Maybe I spoke too soon in a recent post when I said I wasn’t broken. With the problems H and I are having at the moment, I’m starting to question some things:
1. Am I broken?
2. Do I really trust ANYONE to love me without hurting me?
3. Do I always expect the people I love to hurt/disappoint me?
4. Do I put walls up without realizing it in order to keep my heart intact?
5. Is that why when people first meet me, they think I’m stuck up until they know me a little better?
6. Is it a defense mechanism I use to get through life?
7. Is it okay to let those walls and defenses go?
8. Am I asking too much of those that I love (H in particular)?
9. Do I really deserve to be loved in such a way that I feel special and the most important person in the world to H and by H?
10. Is it realistic to think that I should feel special and the most important person in the world to ANY one?
11. Why haven’t I gotten over/through all this yet?
12. Why do these things still plague me?
13. Why do I feel as though I have a HUGE burden on my shoulder 24/7 right now?
Upon reflection, I do realize the answers to some of these questions:
Question #1 – Am I broken? I’ll answer this after I’ve answered all the others. It seems only fair to review all the information before passing judgment (even on myself).
Question #2 – Do I really trust anyone to love me without hurting me? Not really. I think deep down, I always expect that I am going to get hurt. My past has shown me that I can’t trust those I love or those that love me to protect me (including my heart).
Question #3 – Do I always expect the people I love to hurt/disappoint me? I think I must, but I don't mean to. The only person in my life that I have loved that hasn’t disappointed me is my maternal grandmother.
Question #4 – Do I put walls up without realizing it in order to keep my heart intact? I think this is highly probable after talking with H the past few days.
Question #5 – Is that why when people first meet me, they think I’m stuck up until they know me a little better? It must be that they see this wall or something about me that tells them that I don’t trust them.
Question #6 – Is it a defense mechanism I use to get through life? I think this is highly likely as well. If you’ve read my blog for ANY length of time or gone through the archives, you’ll notice that I have been through a LOT (molested by my grandfather, felt unloved by my family, not understood by my family, feeling like the black sheep of my family, battling depression, contemplated suicide on a number of occasions, sexually harassed at work, etc.). I’ve made it through all of it. I guess I can’t expect that I would come out of everything without some way to cope with these or similar situations. I know that my weight issue is a defense mechanism. I didn’t gain weight until I was sexually harassed at work and we all know that people really don’t look at fat people. They look right past them as though they don’t exist.
Question #7 – Is it okay to let go of these walls and defenses? Most definitely! My problem now is that I’ve had them for so long that I don’t know how to let go. Hell! I didn’t even realize I had them.
Question #8 – Am I asking too much of the people that I love (H in particular)? I don’t think I can honestly answer this question without first answering #9 – Do I really deserve to be loved in such a way that I feel special and the most important person in the world to H and by H? I really think I do deserve this. Doesn’t everyone? So, I don’t think I’m asking too much when I ask 1) to be heard or 2) shown some affection without it having to lead to sex ALL the time. Maybe this is just one of the major differences between men and women. Men have sex to feel close to a woman (or to satisfy a basic animal urge/instinct as H put it) where a woman (not the promiscuous ones anyway) need to feel close before having sex. We REALLY need to figure this out.
Question #10 was answered with #9. I think those two go hand in hand.
Question #11 – Why haven’t I gotten over/through all of this yet? I think it’s because I learned in my formative years that I can’t trust those that love me/I love to actually love me without hurting me in some way. Since I did learn this in my formative years, does this mean that this is now part of who I am and it’s something that I’m/we’re just going to have to deal with in order to go on? Yes, another question, but I don’t have the answer to this one. What do you think?
Question #12 – Why do these things still plague me? Answered in #11. I think these go hand in hand as well.
Question #13 – Why do I feel as though I have a HUGE burden on my shoulder 24/7 right now? I don’t know. I think partly because I feel that I am stressing H beyond his breaking point, but I don’t know how to change that. I don’t realize that I’m putting up barriers. So how can I tear them down? I didn’t realize that I expect everyone to hurt me in some way at some time. How do I change that? It’s so ingrained in who I am. Can a person change something that has been ingrained since early childhood? I’ve got nothing but more questions and I’ve GOT to figure this out.
I was told by my dad years ago, “Don’t marry someone you can live with. Marry someone you can’t live without.” That’s how I feel about H. I really don’t think I could live without him. I think I would fall apart if he weren’t in my life. I know that H is the best thing in my life. I know that he loves me even if I don’t always feel it or feel special to him. How can I make that be enough for me? How do I become content without something that I have craved my entire life? Do I have what I’ve always wanted and just not realize it? How can I make myself realize something that I can’t see/feel?
So, this is what has been plaguing me for the past two days. What’s really bad is the fact that I’ve kind of given up on the idea that I will ever be truly special to anyone. Of course, that’s no way to live and is very discouraging/disheartening. H feels it, too. He’s just realized what it is even though I’ve tried to tell him on many different occasions that he’s not hearing me (I will say something to him, he’ll ask me to repeat it; then he’ll ask me to repeat it again because he wasn’t listening – I’m not imagining this or reading more into it) and that I need some affection from him (even just a hug and kiss when he comes home from work EVERY night – this is not the norm for us, but it would help me in SO many ways to feel loved and special so I can give him what he needs from me). I’m not holding sex back from him; it just isn’t really enjoyable for either of us at the moment (after a long emotional talk on Monday it felt as though we were back to the way it once was which is what we’re trying to get back to; unfortunately, last night was back to having problems). I guess we just need time to figure all of this out before we can put things back to the way they were. We also know that we’ve both changed in the last 10 years, so we aren’t expecting things to be EXACTLY like they were when we first met. We just want the closeness back.
After all of this, I think the answer to #1 is that I must be broken at least to some degree.
Any thoughts you can supply on these questions would be greatly appreciated.
Until later...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
1 comment:
Not sure how much this might help, but here's a few thoughts.
I believe communicating - talking and attentively listening - is the key. Maybe if you have a hard time getting and holding H's attention, you can try changing the setting; might be easy as a different room, or you go outside or to a quiet table someplace.
Look for patterns in how you (mis)communicate, and try to disrupt those patterns. If one starts using words like "always" and "never" in a complaint or accusation, it's time to step back, take a breath, and think about what really needs to be said at that point.
Being specific helps. Offering specific, genuine, non-manipulative praise (and criticism) helps. "You make my day when you [something]." "I need you to know it hurts me when you [something]; could you [alternative] instead?"
Also might help to try repeating back what the other person said, as you take turns talking. If he seems reluctant to do so, ask him to treat it as a "humor me" request. If you find you're clearly hearing each other there's no need to continue, but it might help show a need for more careful listening.
Try to not get too hung up on specific words; I think most people - me included - have trouble expressing themselves in such conversations. It's okay to say "I didn't understand what you just said, can you try again?"
And finally, if you find the conversation is, as a friend once said, "generating more heat than light," best thing is to close the session with as much kindness as possible, and pick things up another time.
Hope this hasn't been too vague.
Post a Comment