Now where did I read that...

Monday, October 31, 2011

Bad Habits and Heartbreak

It's become shockingly, vividly clear to me as of late that Mr Nice Guy is, in reality, the first person I've ever truly been in love with.
I have always looked at people like they were stupid when they asked me how I knew I loved someone I was dating. I did love them, all of them. It's the nature of my heart to love- but I never knew it could be like this.
How could I?
To trust someone completely is something I never knew I hadn't experienced. I always thought that the way my relationships were is the way all relationships were and would be- I gave up things to be with that person, and sometimes that meant not telling them everything I'd hoped I'd be able to tell someone I loved. Now, though, it's like dawn finally came after a particularly long winter night.
There is nothing I can't tell him.
I've told him things I didn't even want to think about- because I needed someone to share that knowledge before I could face it as fact.
I'm sure there's some people who may not like the idea that I wasn't really in love before this. Honestly, it doesn't change the way I look at my past or those people I loved. I still love them, and always will, and, in the end, it's really the same thing it would have been if I had been in love with them- they weren't the one I needed to find. There are certain people who I think may have been that person, given different circumstances, and a select few who I genuinely believe helped to put me on the path to finding Mr Nice Guy. One in particular because he was the single most painful relationship I've been in, and certain others who, simply made me realize that there were men out there that would love me and treat me like an equal and a lady, and it wouldn't mean giving up everything to have that. In some ways, there are people I wish had been "that person", and I suppose grieving is a natural part of moving forward. I have lost in order to come to this point. I had to give up some people and some habits that would have held me back from being the person I need to be right now. It would be nice if I never had to, but, really, I don't think life works that way.
I have been through hell and back, and my relationships weren't always the best part of my life, though sometimes they were. I can't honestly say, though, that there is a single step I regret taking, although there are still very, very many questions I wish I'd had answered- and honestly.
A lot of my confusion surrounds Danger. The Lord knows I love that man. The problem was, I never got close enough to see all of the man I loved. I can't say who's at fault for that, or if it was nothing more than circumstance. I believe with all my heart that he loved me on some level, and I believe that he wanted me to be happy. I'm not quite as positive about all his intentions or plans, but I believe that, whatever else may have happened, that he was a good man with a good heart.
I just wish I knew more.
I will always love Danger, among others. It's time for me to grieve the loss of those good people I have loved, though, and realize that it's only through truly grieving that I allow myself to move forward.
Mr Nice Guy and I have discussed marriage and babies. I refuse to find myself surrounded by a family, only to realize that there is bitterness or disappointment in my heart. This life isn't how I dreamt it would be, but it is mine, and it may be the only one I have. I can't spend every moment steeped in regret.

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Moment Of Clarity

I understand why I didn't meet Mr. Nice Guy before.
I can't explain where this came from, exactly, but I'll try. I wondered if he would still love me this way when I was more the person I want to become. I knew he'd laugh at me for even considering this, but I realized I really am not that terribly far away from who I truly feel I am in my heart.
It made perfect sense.
How could he love the rowdy girl who spent four plus nights a week at the country bar, and was determined to get attached to a special forces unit, but still be able to love me when I stopped needing to go out all the time, start doing yoga, trying to heal and planning for a life after the army? He may accept even the rowdiest side of me, but he fell in love with who I really am, not who I needed to be in that moment.
Of course he can love who I really am.
He already does.

Monday, October 24, 2011

Fore!

Mr Nice Guy and I have been together four months today.
I continue to be more grateful for his presence in my life every single day.
He has more patience and understanding and compassion than anyone I have ever known.
Mother Theresa would have loved him.
I snap at him sometimes, but he doesn't push me away or let my frustration get to him. He is so good to me, and so sweet, and so loving, I just don't know how love can be this easy. He makes me laugh constantly (even and especially when I don't want to, the stubborn lil bugger) and hasn't yet made me feel alone or unloved, not even for a second. If I'm having a bad day and want to feel loved, I don't need to ask. All I have to do is reach out my hand, and his will take mine, and hold it for as long as I need him to.
I love him so much.

Work, well, is work. I'm simply putting up a shield because I need, badly, to believe that these people don't matter right now. I don't want this place to be my life anymore, so I am putting up walls. They can't change me, they can't hurt me. I just need to be an individual again. I am expendable to them, so they no longer matter to me. I am just going to focus on my writing and whatever happens in this place is simply periferal.

