Tag Archives: Endings

by

Adjustments

I recall when my ex and I didn’t hook up for three-months that by the end of the second month, I really wanted some arms around me and some sex.  I told my psychologist (who I pay) that I won’t be getting into that pattern anymore because of the little liar.  It was unsettling that she kept truths from me craftily.  Although it would be nice to sleep with someone, I’d rather it be someone who I really know.

I get that takes time.  It takes a year.  But, conversations about what you want and value can organically develop especially when alcohol is not involved and the convo takes place in the daylight.  So, no more than 2 beers and alternating getting together for dinner and for hikes or bike rides, I think.  I’m not a skier or boarder, so that makes some girls not want to be with me.  However, I do love music.  In the middle of winter you don’t tend to think about outdoor concerts, but those are really fun too.

We hiked and sledded yesterday.  My friend who accompanied me so I had help with our dog and my son, played a bunch of songs in the car that her love interest had sent her electronically.  (She is 12-years younger than me, so I noted gone are the days of the mix tape.  And of course I used to synch my ex’s iPod monthly.)  My friend has started a distance “something” with a guy who lives on the east coast.  She was happy and a good pair of extra hands to have while my son sledded and we waited to hike.

Today friends are coming down for a couple of quiches, hashbrowns, and salad.  They have two kiddos.  I’ve known them 18-years.  I think that we will have fun.

I had this running argument with my ex that I ran by my psychologist, and that is that you can tell a lot about a girl by the way that she treats and responds to her friends.  She agreed with me and said that just knowing a woman’s friends is good information, but my ex always said that stakes are way too high in love relationships so it’s not comparable.  My ex thought that quality of friendships and feedback that you get from your friends has no relationship to your love relationship.  Even her best friend in the world was one who she would talk smack about, and I could never understand that because she would do anything for my ex.  You don’t have to agree with a person’s choice of partner, but it makes hanging out in pairs much easier.  So I thought about that this morning–meaning who your friends decide to marry or co-habitate with and it’s effect.

I think that I could ignore a partner who doesn’t treat my friend well.  In fact, I pretty much do.  My best friend who lives locally and is a woman, has a husband who is literally never home and doesn’t seem to make the kids clean up or do any chores. There is more to it too, but I just give him a hug and move on, because I’m not married to him.  My ex says underhanded things directly to the face of her best friend’s partner–one that I could quote was a crack about being overweight.  Another time, because she is incredibly quick, she said a disarmingly mean thing that let her best friend’s partner know that she was intelligent.  I think my ex lives to make others uncomfortable when her insecurities are taped.  There were also those miserable dog walks that we took wherein she’d scream at her dog because she was conducting smell fests more than walking.  She also used to throw the leash down.  I definitely get that type of response!

Like I did last summer, I’m adjusting to being single.  However, I’m different because when we tried late summer to see (just the months of our bdays), and she started her fickle dance of breaking plans when she wanted to and then unloading on me when it hurt my feelings, I just bailed.  Then when she said we weren’t priorities in each other’s lives and I lost it, she did a great job of not yelling back at me, but upon reflecting, she only was calm because she had never seen my lose my temper.  The latter is not pretty.  I’m done, done now.  I’m productive and using schedules and getting organized for the final legs of my doc too.  I think that when you tell a woman that you don’t want to approximate dating anymore, you have really ended it.  When I didn’t go to her party at the beginning of last month, I think that caused her to move even further from me.  So, then like she does with friends, she said things that sit oddly and then hurt later.

I definitely need to use my skills of observation when I start dating.  Having one girl who checked her watch and the another reflect on how feminine her ex was while I was next to them naked, has left me cautious to say the least.  I still want a girl who wants to be with me.

by

New feelings

I didn’t feel like I do now after my coming out affair ended, and I definitely didn’t feel this way after I ended it with the drunk.  Then I was ecstatic, which wasn’t all that good because I started communicating with my ex pretty close to right afterward.  I need some down time to just reflect on what I want before I date again.  I didn’t do that last time around, which is why they were both controllers, addicts in their own ways, and not communicative.

I need to be outside.  I need to laugh like I did tonight.  I need stimulation and connection like I had over coffee.  I need to be attracted to a girl and for her to find me attractive too, so we can have that chemical hit when we connect.  I learned today while reading some research that when you get away, vary your routine, or add a lot of laughs and ease that you can have sex like you did in your first year within your ltr.  That gives me hope.  Also hopeful is that I have some new friends who deeply love each other and have been in an ltr for years.  I want that.  I don’t like the fade.

I also don’t like feeling sad.  It’s finally completely over, and I know it.  It’s different this time and we probably won’t see each other for a really long time.  The latter is ok because then I’m hoping that her rage toward me has subsided somewhat.

