Had dinner last night with a friend who I oddly enough met on my flight home from South America. She is now 21 days sober thanks to our in flight conversation.
She was telling me that after four years of being single she is ready to meet someone and start a great relationship and family but is frustrated that it's not happening. She then went on to tell me about all of the activities that she's involved in, literally one every night. She's been dating a guy causally, but that relationship really just involves him hanging out by himself while she does stuff (not really a relationship).
My take on it was that she has no space for a relationship. Even the one she currently has doesn't have enough space for it. She dislikes being alone so much that she's filled every night of her week with something social - and basically with the same group of people.
I asked what would happen if she had a night to herself, and she said she hated being lonely and would realize just how lonely she was if she were ever alone.
She then asked me about my situation and it came to me very quickly - I'm terrified of filling my space (of really GAL'ing). On some level I believe that if I get busy, if I acquire a new social circle, if I start filling my social calendar etc that it will somehow stop my W from coming back. I know it doesn't make sense, but that's my irrational fear. It's like telling the Universe that I don't want her back.
When I told me W two weeks ago that my main focus was my sobriety she took it to mean that I was "moving on" or so she says. This could be some of the root of this fear. I don't want to appear that I'm moving on, just moving forward.
Today I'm working on this and trying to move forward as if my W didn't exist while still holding a space for her in my heart. It's a tough balance for me, but I know that if I just continue to sit at home and read when I'm not at work, it's just going to make me feel needy when we do get in the same room together.
Can anyone else relate to this? Is this fear of "dropping the rope"? Or something else?
M 39 W 36 T5 M3 BD - 1/15 Separated - Same Day Served 9/15 D finalized 6/17
