Life’s lessons…***big sigh***…I guess I’m quiet…yet again…

16Jun08

Well, between revealing my identity on my blog (for those who know me) and the events of the past weekend, I have really been emotionally challenged.  I’m going to try not to make this a really long post, but…whatever…

So to reveal to people that know me that this blog belongs to me was very difficult.  It honestly took guts that I didn’t know that I had.  It is so much easier to write a blog and say what’s on your mind without reservation when no one knows it’s you…mostly because you won’t feel judged by people who know you.  But once people know, it’s scary…I mean, the possibility of what you might be opening yourself up to by exposing yourself.    Will I still be true to myself from this point on and say what’s really on my mind?  Or will I shrink back and fog up my opinions or real feelings and say what I think people may want to hear?  I guess we will see.

Now this weekend was the absolute worst.  So many things happened to me emotionally.  I mean, I found myself focusing on and thinking about things that really disturbed me.  I have been sure about my future  for the past year or so…I knew exactly who I wanted to be with and why…I knew where I was going and what my future plans were…where I was going to be in about 10 years and all that good stuff.  But starting last night and into this morning, I began to re-assess the relationship in terms of myself for the very first time.  I tend to think about my relationship in terms of my kids…and us…and his kids…just the whole family thing…the unit…but never in terms of myself.  Last night, a question came to my mind while on the phone with Sir that seemed weird even to me, but I asked him the question anyway.

“If we got married, how would you feel about my hosting dinner parties?”

“What do you mean?  Throwing parties??”

“Uh, no…dinner parties…like intimate gatherings for close friends and maybe some family…dinner parties.”

“…Oh…I think that’d be kind of cool.  Why would you ask that?”

“…because I don’t want to do so much giving and taking in this relationship that I end up not being true to myself and not recognizing who I am when it’s all said and done.”

Now, if you don’t know me that might seem like a crazy question.  But for anyone who knows me (especially if you know me from back in the day)…you KNOW that’s a legitimate question.  Everyone knows that I’m the Black Martha Stewart and that I love to be the hostess with the mostess.  Previously, I was married to someone who was not as extroverted as I was (at least before I got married, I was very outgoing and loved to be around my family and friends), and his circle of friends was very small and he did not necessarily like for my family to be around all the time.  No that he didn’t like my family…he did.  He just had this thing about people being in his personal space.  He smiled and talked when they came, but truth be told, I think if he had a choice in some of those situations, he’d kick all of them out the house.  But he loved it when his family and friends were over.  Although he would never say so directly (except maybe once, he expressed his discontent about my family and friends coming over), I knew how he felt about people coming over and me cooking for them and serving them.  (Just as I typed that last statement, I got a theory about why it was a problem).  So I stopped doing it one year after a Christmas party.  That party was such a hit, everyone asked me every year after that, “What’s up with this year’s Christmas party?”  I had the best time…I am a servant…I love to cook for people that I love…it’s how I show my love lots of times because I put so much thought, time and energy into it…and in the end, not feeling that I had the freedom to do that changed me…and I even became an introvert…which is SO not like me.  And to this day, I still am an introvert.  I am having a hard time being social past the weekdays at 5:00.  Once I walk out that front door at work, I generally don’t part my lips for the rest of the day (except to talk to my dog about my day at work and to ask him how his day was.  I think he really cares.  J) That’s not the real me.  I used to be such a free spirit.