I’m culpable only for not wanting to put up with ill treatment, but she’s not used to anyone challenging her or even disagreeing with her.  I’ve watched her say, “He is pissing me off calling all the time.  I think that he just needs me more than I do him,” about her best friend, and I have seen her have periods of silence with her manager wherein it just has to blow over because she does not budge or try to talk through work conflicts.  That’s what she’s used to.  In fact, I recall when we were working in a couple’s book that she had never been broken up with ever anyway.  And I didn’t really break up with her, because she started this dance over a year ago and I just buckled and started agreeing with her after three-months of break-ups.

Being pushed away just is deadly.  I was so demoralized for so long and really wondering why I was such a bad person?  I do think that you can be mismatched with someone, but really I do think that some people just naturally find faults.  I don’t want that because I really have a belief that everyone is doing the very best that she or he can with what they’ve got.  That belief includes me, because I always try the very best that I’m able.

by

My place

So, I went out with a friend last night, and I really wish in most ways that I had known that my best friend was hosting a karaoke night, because that is much more my speed, but I did get some insights from the friend with whom I spent last evening.  It really is great to have so many friends who work in mental health.  She told me that our relationship has the perpetual flavor of “I will leave you first.”  I can honestly say that I have never done that with a girl, so it is spurned by a super shitty dynamic that only she and I create.  I get that she has a control and abandonment flavor, but no matter how sexy she is, I must not take her back.  If I see her again and she has been sexually untoward, I must say, “I will definitely see you.  Here are the three names for psychologists and social workers that I have.  Phone screen them and tell me where to meet you or trust me and I will make the appointment.”  That has to be it.

Additionally, I know in the bottom of my heart that she is interested in the woman with whom I will have a playdate and probably a couple of others who actually live in her county.  I am intuitive, and she would not continue to ride my ass about “someone” if she didn’t have a woman closer than I who is a prospect.  I am not going to text–something that I’m good at–and I have changed my mind about sending a letter asking for counseling. She, of course, emailed yesterday, and I wrote that I would go to couples’ counseling with her in a heartbeat, but ironically there is not time.  And there isn’t!  Like I always say, “We are not aging in reverse!”

by

Self of Therapist

OK, it is finally D-day because someone who calls you a big baby when she hurts your feelings is not your partner…  So, I have to ask her why she went from it will be great to see you to, let’s play it by ear to, save gas and let’s see if we can work tomorrow out.

  • She told me that it was because she wanted free time with her son like I was currently having and that then when she heard that I’d be closer to her Sunday see if that could work out, but without me re-arranging

Translation:  I want to control whether or not you get to see me, and I’m much more interested in connecting with this other woman who you live to close to, because I was attracted to her initially, and want to know who you live by and possibly will spend time with at times.

I have to ask her lots of questions.

  • I, in fact, asked her few questions, and when she said, “I know who you’ll date next and I will send the name to you in an envelope,” I told her openly that I’m interested in the engineer and she LOST it.  I am honest, I don’t regret it, and although my interest is not sexual at this point, and I can acknowledge that I still am in love with my ex, I am intrigued by the engineer and very attracted to her stability.

When did she go from in just a short time I love you and your son and want to say move in here and enroll him at the local elementary?

  • I couldn’t ask her this questions, because she only sees that we trigger each other and continues not to acknowledge her back and forth with me.

How does she see our fights?

  • She doesn’t think that we fight all of the time even when I told her that it follows a monthly cycle.

Why do you pull away from me when things get intense or scary for you?

  • She said that she didn’t consciously this time when she had her health scare and if not talking and then changing plans last minute is not pulling away, then we don’t see emotional connection in the same way at all.

Why did she say that she couldn’t go to therapy after reflecting for six-weeks because she didn’t want anybody to poke around in her head?

  • I didn’t ask this question either, but if you have read any of the entries that I wrote from winter, I think that you know the answer, because I certainly do.  I also want to point out that it is snowing today, and so I get the whole cycle now.

Why does she continue to say what our friendship could look like if that’s not really what she was focusing on, because it felt like that is what she wanting?

  • I have that answer too.  Because she doesn’t want a friendship.  I have hateful texts and have been blocked from her social media and also from her cell phone, I am sure, because she told me that she was going so.

So, what have I learned?  I am capable of deep, connected love.  I like to keep in the tip top physical shape.  I give second, third, and many chances because I am adaptable.  I really had grieved our relationship toward the end of last spring.  I had gotten very intrigued by how different she had appeared in August and was quite hopeful, but that hope started to fade quickly when I realized that we would be back in our monthly cycle.  What is interesting to me is that when I blocked the drunk, it was because she threatened my life, and I am blocked because I threaten her heart.  It is too bad that we can’t be friends, but it is just as well that our relationship completely ended in a clean manner.