I've had two major relationships in my life and in breaking them down to brass tacks, I made the same mistakes in both, I was just better at justifying things the second go around. Both times, I looked for the wrong signs indicating success and was so certain both times that my family just didn't understand how good these guys were for me. I was blind to my unhappiness in the first relationship and it wasn't until after the break up that my family revealed their misgivings. In the second, I thought if my family could see that with this guy I was happy, they would agree that we were perfect for one another. When that failed and my mother, father, sisters, and brother still disapproved of the match, I convinced myself they didn't understand our love and they lacked faith in my ability to have a healthy relationship because of my past experience. Let me say that again so as to emphasize the craziness -- I convinced myself that the 5 people who have known me all my life, who know me better than anyone in the world, were ill equipped to judge my compatability with someone I had met only a year prior. I knew they were wrong and I set out to prove to them just how wrong they were, and in the process, I discovered in 1 year and 2 months what they knew from the start. My first reaction, once the river of tears momentarily paused, "Dammit! My mom was fucking right!" One of the scariest feelings in the world is when it is made abundantly clear that someone knows you better than yourself. It is a very vulnerable position in which to find oneself. The remedy, to call your mom letting her know she was right and finding out that the only thing she cares about is that you are hurting.
Be cherished! That is the inscription on the claddagh ring my parents got for me for my birthday several years ago. Not "be tolerated" not "find someone who will put up with you" not "find some one indifferent to you." It says, Be Cherished! as in find someone who feels like the luckiest bastard in the world to have found you, someone who feels they can't live with out you, who puts you first, who dreams of spending the rest of his life getting to know you, someone for whom you feel the same way. The problem with my relationships and what my family could see that I couldn't, I found guys who at that point in their lives, felt I was the lucky one that they would love me. As far as syntax goes, it is a small distinction, but in practice, it is everything. Both times, this thinking resulted in my reverting to the mentality of a 5 year old in the presence of my significant other, I became an insecure, dependent, attention seeking, little girl who I hated and didn't recognize, but avoiding her was strangely difficult. It was also counter productive because rarely do those behaviors inspire anyone other than the mother of a 5 year old to offer attention. On the opposite side, those days when I was frustrated enough with this lack of attention that I seemed distant, I received the attention I sought so feverishly any other day. I resented these occasions as they were a reminder that the relationships were a power struggle and the one who cared the least held the temporary lead. In case you have never experienced this phenomenon, it really sucks to be the one who doesn't care least. I believe that real love, the love on which lasting relationships are build is not one that requires this sort of game playing.
I tend to ramble and sometimes even lose my way in my own thought processes. So to redirect and draw this page to a close, There is one thing I have not yet really accepted but need to remind myself everyday: if the man I am with makes me become someone I neither recognize nor like, however painful it maybe to admit, he is not the one. What's the worst thing that could happen anyway, I live the rest of my life unmarried with a house full of dogs (allergic to cats)? At least I already have a nice set of fine china :)
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