I initiated conversations with strangers all throughout the day. EVERY DAY. I felt I was being outrageously flirty and friendly until she informed me that this was the way she’s always known me to be.

She’s right. That did used to be me. What happened?

I’ve continued the streak, chatting with the taxi man on the way home from the airport and tomorrow I promise myself to engage with at least one stranger before the end of day.

I got teased a bit by my workmate during our lunchtime review of Match yesterday. Instead of my usual apathy, apparently I expressed a tremor of glee when I saw a particular fella winked back at me. THIS guy I felt I could communicate with. He wrote a terrific profile, succinctly laying out pros and cons and for the first time I was genuinely interested at someone when I winked.

He winked back, we emailed, now it’s his turn… don’t tell anyone, but this is kind of exciting.

Random dude winks at me.
I politely wink back at dude.
Dude then sends a “not interested” reply.

WTF?

I learned a long time ago that men and women think differently, and have thusly avoided a lot of unnecessary frustration. But shit like that? I can’t even begin to translate what he might have been thinking. I think I’ll file that one in the same mystery folder as the male nipple.

I’ve just (finally) made my online dating profile public and have winked as some fellas.

per the 1st Challenge of 2009, I have joined an online dating service. I wrote my profile and plan to have my photos up by next weekend. I then have until the end of this month to make the first contact with 25 men. This was a lot more fun when I did it three years ago, because that was just a month-long experiement with rejection. Now this is serious, and for 3 months, and if I think too hard about it I’m going to start freaking out. I’m not worried about them not reciprocating, I’m worried they WILL—then what the hell do I do?

Originally when I’d decided to come back for a visit I didn’t know if I was going to call my friends, so they’d received rather late notification that I was coming and STILL they made time to see me. We had a long talk yesterday and I explained just how bad the past year had been, and why, and what nearly happened, and why, and I got a big hug and was told I was loved and missed and I let them say everything without cracking jokes (okay, maybe 1 joke but it wasn’t even a self-depracating one) and even let them hug me. For fuck sake, I even hugged back.

It was a bit overwhelming, but good.

after reaching out to one former friend, I made the decision to send a christmas card to another. I hesitated for a long time over this as, to be frank, I’m not really interested in reconnecting with her. However, as we are now living in the (basically) same neighborhood again, I thought it would only be fair to offer a chance for closure. So I wrote out a brief greeting and told her to email me after the holidays (because I’ll be in Seattle) if she’d like to come by for a coffee and a chat. Yesterday, before I could change my mind, I handed it to my workmate who was on her way to the post office.

I had a couple moments of “ugh, I really don’t want to rehash all this” but figured there was nothing I could do about it. Either she was going to call or not.

But then this morning, the card was in MY post—it seems the postman delivered it to the return address (which was on the back) instead of the address with the frickin’ stamp next to it.

My question is this: Is this a sign from the universe to just let this go OR should I drop the card back in the post and hope it gets delivered to her?

When I was 15 I had my charts ‘read’ and was told that the primary lesson outlined for this lifetime was ‘relationships’. I think that’s pretty standard for nearly everyone, but boy howdy I’ve been running the full gamut here!

I’ve been very good at avoiding true romantic relationships (it really does help to only date men who are afraid of success), and over these past couple years I have become aware that I’m really not that good in the friendship department either.

I’ve learned that I would (subconsciously) pick people that needed my help (a lot) but would not /could not be there for me in return. And by always doing things for them I was giving to them everything I had but what a true relationship needs – myself.

I’ve been thinking about this a lot the past couple of weeks, 1) because my head is finally clear of depression and 2) I had a bit of a shock from the hostility my now former flatmates expressed when I was moving out. She told me I had to quit using people and wearing out my friends when they become inconvenient.

Was I using people? Was I wearing out my friends? What I only interested in being around people if it was convenient?

I’ve given full thought to all of my friendships and concluded that 1) she’s a bitch, 2) I’m okay and I did not do anything wrong, although I could perhaps learn to recognize and then articulate my feelings better. This lead me to the issue I had with my camera/walking buddies just prior to the MoonWalk this summer.

In that instance, I still feel I was in the right to be upset HOWEVER I also see that I was too deep into my grief & depression state to explain myself properly and reach a fair resolution. I was hurt by their actions, scared by my response, and frustrated at my inability to communicate this in a clear way. So I just shut down and shut those people out of my life. I think I was wrong to do that.

This Thursday I wrote a letter to one of the walking buddies and, after giving a brief explanation of my actions, told her I’d like to renew the friendship and asked if she’d like to meet for a coffee, then gave her my contact information so she can make the next move. I certainly understand if she won’t want to try again, but it was important that I did—and I feel better for reaching out.