I try to live my life in the open… mostly.

I try to be open to myself, open to the world, open to people.  I try not to hide who I am here.

But I still have been having a very difficult time getting to know other people in my real life.  In the past I have often felt very disconnected, cut off, unwanted, unloved, and unworthy. In short, I often felt LONELY.

Loneliness is not necessarily being ALONE

In the past I believed (wrongly) that my worth as a woman was determined by my ability to get a man. When I was with someone I gave up everything I was to try and be who that person wanted, whether that was “me” or not, and this often led me choosing men that were not compatible and with the men I was with treating me poorly (or maybe they wanted someone who would put up with their bullshit and they looked for the compliant, people-pleasing girls who would do ANYTHING for them??).   When I was not attached to a man I didn’t feel like I fit into the world – social life was very much a “couples” arena where the single people were gawked at as there was something “wrong” with them – and I would become desperate to find SOMEONE to like me.

I was pretty and lively and wonderful, but I believed boyfriends (and husband) who told me that I wasn’t – ugly, plain, boring, bitchy, frigid, slutty, fat, scrawny, flat-chested, stupid, moron, useless, unlovable… — because I based my worth on what the men in my life told me, and with how much I pleased them.  I was TERRIFIED of “ending up alone”.

I’m not going to go on about the hows and whys of getting into abusive relationships here – if you have been unlucky enough to find yourself involved in an abusive situation you know how hard it is to explain why you not only didn’t SEE it but why it was so freaking hard to get OUT of once you were in – but I do believe that the isolation that was caused by being involved in domestic/partner abuse helped solidify the pattern of jumping from one man to the next to the next in hopes that THIS relationship would magically be different, that it would be that perfect thing that fulfilled me.

Instead I went through one relationship after another that just left me HURT, confused, unloved, and profoundly LONELY. I put up with being called names, being told I was unlovable, useless, frigid, unloving, unkind, and that I wanted to be abused*.
*the ironic part was that while he was telling me that I WANTED to be abused, I was trying to get away from the “perfect” way he was treating me that I thought was abuse and HE thought was how a real loving, respectful relationship was supposed to be!

I would go from ONE abusive relationship that left me feeling lonely and unfulfilled to ANOTHER abusive, lonely, unfulfilling relationship… filling my life with the trying to make someone else love me enough to make me believe I was worthy.

And then something CHANGED

It’s hard to pin point WHAT exactly changed. I was with TheNoodle (R ), so it wasn’t like I was really a single woman who learned to be happy with her singlehood.  All I remember was a gradual sense of dissatisfaction with the way things were going with TheNoodle and trying to determine if this was really what I wanted in my life, if this was going to be “as good as it gets” was it gonna be better than being alone.

A radical change happened there, did you see it?  I was looking to see what I wanted out a relationship, and I actually balanced the idea of being ALONE against being stuck in yet another unfulfilling relationship!

I started to look at what I had in my life, my goals, my dreams… my potential. For the first time in my life I looked at how the relationship I found myself in with TheNoodle and placed it against the life I wanted to make for myself. And in EVERY aspect of my life I was better off WITHOUT TheNoodle — financially, socially, physically, sexually, spiritually, emotionally, with my family, with friends, with the kids, intellectually. He wasn’t abusive, he wasn’t violent… but he wasn’t worth the time and energy I put into him.

I started to realize that I was truly FREE to make my life my own, and to make it all I dreamed for myself and my children. I was no longer held back, I could make things HAPPEN if I wanted them to…

But not with TheNoodle holding me back.

I wanted to own a home.

I wanted to travel.

I wanted a good relationship with my kids.

I wanted to explore my spirituality.

I wanted to try new flavours, recipes, activities, experiences.

I wanted to be active

I want to LIVE my life. I want to EXPERIENCE. I want to PARTICIPATE in my life. I want to CONNECT, SHARE, and EXPERIMENT.

And when I stood back and really LOOKED at what I had gotten myself into with TheNoodle? Well… it was not gonna get me anywhere near the life I wanted.

And after thinking about it for MONTHS I came to the conclusion that I no longer wanted a relationship with him:

He wasn’t good enough for ME, it had nothing to do with me not being good enough for HIM.

He wasn’t worth my time and attention, my care, or my money. I could no longer JUSTIFY the mental, physical, emotional or FINANCIAL burden that he (and his kids) had become on my life.

My attitude changed for the better

Instead of focusing every night on how lonely I was and how upset I was that TheNoodle wasn’t honouring my feelings and needs in the relationship, I was actively doing things that I enjoyed. Instead of worrying about talking to him I was happy about being left to think for myself. Instead of wanting to see him, I found myself unhappy when he and his kids asked to visit and take up my precious free time.

I let it go.

I let go the idea that to be happy and fulfilled i NEEDED a relationship with a man.

I let go the idea that I couldn’t do things for myself, with myself, and by myself and feel “right”.

I started to focus on becoming comfortable with me.

I made a commitment to MYSELF to change the things in my life that I wasn’t happy with, and make them MINE again.

