Frozen Nowhere

Anyway…

I settled for STBX because I thought that he was someone that would fulfill what my family wanted for me — stable provider who was relatively kind to me and seemed to be supportive and liked children. Partly my choice of STBX was based on the fact that, as a rebound from a VERY bad relationship, he looked very good in comparison with the previous boyfriends. Partly I was wooed by the flowers and gifts, interest and gentleness that came from him BEFORE we were engaged. And that disappeared immediately after we were married, which should have been a hint that he didn’t care anymore…

The point is not what happened, but the fact that I SETTLED for someone that I wasn’t sure of because I felt that I was ready to enter the next part of my life — I was ready to be married and I was ready to start a family (at 23!!) and here was someone that seemed “good enough” to fill the role of husband, father and provider and who SEEMED a good match for me in the role of mate.

And that didn’t work out very well, did it? Like I stated before, it really didn’t take long before he was embarassed by me, when he took the opportunity to live away from home, and before I was just another stupid “purchase” tossed aside and taken for granted. And in the end the constant loneliness of being in a marriage with someone who really didn’t want to get to know me, and who wanted to believe I was cheating on him was too much. And I left.

Yes, I know… it doesn’t seem to be common for women to leave, from what I understand often the women ask the men to leave, and they retain the home until the house can be sold… but in my case I knew STBX would not leave the house AND provide support for the kids so I could pay the bills, and that left me little choice but to seek shelter somewhere else. And I left.

And I entered into yet another relationship disaster.

Only THIS disaster didn’t look like the first one. This one looked very very different.

Instead of being embarassed by me and wanting to keep me hidden, K seemed to glorify me, and to hold me up as some prize or goddess that he had been awarded by the Gods. But the problem was that he seemed to be holding me up to some divine standards — he expected me to feel exactly the same way about him that he felt about me, and I just didn’t.

For the most part K was very good to me… but there were moments when he clearly thought I had failed to live up to his standards of what our relationship was that he made me feel very very small, and very very unhappy. And the problem was that the unhappiness stayed, the relationship was quickly permeated by the feeling of unhappiness from him that I didn’t love him enough or in the way he wanted, and my unhappiness because I didn’t know why I didn’t feel the same way.

He treated me sometimes like a goddess, sometimes like a child, and it was always a very large discrepancy from what it was that I wanted. He would glorify me, telling me how lucky he was to have me, how he never thought he’d be this happy. And then at other times I felt like he was “raising” me, like I was a child-like thing to him, to be cradled and cared for, to be taught to be the right way… the way he treated me mirrored VERY closely the way he treated his only child. And that was a bit disturbing to me.

I never felt like an equal with K. I felt like I was either seen as “better” than he could deserve, or as if I were something to be cared for and protected, like a bunny or a child. And I didn’t want that. Because in the end, when I openned my eyes and saw for myself that this wasn’t working for me, I couldn’t really explain why to him or myself. It just wasn’t RIGHT for me, and honestly that should have been enough.

But it wasn’t, as he used every reason, every uncomfortable feeling, every issue that differentiated us to “improve” and every “improvement” as a reason to backlash against the fact that I didn’t feel as strongly as he did. And in the end it was very much a whiptail effect — as I felt disconnected he reacted by overdoing and overcompensating, and that made my feeling of discomfort worse, which would lead to him attacking my reasons and pushing harder to make it up to me by being more like what he thought I wanted.

But the very soul of the issue was not religon, tidiness, child rearing, hobbies, interests, or friends. It wasn’t getting out and having fun or relaxing. It wasn’t communicating. It wasn’t money or financial choices. It was just a feeling that we were not mates, not partners, and the fact that there was more guilt and obligation than care and love in the situation.

And I also found it creepy that, after the fact, I found out that K had made an oath to HIS GODS (not my Gods, not ME, not even himself, but to HIS Gods) to protect me from being abused again. I find this creepy in the same way I always think it is creepy when Christian people “pray” for you, its a feeling that you’re not able to entreat your OWN diety or Dieties on your own behalf, but that you are so spiritually deficient that you need someone else to take on spiritual responsibility on my behalf. Yuck.

I deny his right to do this, and therefor his worry that he is an “oath breaker” since the oath is not HIS, since he has no right to my spirit as he is not my mate/partner/husband… I have not given him a part of my spirit… and I don’t APPRECIATE the idea of being protected or guided or saved without being ASKED first.

So, yeah. I didn’t like being doted on because I felt too much like a pampered pet or an indulged child and not much like a fully capable adult woman who’s views and education had bearing on the focus of the relationship.

So… what DO I want?

I want a true partner, not someone who pats me on the head and gives me things, solves my problems for me, or who spouts on about undying love and how I am the only thing that makes him happy. I want someone that truely makes me happy, who I smile when I think of him. I want someone who knows that I am strong and capable, and can push me to get over my fears and do the things that I want to and need to, instead of being mired in self doubt.

I don’t want to be someone’s WORLD, I want to be part of their world.

I want someone positive. STBX was always negative about me and our outlook, K was just all around negative in almost everything he did and said (to the point of actually telling me he was thinking his life was OVER when I didn’t want to be with him anymore, and refusing to accept that feelings had changed). I want to move on with my positive life, I want to feel open and free to explore things inside myself and outside without being told that its stupid or embarassing or needs to be hidden.

And I am at the point, really, in my life where I want someone because I want a mate and partner, not because i NEED one. Maybe I never REALLY needed a relationship, maybe i never really did. I firmly believe that the only reason I settled for STBX was because I was “ready” to have kids and I wanted a settled man for that. I picked wrong. But at 20 I didn’t know that I had YEARS left to have children.

Now I can’t have children. I mourn the loss of my fertility, because I liked having children, being pregant. I know there is still posibility, somewhere down the line (should I ever be able to get divorced from STBX) if I want to. Did I have children with the wrong person? He isn’t a bad father, for all that he was neglectful as a husband. But I do wish I had been with someone who would have loved and supported me through and after pregnancies…

I would like another child… but at my age, given the fact that most men I know already HAVE children, I don’t think its likely.