heal my heart

I’ve met someone new. It’s a strange feeling to be starting over again. C left things in such a way that we will never be friends, which makes me sad but, in a way, is also freeing. He has moved and we’re both moving on. I’m taking things slowly with B. Past experience has taught me to be less impulsive, more careful. I’ve thrown out or packed up anything having to do with C and I no longer have to worry about running into him around town because he has finally moved. B will have a harder road with me because of what I’ve been through, but, on the good side, I’m more aware of my own issues and ghosts. We’ll see what happens. No matter what, whether it’s with B or with someone else, I’m definitely moving on. Finally.

I’ve been thinking a bit about that previous post and about everything that’s been going on. I know that my pride is hurt. My feelings are hurt. I think that part of the reason is that, as hard as things were, I was willing to stick it out and work on it. Each time we were together I tried and he just disappeared inside himself. I think the fact that I gave it so many chances and tried so hard with someone who was so obviously not a good fit for me makes me feel a little bit pathetic. I realize it’s not logical, but feelings rarely are. I’m a strong, fiercely independent sort of woman so the idea that I was so willing to lay down, to sublimate all my needs and desires to someone else, really bothers me. It makes me question who I really am.

This is about more than C. I always seem to gravitate toward emotionally unavailable partners. I think that the hard part with C was that he had convinced me that he wasn’t that way at all. When we were apart, he was a different person. So loving and open and willing to give of himself. Then we’d get back together and he’d shut down.

I’m trying to figure out what, if anything, I’m doing wrong. I know people find me attractive and interesting. I feel a bit like the character in Sunshine Cleaning when she says “But I’m good at getting guys to want me. Not date me, or marry me, but want me.” I’m not sure why that is. Hopefully I’ll figure it out someday soon.

When you sit with your feelings, it’s amazing to realize how quickly and constantly they’re changing. I have a million shades of emotions floating just below the surface and they seem to bubble up without a whole lot of rhyme or reason. I’m trying to sit with things instead of looking for an escape or a distraction. It’s not easy. I find I’m angry about a lot of things, but anger is really just a different form for fear and sadness. I’m hurt. My pride is hurt, really, but I’ll survive.

I’m realizing how much I create stories in my head and try and make my life fit into them. This is especially true where relationships are concerned. C pursued me for a long time before we dated. We had been friends and I knew what he was like and he wasn’t someone I was interested in dating. Then something changed. He learned who I was and what I wanted and his stories and his pursuit became more attractive to me. He knew what I was looking for and convinced me (and maybe himself) that he was those things. I wanted to believe his stories because they fit so well with my own. I wanted to believe and so I ignored all the glaring contradictions. Eventually the contradictions proved to be the reality and I felt crushed under the weight of disillusionment and confusion. How could I have been so wrong? Easy. I wanted the fairy tale and so I pretended the reality could be made to fit.

With D it was different. Again, he wasn’t someone I was initially interested in. Originally I was interested in one of his friends and didn’t even talk to D until she (the friend) moved away to CA. The first time I went out with D and his friends was the day I got fired. I thought D was trying to set me up with one of his friends, but midway through the night he seemed to change his mind. The more we talked, the more I liked him. I fell hard and fast, which is something that had never happened to me before. I look at pictures of myself with him from that first month we were together and you can see in my face that I was crazy happy. Something I don’t remember ever feeling with C when we spent long periods of time together in person. I didn’t realize D had a drinking problem until later. He’s only happy when he’s numb, which is sad. Still, he’s a good man.

I’ve spent a lot of time the past few months going over my relationships in my head. It’s one of those times when I’m grateful for my habit of journaling and for my poetry and long letters. I can go back and read something I wrote in a moment of pain or happiness and the feeling will rush over me as if I’m living it again. C and D were my most recent relationships so I can’t help but compare them. It’s easy to forget how you felt at the end of one relationship when you’ve already moved on to another. I got involved (re-involved) with C just as things were ending with D. I never really took time to be on my own or to grieve. This is a pattern for me. When one relationship ends, I somehow end up back together with an ex. It’s not healthy.

All of this is part of me trying to figure out what I want before I get into another relationship. C hurt me a lot in a lot of different ways. Trust has always been a tough issue for me and he made it tougher. But I’d like to think that no one can change you against your will. People can do things to you and can treat you badly, but how you come out of it, what you choose to make of it, is up to you. What I’ve learned from my relationships so far is the following:
1. Despite my darkest fears, love will not kill or destroy me
2. Real love doesn’t have to be forced. It flows out naturally. It doesn’t drain you or exhaust you, but fills you and makes you feel as though you are full of light and warmth.
3. Selfish people are drawn to generous people, but that doesn’t mean you should stop being generous. You just have to know when to draw the line. Saying “No” doesn’t make you selfish or a bad person.
4. You can’t always make everything turn out nicely for everyone no matter how hard you try. Some things just end and everyone has to deal with the pain and aftermath in their own way.

Despite everything I still feel certain that I will find my match one of these days. Until then, I’m finding that I’m just fine on my own.

I’m exhausted. In every sense really. Mostly it’s mental. I’ve been working 60-70 hour weeks for the past month, which is getting old really fast. The fact that I don’t get paid for overtime just makes it more painful. Mostly though, it’s bad because I feel like I’m all out of balance. I’m too tired to exercise by the time I get home and I’ve been eating crap. I haven’t had energy to write or even to read much. It’s just not good.

So I’m making myself slow down. The project at work is wrapping up and I should be able to get caught up somewhat this week. I had to cancel my trip to Seattle, or rather postpone it until April. So I’m taking a few 3 or 4 day weekends instead of one week off. It’s still two weeks away, but at least I can see a break on the horizon.

The party at work this past weekend was nice. I had to work from 9am-9pm, but once everyone got checked in, it didn’t really feel like work any more. I love being a hostess. My face hurt from smiling so much and my throat was sore from talking and laughing. I love my brewery boys. Even the fact that my ex (not the most recent one but the one I dated when I first moved here), who was my guest, was being less than social (texting his more recent ex most of the evening), wasn’t enough to spoil my fun. My other guests had a great time and their enthusiasm was contagious. I felt very full of love. I find I often feel full of love these days. The older I get, the more I feel love for people in general.

I’m realizing more and more how lucky I am. I am loved. Truly loved. I have friends and family who would do anything for me. I have people who would give me the shirts off their backs if I needed it.

When I was in college one of my friends from highschool told me that my friends talked about me and worried about me. I was an open heart. I was too trusting. They worried that the real world would crush me and it did for a while, but only because I didn’t know balance. For a while I became hard and untrusting and I was so miserable. Then I realized something: the fact that the world is hard doesn’t mean that we have to be.

I feel like the more love I send out into the world, the more it comes back to me. I know that sounds cheesy but it’s true. I feel surrounded by love. And even in times like this when my life is stressful and I’m tired and cranky, my heart is full and I’m very grateful. I’m grateful that the pain in my life has softened me instead of hardening me. I’m grateful for sadness and loneliness because they connect me to others who feel sad and lonely. Mostly though, mostly I’m grateful for love, for being so very full of love.

I’m glad no one’s here, just me by the sea
I’m glad no one’s here to mess it up for me
I’m glad no one’s here, just me by the sea
But man, I wish I had a hand to hold

I saw an orange starfish on the side of a rock
I poked on his back & tried to pull him off
A crab scared me away he ran close to my toes
And man, I wish I had a hand to hold

The moon is nowhere almost time for the sun
The voice of the waves sound anciently young
I’m a prisoner of freedom ten toes in the sand
And man, I wish I had a hand to hold

I’m in the habit of being alone
I try hard to break it I can’t on my own

I’m glad no one’s here just me by the sea
I’m glad no one’s here to mess it up for me
I’m glad no one’s here just me by the sea
But man, I wish I had a hand to hold.

My 13.5 year old cat has just been diagnosed with hyperthyroidism and failing kidneys. A friend had posted online about her cat’s hyperthyroidism last week and I decided to get my cat checked because he had many of the same symptoms. Turns out this was a wise decision.

He’s on daily medication now, but the kidneys worry me more than the hyperthyroidism. The kidney values have deteriorated rather quickly, as he was perfectly healthy less than a year ago when he had bloodwork done. He and his brother were my first real pets. His brother was sick his whole life and died about 3 years ago. I’m not sure how I will do when it’s Dante’s turn to go. Hopefully we have a while yet.

It’s tempting to mark this as done, but it’s not really. It will take a long time before it is. It’s pretty much done as far as the last relationship goes, but it was never about that anyway. Our pain is never about someone else. You can’t control another person’s actions or how they feel or how they treat you. You can only control your reactions to those things. That is the core or “heart” of what I’m working on. My self-worth and my life cannot be measured by what others think, feel or do; only by what I do and by who I am.

My goal is to be the kind of person I’ve always admired. I want to be courageous, strong, patient and compassionate. I want to remember that there is a difference between being kind and being “nice”. Nice is not always a good thing and you don’t have to let other people walk all over you in order to be kind. One of the buddhist authors I read (I can’t remember who at the moment) said something along the lines of “sometimes the kindest thing you can do for someone is to smack them upside the head.” I try and remember that advice, but I also remember that it is not my place to judge how others live their lives or to try and lead them in any certain direction. My path is mine alone.

So, while I had an ugly past, I have a beautiful present, a clear mind and a strong will. Every day teaches me something new about myself and helps me to move forward with my life. There is no real point to all of this. It’s just what I’ve been thinking about and I wanted to get it down so that I won’t forget. Every second we are breathing is a new moment, a new chance to start again and to become who it is we want most to be.

I have a lot more anger than I realized still floating around inside of me. I almost never show anger. I learned at a young age how to keep everything inside and curl up inside myself until I was almost invisible. That stuff you push down inside? It never really goes away until you deal with it. So I’m trying to shovel through the layers carefully, like an archaeologist sifting through mounds of dirt for hidden treasures. I’m also learning how to deal with emotions in the moment like most people do. It’s surprisingly difficult. I have a joke with one of my friends that I’m always “fine”. If I’m not dead, I’m fine. The other emotions mostly get ignored because I don’t like drama or explosions and because I worry about appearing out of control, over-emotional, or hurting someone’s feelings. I still don’t like any of those things. So I’m trying to learn how to realize I’m angry and deal with the anger, without lashing out at someone and without burying the anger inside. Strange to be a grown woman and not know how to deal with basic emotions like sadness and anger, but there you have it. I’m working on it.

As for him, we’re trying to be friends. I don’t know that it will work. We’re very different. Some people let sadness and pain soften them and some let it harden them. I’ve gone in one direction and he’s gone in the other. It will be sad to lose him as a part of my life as we’ve known each other for a really long time, but I’ve come to accept it as a possibility. Just because someone has a strong place in your past, doesn’t mean they always have a place in your future. Painful, but true.

I’m a work in progress, always and forever.

I find I have a lot more energy lately and it’s making me feel a bit Puckish (mischievous), which could be a bad thing but a fun bad thing :) I’m back to exercising regularly and am losing weight, which is making me feel good. I’m also back into my buddhist practices of mindfulness and meditation. I’m not very good at it, but I’m working on it. I’m thinking of taking an oath to do no harm. This means not doing harm to myself as well as anyone else. It would mean being more careful about what I say (no gossip or snarky comments) as well as what I do. We’ll see.

For now I’m just continuing to put one foot in front of the other and it seems to be working out fine. I feel great!

Doing much better. The exercise and bellydancing classes are definitely helping, as is getting back to buddhism (meditation and mindfulness). I’m coming to a lot of realizations about myself and the situation, which are helping me to move forward and to heal. It will be a while before I’m ready to get into a new relationship, but I feel confident that I will be in a really good place by the time it gets here.