What I want to work on most right now is a written piece outlining who I am- just me, without all this Army crap involved. This is what I need to know, what I need tattooed on my mind on days I must trudge through all of this madness- who I am, who I want to be, who I will be. I need me.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Just Pray

Mr Nice Guy is out playing Army this week, being a medic to all of the guys out in the field with him.
It's unusual for him to be somewhere he is allowed to have his cell phone but doesn't get reception, but this week, that is the case. He left early yesterday morning (Monday) and is expected back sometime at the end of the week.
He has, for all intensive purposes, moved in with me at this point. Now, please remember, that I don't claim to be perfect, let alone a perfect Baha'i, and, for the record, no, this is not something accepted by my Faith or the community of my faith. This has been a choice I made.
In any case, Sunday night, for the second time since we've been together, we prayed together. The first time, he asked me to pray with him, and I mostly just held his hand and felt pride, fear and love in listening to what he had to say to God. This time, I asked him to pray with me. I am nothing short of stunned how difficult it was for me to ask him this. I've never prayed with anyone before, not like this, and the level of vulnerability is stunning.
This time, neither of us kept silent. Despite our difference of religion- he is a Christian and I am a Baha'i- we fluidly moved from one voice to the other's, from the worries on one heart, to both or the others. He knows me so well, much of what was on my heart, he said, rather than I. To some degree, I think he was surprised at the things I both thanked and asked God for- I am much better at saying what is on my mind when I think about it first, and when I am truly in the moment, with no worry of repercussion or hope of particular response. I was surprised at how articulate I became in that moment, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
There are many types of intimacy, it seems, though so often that word now carries connotations of sexual action. Even within sexual intimacy, I think, there are many levels of intimacy. Sex is not a simple matter, made up of only one possibility or school of thought. Having this incredible level of emotional, mental and spiritual intimacy within my relationship is incredibly new, and incredibly comforting to me. I have always envied the marriages of highly spiritual or religious friends. I was always impressed with the fluidity they share with their spouse- they seem, more than other couples, to be one, rather than two people sharing the same space. I am beginning to understand the reason for that.
I have had people, friends, former boyfriends, my ex-husband, even the occasional family member who really opened up to me. There have been people in my life I truly felt like I knew. The vast majority of those people are no longer in my life, a good many of them because of choices they made that I couldn't have imagined them making. It dissolved my ability to trust people that I thought I knew. Mr Nice Guy, though, is not the same... From talking to him about personal things, to opening up about details of past hurts, to watching walls I never knew were there come crashing down with him... And, now, this is someone I can share things with that I've only been comfortable talking to God about before... I can talk to God as I always have, but with someone I really, really care about...
I just don't think it can possibly get too much more intimate than that.
I am very much in love with Mr Nice Guy. I am beyond thrilled to have such a wonderful man in my life. He is the type of person I always thought was simply too good for me. He's not the type I found myself angry at or jealous of because of the quality of who he is; that type of person was just simply that kind that I had no chance of being or being with, there were no questions or doubts about this to me. And yet here I am.
While I am struggling with the various and progressing symptoms of PTSD right now, and, though the violent, vivid and all too often new nightmares have become a regular thing, I no longer feel like I'm fighting this battle by myself or for myself. I have always had this India Arie-like image in my mind of the woman I want to be. More than ever, I want to become this person.
I don't want to become this person just for myself, though, I want to become this person because Mr Nice Guy deserves someone like that in his life. His children deserve someone like that to be their mother. Eventually, I expect, I will likely find myself believing that I deserve to be someone like that. I would be lying if I said I felt like I deserve anything of the sort, though. I still feel too much like a burden, too much like I can't help the people I want to or do the things I wish I could or feel I should.
I am trying to write more- though it doesn't always appear here- and trying to listen to more positive music. I am trying to absorb the attitudes I wish to adapt as my own. I am focusing on learning how to be this happy, healthy, intelligent person that, so much of the time, I simply don't feel like I am.
I am trying to take care of myself and improve myself.
That is so much more difficult than that one little sentence makes it out to be.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

The System Is Broken

I have been trying to get in to see a shrink for over three months. I finally got a phone call, and have one appointment at the end of this month, and another the end of next month. My leadership seems to think I'm just a waste of their time, resources and positions, and are treating me accordingly. Anger has become so prominent it seems always just below the surface my entire work day, and worse when I must deal with these "leaders". I am tired, I am angry, and I continue to feel more broken every day. I am scared of my temper, I am scared of facing this stress and all the stress with my family and roommate on top of it. I am scared that I will find myself losing control the next time I am told to do something that will have a negative impact on me or the next time I'm forced to listen to my boss take credit for something I did entirely on my own, when he and his counterpart were completely unreachable and/or unresponsive, and then listen to him talk about having gone home early the same day I was doing so much alone and without being able to reach him. I am tired. I am treated like I have done something wrong and must be cut from the group, and I am already struggling so much. Mr Nice Guy is the most stable part of my life and I could not be more grateful for the man who continues to hold my hand through it all, and be there for me every time I cry.
I try to focus on the positive- Mr Nice Guy and our dog, Sugar- but find myself overwhelmed and miserable as I struggle just to get my own business taken care of.