But anyway, that’s an example of a way that I’ve changed because of someone else…how not doing some of the small things I loved, one small thing turned into a whole ‘nother monster.  As it turned out, most of the outlets that I had for expressing me were slowly but surely taken from me…mostly because my ex-husband from the very beginning (well…after we came back from our honeymoon, at least) expressed that now that we were married, there was no room for me anymore…only what the family wanted (which usually turned out to be what he thought was best)…and that I didn’t need any friends now because he was the only friend I needed because we were married, and I guess that was the way it was supposed to be.  Although I’m inclined to believe that he didn’t do it be hateful or mean, I don’t think he realized what some of those statements did to me…they killed my spirit instantly.  Every once in a while we’d do something because I wanted to do it (although most times I was not aware that he was so dead set against it because he never said so to my face), but later it would become a thorn in his side that would get held against me.  But once I started feeling that he didn’t care about me as an individual, I lost all passion for the relationship because immediately I felt as though my soul was snatched out of me.  There were times where I tried to do things for me (like my business ventures and finishing school), but he made it very hard for me to be successful at those things.  I never felt he believed that I COULD be successful.  After a while, I felt he didn’t want me to be successful – at times, I thought he had done things to sabotage my efforts and he would say things to make me feel absolutely guilty for doing things that were just for me and my growth and development (or simply because I wanted to)…and that would just kill any momentum I had.  The older I got (in my 30s), I started to become rebellious (if you can really do that in a relationship?) because I really had a need to figure out who the hell I was and what I was doing because I didn’t know anymore.  I was so unfulfilled in just about every area of my life.  The only motivation I had was my kids – I love them more than anything in this world (no matter what anyone else would like to believe).  I had totally become someone completely different…and I hated myself for it.  And to be fair (I have to put myself out there as well) because I didn’t think that my ex really cared about my individuality and didn’t see my potential and my uniqueness and my need to express that (or maybe he didn’t think it mattered?  I’m not sure which one it is), I began developing relationships with men that DID see it.  90% of them were completely innocent…just having another man validate that I was a good woman (which I never heard in my relationship) and having some dialogue about things that mattered to me was something that I needed.  5% teeter-tottered on being inappropriate because of the emotional connection I had with them (even though most of them were gay men, but he didn’t care – they were men)…and the other 5% was full-blown relationship.  Let my ex tell it, though (and probably my family, too, who I believe a long time ago pegged me as a whore before I knew what a whore was) every man I talk to I’m sleeping with – gay or straight.  But that was definitely not the case…and it still isn’t.

Not that it’s a valid excuse to have friendships or relationships with others behind your spouse’s back…but in hindsight, I think I was just really needing some validation that “Hey…She is okay.  She’s worth knowing.  She’s worth loving.  And all that makes her unique is wonderful.”  I didn’t get that.  So I went outside of the relationship to get “it”…and all “it” really was was validation that I was a beautiful woman and worth loving just the way I was.  It had nothing to do with sex.  [Moral of the story for men: No matter how much your wife or girlfriend adores you or loves to take care of you, there’s more to a her than being your significant other.  She’ll be a better wife or girlfriend if you embrace her individuality…which is probably the very thing that attracted you to her in the first place!  It doesn’t take away from your relationship or her love for you.  And it’s not a threat…if anything, it makes her stronger and more empowered and inspires her to love you even more and harder than you imagined because she respects you so much for allowing her to keep being who she is.  It doesn’t do anything positive to the relationship when you try to mold her into someone else (like your momma, or someone else from your past, or your own idea of what the perfect woman is)…she may do it in the beginning out of love for you and a desire to please her man…but eventually she’ll resent you for it.  And ironically, you’ll resent her for changing, too.]

Now that the divorce is all said and done, not that long ago, my ex said some of the cruelest things anyone has ever said to me in my entire life (to my face).  He then called me a selfish S.O.B.  I couldn’t believe he said that…but the only thing I could muster up the strength to say was that I didn’t mean to hurt him and that I didn’t do anything out of selfishness.  He honestly thinks I’m the worst mother in the world, and even once told me directly that I have added no value to his life or the kids’ lives, and some other stuff that I don’t want to repeat that were really mean, but I am sure he said those things because he was hurt, too, and he just wanted to take that opportunity to say what he really felt about me.  Although I am usually surprised and hurt by some of the things that he says to me about me (it’s devasting to know that someone can express so much hate and disdain towards you – especially when he’s the father of your children), I just let him talk it out (he had a right to say what he felt).  The funny thing is that I don’t think that he sees his part in the demise of our relationship (everything is ALWAYS my fault – I’m the only loser, obviously…even my family used to tell me that when he did or said things, it was likely that I PERCEIVED that he was doing those things and that IF he did do those things, that I needed to look at myself and see what I was doing wrong)…and at this point, I don’t even have the strength to try to explain how he’d played a part in anything.  I’m not even sure if he cares at this point.  It’s too bad that he can’t continue to respect and care about me despite our differences like I do him. 

