Still Dating

[labug]

I should say, I'm not here to suffer, even tho it took me a long time to realize that suffering wasn't necessary. The earliest lessons we learn are the most difficult to expel.

I had IC yesterday and it was very affirming but I also learned a few things.

H and I had a misunderstanding over the weekend. Text induced, again. The short story is, I asked him to share more about something he had said in the previous text. All I texted was: Share. He said he was tired and would tell me another time but needed to sleep cause he had to get up early. I then texted: Thought it would be a short answer. Nite.

He then came back with how hard he works, he's tired, etc.

So we were on the way to a major misunderstanding. When I got the text about how hard he works, I knew it had gone off tracks, so I asked if he was OK, no response, then just sent sleep well.

The victory for me was that the old me reared up for about half a second and the words "I work hard too..." were there but I was able to stop them and think about what was really happening, a stupid text misunderstanding but H's was hurt by whatever. I didn't negate that, which would have been the old me.

A few minutes later he sent me an email saying he felt disrespected. My response was, let's talk about this tomorrow. I don't ever want to disrespect you.

Another victory, he let me know what he was feeling, didn't retreat to "There's nothing wrong, everything's fine." then silence.

We talked about it, he recognized that he misunderstood and apologized (huge). I recognized that he had feelings and didn't devalue them.

My IC talks a often about separateness, not physical but emotional. I've always been uncomfortable with negative feelings of others. I felt the need to fix it, make them better. I now realize that other people can have feelings that have nothing to do with me, that I don't have to fix. I can recognize and validate but not take it on. That's a part of separateness.

And even tho what I said triggered H's feelings, I didn't cause his anger. It was up to him to figure out why he felt as he did and do what he needed to do to fix it.

It was up to me to provide a safe, non-judgmental place to have a conversation about it. For those who've been with me from the beginning, you know that judgment was a huge part of who I was.

This is just geling in my mind so it may not make a lot of sense to anyone but me.

And at the root of it all is fear.

WE talk a lot abut detachment. I read a post I wrote that someone else reposted and it was about fear and detachment. We have to overcome fear in order to be detached. There are no steps to detachment other than to overcome fear. There are things you can do to help but until you can face your life fearlessly, we're stuck

We stay attached because we're afraid of life without that other person. I know I wasn't detached until I was able to look at my life realistically and realize, not so bad. Actually pretty d@mn good.

But I had to overcome a lot of fear to get there.