First Buds

[mustardseed]

A lot to think about. Boundaries are definitely an issue with me but like jujub I was always very clear on those boundaries in the beginning then I slowly start to give my autonomy away as I get more deeply involved. I recently found some old journals and have been rereading about my love life from my mid teens right up until before I met H. Interesting to see the patterns.

I've been in 4 significant Rs in my life. H was the only one I never considered marrying. The first was with an egotistical blow hard who no-one liked.He was in with the in crowd like H. Image meant more than substance. Just saw it in him. It was so much more hidden in H. I always thought of H as first BF done right. H appeared to be humble where first BF was haughty. They were both the all American high school athletes. Entitled.although h masked it so well.
Second BF WAS DEFINITELY a friend more than anything. We had a lot of exciting adventurestogether. Travelled. Tried new foods and music. It was a fun time, but the attraction was never really there. He had his own form of arrogance but they were built around his talents and intellect which was legit. Just annoying at times. And my response when he was being overly pretentious was to start acting really shallow and dumb. Immature on my part, but I think I was trying to turn him off and it worked. We broke up but stayed friends until BF number 3.

That was a crazy time in my life. It was intensity in every way.he was clingy and manipulative--in a childish and emotional kind of way. We broke up and got back together almost monthly in the most intense possible situations. It kind of felt good to be given permission to just give in to every emotional response I felt. I was younger and an idiot and I really lowered my expectations for myself. I came out of that longing for peace and stability. I needed to reclaim who I was. My life was spiraling out of control and on the brink of adulthood I was heading in a really bad direction.

I felt so free and happy when I finally made the decision to never go back after that last break up. I reclaimed my life and started to love myself again. That's when I met H. And he was the total opposite of that last destructive r. He seemed calm and grounded and I never felt like I had to pretend with him. It was peaceful. I quickly dropped all of my boundaries and rules with him because he was such a breath of fresh air.

I think that is why it was so easy for me to ignore signs. To look the other way when subtle things happened. We were living together in less than 2 months and married less than a year after meeting. I never trusted so fully. I never kept my mouth shut like that before. But after the previous R I was convinced I was an emotional hurricane and I was going to be the complete opposite with H. So I would speak up then quickly back down. H must have loved my self-loathing. He was the hero. I was the lucky one. It wasn't until almost 10 years of marriage that I started to realize that I needed to step up to the plate. I thought it was going to save all of our marital problems by me taking on more decision making. Things never got done before and I thought I'd be easing his stress.but everything I did was wrong or annoying. The rules kept changing and I never new. I think he sensed me getting stronger and breaking out of the "I'm the problem I'm lucky he loves me" frame of mind and into a more equal partnership role. He went along with it in words, rejected it on actions. As always. But now I no longer let his behavior dictate how I proceeded. I thought it would make things better. Instead he jumped right into discard.

I am able to separate intimacy and commitment. I was able to be in love 3 times before with zero intention of marrying the person. I can be a friend and lover and walk away when the R has run its course. I've done it three times before and while there was a grieving process it wasn't devastating or bitter because I always new what the Rd were and I understood why they didn't work. They were just for the moment Rs and sometimes they lasted 4 years, sometimes 6 months sandwich between friendship. But I never saw them as permanent.

H threw me for a loop. That was the first time
--the only time--I really felt THIS IS THE ONE. This is true love. I felt like me again, but I also set myself up to get subtly torn down. To say our marriage disintegrated isn't true. Yes we had issues and we drifted apart, but that's not entirely true. It was more like we had a wall between us that would systematically be taken down and put back up based on Hs needs. I'd start to move away from the wall and he'd quickly grab me and pull me back in. Once settled the wall would go back up.

He points to facts that "prove" our marriage was breaking down, but those same facts were true even when we were at the heights of our romance. Before even marriage. How does it prove we drifted apart when it was a constant not a change.

All of those things carefully placed as "normal" because in spite of it look at how crazy we are about each other. Until the discard when's it is suddenlyevidence that our marriage has broken down.

I took responsibility for everything for such a long time. I believed the lies. I believed I was at fault. Yes, my boundaries were blurred, but a lot of that was strategically designed. I honestly don't know if I could safely not fall for this type of pathological behavior. My previous Rs weren't healthy or good either, but I knew what I was dealing with. I chose to be in it and I chose to leave it. This time around I was living in someone else's set design. An unscripted reality that was carefully designed to get the response he needed. He was the game maker, the producer, the marketing team and I had no clue that was what I signed up for.

That's why I am a sociologist this time around. Because my instincts were so very wrong