Countdown to New Year, and fresh start?

[istherehope]

Hi,

Just haven't posted in a couple of days, so thought I'd do some journaling. Not a lot is going on here. Things are sort of at a standstill at the moment. There haven't been any recent major breakthroughs or blowouts. Good thing is that I have now been back home for 7 weeks today, and there have not been any fights whatsoever. We used to fight like crazy. In fact it was the rare weekend where there wouldn't be yelling and tears. That is definitely not the case anymore. From my side if H starts to get irritable, I validate whenever possible. I can only control my own actions, so I think very carefully before responding to things, rather than just saying the first thing that pops into my mind.

I have let H take the lead on everything possible. Previously he said I was controlling, and I accept that I was. Of course, to be fair, even when I did try to get him to make suggestions for us to do things together he usually didn't have any. I like planning, so he'd go along with things, and I had thought this was more or less OK. Now, we have a few trips planned. I am still booking the hotels, flights etc. for most of them as H has been busy with work and school. However before I book anything, I ask for his input, and whether he has any other suggestions. This seems to work fine. We have a trip to Brazil coming up in March. This is getting booked through his work, and he is taking the lead on this. His travel agent found tickets that cost more than the amount we've been allocated for this trip, and this was extremely frustrating to me as I found tickets that cost 300E less, and would have left us with money for hotels. Well I just asked whether we could still book through his company if we had to pay extra and mentioned that that was why I had tried to find cheaper flights. He wants to just book the more expensive flights, so I've kept my mouth shut.

Things are nice between us in terms of the dynamic. We chat about things, can be in the same room together for hours etc., and it feels comfortable. However, there are very few real conversations, and I know one of H's issues had been the lack of intimacy (emotional). I don't feel that I am in the place to address this though, as he still seems to want to keep some distance. So I am hoping the upcoming trips will help us get through that barrier. I do ask him about work and school, and other serious non-R topics when I can. In terms of future talk, there isn't really any direct future talk like planning for where we will move. H does make comments around things like the "next one we buy", or the next time he sees my mom etc. that indicate he is thinking I will be in his life in the future, but this is not explicitly stated. ML happens sometimes, and has happened twice in the last 4 days, which is a good thing. The last time we had a real "conversation" about things was by email, when he said that he wanted time to adjust to things and that he would go to MC etc. after the New Year. I feel like New Years Eve will be some kind of marker for us both. At the moment it feels like we are really building up to something, but that I need to let it happen without pushing. I guess that I am hoping that this upcoming trip will let us see the relationship in another light. We will be around others, and not stuck in our daily routine. I think we are missing fun and lightness between us, and hoping this trip will help in that way.

So apologies for the novel. It is just interesting for me to step back a bit and take stock of the situation. We've come so far, but now we're sort of at that scary point where we are going to have to start doing real work together to move forward. I hope H will be up for it.

ITH