I’m not always SURE… but I know a few things right now:

• I am taking a sabbatical from dating/relationships to work on finding my OWN light
• I am focusing on my relationships with myself, my kids and my Gods
• I need time ALONE to focus on my own private work
• Sometimes the best thing I can do is housework or solitary chores
• I know when I need to be with others, I know when I need to work on solitary things
• Its okay to be a “Heartless Bitch” and enforce healthy boundaries

I missed doing a Check-in last week because, well… things were crazy (and I was crazy exhausted because my neighbors woke me up SUPER early (4am) and I wasn’t well (UTI))… anyway here I am again…

The Bad Stuff

Still Exhausted

Just plain exhausted.  It seems that no matter how early I go to bed at night (I try to be in bed by 10pm, which is “early” since I get home from whatever activity I had that night at 8:30pm or 9:30pm and then I usually need to wash dishes and sweep floors and do some housekeeping) I don’t seem to be able to get a RESTFUL sleep.  With my anxiety over everything right now, and worrying that at any minute something unexpected will catch me off guard, I tend to wake up 4-6 times during the night.

Too Much to do

While I know I will get it done (I really have no choice with this) I am also keenly aware that this time I am completely on my own.  This is the first time in my life that I haven’t had either a partner OR family to help me move. And its freaking SCARY, because I feel like I am leaping out there and risking everything without any support. And I know that even when I was married I didn’t have support. And I know that I didn’t have support from R at all. But it FEELS different not having anyone at the end of the day… you know?

I just HAVE to get everything out of the old place in order to clean the place completely for the landlord. I might not like the way he treated me, or the fact that he never did any upkeep of the property once he left, but it is basic respect to leave the place clean…

I will do what I can to get it done. That’s all I can do.

Hard times in my head

I have been attending a group for women who have been involved in domestic violence situations AND have started seeing a counselor as well this week. This has been bringing up a lot of feelings that I had stuffed down for so long. I have been feeling LESS safe in my suite, with the partying going on over my head at all hours of the night, strangers coming and going and slamming doors, and having to call the police several times a week to get the neighbors above me to turn their music down so it doesn’t rattle the windows and pictures. I have been remembering all sorts of nastiness with theEx, theStalker, and ColdBlood that I thought that I had forgotten – outbursts, feelings of intimidation, fearful feelings – and it hasn’t really made it easy for me to deal with a lot of the things that I have going on in my life.  I have it on good authority, though, that I am, in fact, NOT crazy to have felt that these men treated my badly and that I DO have the right to have distanced myself from them.

Still… I think it’s gonna take time.

Haven’t been doing the journaling/tarot thing

I sorta dropped the ball this past weekend when the UTI and exhaustion caught me off guard, and the stress took over when I got LESS done than I wanted to (because of the feeling of ICK)… and the overwhelm took over when I got overscheduled and realized that I had only 3 weeks left. What that has meant is that I seemed to have dropped the 5 minute journaling/tarot card pull from my daily routine.  And I have realized I have felt… um… less grounded lately too. Although that COULD be that there is a deadline  or two or three bearing down on me right now…

I think maybe cutting the reading before bed by 5-10 minutes and putting this back into my routine might not be a bad idea.

The GOOD Stuff

Almost FREE

Although the stress is likely to do me in this next 3 weeks… I am almost free from the daily stress and pressure of living in a shared dwelling with people who do not know how to respect differences and needs of others. Maybe it’s wrong of me to expect them to have some sort of idea of how to respectfully SHARE space and do things like:

• Clean up after their dog when she messes in the laundry room
• Clean up the yard after she deposits dog-logs all over EVERYTHING
• Not leave garbage on the back step where their dog will rip it open and SHRED it all over the yard
• Remove their laundry from the laundry room when they are done
• Turn their music down when asked politely, or by 11pm as per the general noise ordinance
• NOT slam the doors when they go in and out
• NOT allow their friends to try to get into my suite (or not DARE their friends to do that)
• NOT smoke drugs (or actually ANYTHING) in the house

Anyway… it’s just a matter of DAYS before I get away from having to live with them and they become someone ELSE’s problem.

ALMOST DIVORCED!

After 2.5 years away from theEx, I have FINALLY signed the affidavit for dissolution of marriage. According to the MoronLawyer, now it goes to HIS lawyer and then to the Court of Queen’s Bench. Depending on how busy the courts are, and how many holidays fall in the middle of the process, it could be anywhere from 4-6 more weeks before I am finally granted the certificate of divorce.

It was an expensive milestone, but I needed to be free from ties to him.

My own STYLE

With my own home comes the ability to decorate in my OWN style. Sure it will be a while before I will be able to afford to replace my living room furniture, but over time I will be making my new home MINE.

This is the first time in my life that I will have a space that I don’t need to get permission to do what I want to my own space. I don’t have to be accountable to my parents, a boyfriend, a husband or a landlord!! I can (and will) paint the walls whatever colour I want. I can put down whatever kinds of rugs I want! I can hang up my needlework and my degrees. I get to decide what I want to do, and I get to make it happen… WITHOUT ANYONE ELSE SAYING I CAN’T!

