A few lessons from the land of not quite love
So being in therapy for 2 years and counting is teaching me a few things not exactly at speed — I often find that it’s just nice to have someone to talk to who doesn’t in turn need to talk about themselves, or somehow agree with everything you say. I am often wrong, and sometimes right, but certainly not both all of the time. I find my therapist can empathise with me, but can also call me out on a lot of things in a way that friends sometimes can’t — especially so with ‘relationships’ (I always use this term lightly having never really had a long term relationship — I think 4 months was my longest, and that was a distance one).
One of the first things we did was recognise how my depression tends to spiral when something ends — whatever that thing may be — it just gets to a point where I can’t control it and it drags me off in to a really awful place, even if I present to the outside world that I’m OK. Most of the time my depression is merely a product of just being over stimulated — if there’s too much going on, stuff that I can otherwise control, it just makes me flatline a bit. I’m listless, don’t really want to do much, sleep as much as possible (I’m going through something like this at the moment), and it just takes some poking to get me out of it. Which I will. Eventually.
Once we’d figured out how my depression works, my therapist asked me to make a list of people who I’d had a ‘relationship’/been intimate with/anyone who’d had an impact in one way or another and how they made me feel. I’m going to share that list now, without names.
1 — Don’t lose your virginity to a goth whilst listening to The Mission. Actually the worst part of this was the music by far! No hard feelings now as it was so long ago but I have to say they haven’t aged all that well (Facebook is good for something!) which a small part of me really likes knowing! :) I do have that slight Scorpio ego!
2 — Do not have a one night stand with your then best friends fuck buddy. It’s quite simply not worth it.
3 — You are quite literally a groupie now. Urgh. The only thing I remember from this was huge (you know where!) and worst date ever.
4 — On again off again on again off again is not a game you play over a period of 6 years!! No matter how hot he is/was (I haven’t seen him in a long time). I am happy we are friends now (at least at an occasional email level of friendship) but I feel that I shouldn’t have taken it all so seriously and should have gotten over it so much quicker than I did, but we did have undeniable chemistry which is hard to shake off.
5 — Narcissistic Knights in tin foil are the absolute worst!! They will come for you at your most vulnerable, fuck you a couple of times (mostly when they’re bored) and will ruin your life….at least for a while. I’ve tried to extricate this person from my life for years failing miserably at each opportunity, and he’s only apologised for being a total arsehole once when he was high. I won’t ever forgive or forget. He was supposed to be my friend and used me when I was at my most vulnerable — a pattern he has repeated a good number of times with other people too. I should have known better.
(Number 4 again! Just to make sure!)
6 — There are some people who are genuine and kind. You won’t recognise this and will ruin things by closing down emotionally. He was/is lovely and I wish I didn’t hurt him by being so distant. The day we broke up was probably one of the saddest days I’ve had. I only want the best for this one. He is good and decent, and I hope someone with the right emotional strength will find him, and treat him better than I ever could.
7 — Fancied the absolute fuck out of him for months (still do) — I got REALLY drunk and propositioned him and it worked….of a sorts. Afterwards he dismissed my feelings entirely which made me feel incredibly sad, but of course I pretended I was fine. I need to be confident in the first instance, then get turned down, and then get earth shatteringly drunk! Not the earth shatteringly drunk, then drag someone to bed method. Also patchy memory and definitely not talking it out afterwards makes me think that I was a really bad shag…which is weird as I have never had any complaints in that department. Just generally feel if I could go back and do things differently I absolutely would.
There are other people in this list, but I’m not sure if emotionally intimate, or straight up abuse (there is someone out there who genuinely threatened to kill me! Oh and the physical assault at a music festival — and you know how the goth scene works….no escaping that person) counts — although their actions still cloud my every step. Intimacy isn’t all about sex, it’s how they get in to your life and change it; for good or bad. I just think it’s important to be open when we’re often told to be quiet, or limit your emotions, or just something else equally heinous. Be open, be emotional (it’s not all bad) and don’t be afraid to call people out, yourself included. I think this list shows me in not the best light (People pleaser on one hand; emotionally distant on the other) as well as calling others out. I’m not the easiest person to care for, so I often attract people who quite simply don’t, and when I do attract people who do I don’t know how to handle it and I close down. I will figure this out eventually — promise.