I’m not saying all this to make him look bad (he’s hurt, too) or to make excuses for myself…I’m just making the point that not staying true to yourself (and not communicating – we rarely talked about our relationship) and constantly reinventing yourself to try to gain acceptance (“maybe NOW he’ll like me”) and morphing into someone completely different never works.  In the end, he was mad at who I had become (even now, almost three years later, he still says, “I don’t know you!”)…I was mad at myself for getting lost in the marriage and mad at who’d I’d become…and now neither one of us recognized me!  Truth be told, I honestly was not the person that he married anymore… so could I really be mad at him for that?  On the flip side, there are two people in any relationship…whether the relationship was the greatest ever or worst relationship of the millennium, there is no way that one person could single-handedly bust up a relationship on his or her own.  NO way.  So I take responsibility for my part.

And now that I’ve been abruptly thrown out on my ass all alone (and for the first time, I might add), I am less than 3 years from being 40 years old and I am suddenly in a position where I am trying to sort out who I really am now.   That is hard to deal with because I feel like I’m doing something that I should have done when I was 17 years old.  So now I feel terrible and having a hard time with feeling so immature or so unsure of myself.  I feel lost among my peers because they all seem so far ahead of the game.  But you know what?  I allowed myself to be changed, I convinced myself that I needed to be someone that I wasn’t, and I adapted my personality and my likes and dislikes for people.  Truth be told, it doesn’t matter how or why…I could blame it on my passive-aggressive parents…my mother not being there for me when I really needed her the most as a child…my church…the man that raped me when I was 7…not getting the confirmation that I needed when I was a vulnerable pre-teen girl trying to find myself…whatever…I could blame the whole world.  Although there were some serious life-changing situations that probably 99% of you would give me a free pass for if I turned out to be bipolar, I’ve chosen not to shift blame…I am taking full responsibility for MY actions because that’s the only way I will turn those terrible things into learning experiences that will make me a better woman…someone that I will finally be proud of and that my kids will be proud of.  Whether my ex does or not, that’s his prerogative and not my business.  But I hope for his sake and for the sake of any future, meaningful relationships (I wish him all the best in that area) that he looks deep into himself and make some self-assessments and see his part in our relationship’s failure.  It’s not my place to point it out to him.  There are some things I could say to him about how I feel about him and what I believe he did to me, but despite having plenty opportunities to do so, I refuse to…I don’t see the value.  In the end, it’s not going to help me…the best thing I can do from this point on is to keep it the hell moving.

Now what does all of this have to do with anything?  Turning life’s experiences into meaningful lessons…and all of this leads to my concern about my thoughts this weekend…

I am wondering this weekend whether or not I am falling back into the pattern of throwing myself into the relationship and taking on/accepting things that I probably shouldn’t?  Am I once again setting myself up for changing the essence of who I am for another man?  I don’t want to do that again.  I do love Sir…and I want to spend the rest of my life with him and he knows that.  The really funny thing is that I do know THIS about him:  he would never respect me if I morphed into someone that I’m not just to please him.  He likes my uniqueness, my individuality, my intelligence, my quirkiness, and he encourages me to be true to who I am.  But ironically, he doesn’t realize that the bolder I get…the more confidence I gain…the more I discover who I am…well, some of the things he’s constantly doing to me over and over again (conscious or subconscious – even though I have clearly communicated to him about how they make me feel) are becoming more and more intolerable and, for the first time, I’m beginning to question whether or not we are really as compatible as I thought we were or if he’s even the one.  It’s disturbing.  Now I’m confused…and um…I think I’m just going to be quiet for a while…again…

(Help.)

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