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.