I can (and will) put up an altar. I can do a house blessing. I don’t have to account for ANYONE if I want bright colours or dark colours or even WHITE all over the place. It will be MY place.

It’s the first part of my independence!

Making my friend Sunil come to visit

Yes, I totally intend to make my friend Sunil visit… and help paint things garish colours (and likely help pack a few things, and do a house blessing ) and you know why? Because I have a house!! And because he totally needs to visit and celebrate with me! HOUSE!! YAY!! DIVORCE (almost)!! YAY!! BEING SINGLE !! YAY!!!

Yes, I like to make up events to make Sunil visit – like throwing myself a baby shower when I had GirlChild and throwing myself a birthday party when I turned 35 – maybe its kinda sad that I throw so many parties FOR myself??

 Whatever.

Being SINGLE and LOVING it!!

It has been about 3 weeks since the breakup with R and I feel like I have really blossomed as a single woman.  Other times when I was single I was looking for ways to get into another relationship. Yes, there are certain benefits to being in a relationship (*ahem* you know what they are… but also having someone to lift heavy stuff for you or get things off the top of things is good… and killing big bugs), but I am starting to realize that I am fine alone.

I am actually LESS lonely now than I was when I was with R. And that is how I know that the relationship wasn’t really meant to go any farther than it did.

More amazing to me is that I am not really that interested in trolling more dating websites and trying to find “Mr Right” through online chat sessions. Not right now, anyway. I might go back to wanting to find someone to go on dates with or talk to on the phone, or to share special events with… but that’s a someday kinda thing. Because when I seek again I will be looking for someone who gets ME and who will treat me RIGHT and not just whomever will take me without too much whining complaints.

I am happy to be alone right now. I can make a mess doing my scrapbooking thing if I want to. I can spend hours doing needlework WITHOUT having to watch football. I can try out new recipes. I can WRITE. I can explore my spirituality. I can learn to love the ME that is ME.

And I am gonna give MYSELF and MY KIDS a special valentine’s day – I’m gonna make chocolate pancakes with strawberries (for them, because, dudes I can’t do chocolate before NOON) and maybe we’ll go see a movie after dance class (well… after SUPPER after dance class, because I don’t want to fill them up with junk ALL day)…  I am hoping we get some packing and cleaning done as well… but I think that this is something WE need to do as a family.

I know that when I do start to seek love again I will have a MUCH different attitude about how I want to be treated and a MUCH lower threshold for “men behaving badly”…

CHANGE IS GOOD

I think if I keep saying this to myself I might come to believe it (laugh). But I know that this time it is true… this change will be for the better and the stress will be totally worth it, if I can just keep it together for another few weeks.  

I will be getting my OWN internet (connection) and a home phone (part of a deal to try it out for 3 months) and that will be different. I haven’t had a home phone system for 2.5 years… and I have gotten used to not being able to call anyone outside of my city. And to have a (sorta) phone line for even 3 months with UNLIMITED long distance will feel SO good! I can CALL people and not worry that my cell bill will be astronomical… Don’t know if I will KEEP it though.

Part of the plan is also a free 3 month trial of cable tv. Which is odd because I am also keeping my satellite tv system (rather than paying $200 to cancel it with a month remaining) and a PVR rental system. I have 3 months to see which system I prefer, satellite or cable, and then cancel the other… and make any changes to my existing internet and phone systems as well…  

But I will need a phone handset AND a wireless router.

Oh, and curtains

That is all

I’m not doing well lately.

It’s not working for me (shock, awe, gasps of horror).

Getting here has been a hard road and, despite the fact that sometimes I am a total mess, I am immensely PROUD of myself for making it happen.

1. I have a job where I am (relatively) respected and which I earn a decent salary
2. I have control over my fiances — money coming in and money going OUT are no longer a mystery to me. I can set a goal and be sure to have the ability to get to it, at least financially, without having someone dip into the accounts. Any mistakes are MINE alone.
3. I have spaces that I can meet my own needs as well as the needs of my family.
   • I have an altar space (thanks to Goddess Leonie and Lisa Baldwin for the Divine Declutter eCourse) and also Kyeli of the Freak Revolution for helping me see that its SAFE to do this)
   • I have FURNITURE that works for me.
   • I have a space to meditate
   • my kids have spaces of their own (including building space, creating space, storing space, playing space, and learning space)
4. I speak up for myself (sometimes) when I feel I am not being treated fairly, rather than just being a “good girl” and keeping the peace. I have a LONG way to go with this, obviously, but it IS starting albeit tentatively
5. My body is now my own (mostly)… I have pierced my nose, I have started to choose what my STYLE might be, and I’m starting to allow myself to feel “part-of” my body. Yes, I am still nervous about making changes
6. I am becoming self-aware.

I feel, very much, like I just “woke up” from a nightmare

I refused to THINK that it was abuse, because the thought scared me too much.

I missed having FRIENDS

I want to start living in connection.

Another Time Away…