If someone was angry, or cranky, i would feel responsible to make them not anymore. Or i would feel like i did something, or they were mad at me.........were going to cut me out of their life.
Every disagreement was the end of the relationship to me. It was never just a disagreement.
These feelings are what i took from my childhood relationship with my mother. As an adult, i struggled with all my relationships. I always felt the weight of responsibility and if they ever disapointed ME, i would accept it as my fate, that i had no right to expectations. I have no idea if the women who birthed me is even alive, and I have very ambivalent feelings about it.
I have been alive 57 years and i knew her until i was 16. That is 41 years without her. Maybe add in a few months of connection when i divorced my husband and she came around looking for me to take care of her, and having no interest in my children. That was a very short lived reunion. I promptly removed her from my life permanently.
Like she did to me. Mama taught me well.
I have anxious attachment with a fierce will to be independent and a big attitude of "I don't need anyone"........any quesions about why i'm in therapy and on meds?
This go round with Bill i'm noticing that his little tirades don't affect me. They are HIS tirades and i refuse to be dragged into them for an argument. Before, i would feel defensive. Now i let him blow his steam and then i move on. He is allowed to feel the way he feels. So am I. Funny how that works.
He purposely says inflammatory things to me, trying to get a rise out of me. In the past, i would rise to the occassion, giving him (or whoever i was talking to) the control over my emotions. My friends, family and men in my life have always had that ability to trigger me.
Now, i know he knows my views on certain things and if he wants to poke fun at me, or try to get a rise out of me, its a game to him. I don't feel like playing games. So have fun with that.
Peace. Tranquility. Partnership. All very important to me. I don't need to argue to prove my love or have him agree with me to love him. He gets to decide how he feels about my lack of enthusiasm to argue. I get my peace.
He can be a bully. Overbearing. Opinionated. All things i instictively want to fight. HOWEVER, i'm not here to fix him or anybody else. He doesn't need my fixing. I don't need to have feelings about things that i am not impressed or moved by. The bottom line is i'm not fazed by that behavior from anyone. I'm the one in control of my life. How i feel and react is under my control. I don't get led by the nose into stupid arguments.
Not anymore.
This is true for everyone in my life, not just Bill. Even my bestie has been overbearing with her opinions about my life ......and those are her opinions. I don't need to feel anything or do anything about it.
My life isn't up for grabs to be taken over by anyone else. I'm very much involved. I've set boundaries. I have learned to be detached. Not in a bad "i don't care" way, but in a way that means i don't have to have feelings about everything or anything someone else has feelings about.
I can acknowledge that Bill is being punchy, and trying to set me off.........and then move along. He should feel free always to express his thoughts and emotions to me, but that doesn't mean i need to take them on as mine.
I wish i had learned this a long time ago. I probably wouldn't have gotten married. If i ever even fell for my ex bf, it wouldn't have lasted long. I would have seen how very little they actually added to my life. