Fully Operational

Another year, and thankfully some incredible new insight.

I'll start from where I left off.

Last October, provided with a monumental challenge of the heart, I stuck up for myself in a big way.  At the time, and for months afterward, I was not happy that I made that decision, and it hurt so deeply I can't even describe it.  I slipped into a deep despair and cried regularly.  It was helpful to be around friends, because they were understanding and supportive, but the burden was mine alone to bear.  I felt the sting of having lost what might have been love, my heart burned from a sense of rejection, and no amount of rationalizing that I had done the right thing could salve my wounds.

At the zenith of this suffering, I found myself longing for death...something I had not begged for in many years.  I knew it was time to go to therapy again.

My therapist worked hard to help me find my center, and validated me and my pains.  She was a bit inarticulate, so I felt that I often had to decode her meaning, but her sincerity made up for it.  I made leaps and bounds in understanding myself and loving myself, and turned 30 with a refreshed new outlook on my life.

• I am dating myself and I love treating myself with kindness, patience, and gentleness
• I will not take emotional crumbs just to assume the title of "in a relationship;" therefore, I have higher standards for the men I am involved with
• I have learned that my previous attitudes about desperately clinging to dysfunctional, emotionally scarce relationships stem from my father and his regular disappearances and reappearances in my life 
• My friends are the center of my focus right now, and I am taking this time to cultivate healthy relationships and cheerful memories with them
• I am revisiting many things from my past, such as television shows, music, and books, that I am allowing myself to enjoy from a healthier, happier perspective, so that I can heal that broken girl of long ago
• I like to think that I am unpacking my baggage
• I love my body, and I take care of my body, and I feel confident in my skin (unless I am bloated!)
• I like my job and I am working hard to make a difference in the lives of my students; additionally my coworkers are wonderful people and I am trying to be a supportive, contributing member of the faculty
• I'm generally responsible with the upkeep of my household, and I have made serious effort in staying financially afloat and on top of all my bills
• I'm back into discovering and loving music
• I'm happy.  I really am happy.

So, the new me armored with self-confidence and a better understanding of how to love myself has been challenged in much the same way as last October.  A couple weeks ago, the fireman called me out of the blue, late in the evening, to invite me over to meet his new dog.  I was so blind-sided by it that I went over there and fell for the obvious trap of a booty call.

He tried again two days later, but I was unavailable.  I asked him to call me that weekend, and he did.  I made my case to him, that I still hadn't wavered in the terms I set before: I am not a casual hook-up, and if I am with him it is because I am special to him and for no less.  He's still opposed to the idea of a relationship, and so that was basically the gridlock.  We agreed that he would no longer contact me, though it was not without regret that I said goodbye a second time.

My wonderful girlfriends protected me from a lonely night following that phone call, and their consensus was that I did a good but difficult thing.  They were proud of me.  I felt much better.  Since then I have felt several twinges of disappointment, but I realize that it is allowed to affect me, and I am allowed to think about it.  I simply no longer feel the sharp pain in my chest when I picture what I might have lost with that man.  He is broken and I am not.  I do not want to be with a broken man.

I really am blessed and I am pleased to continue growing from this place.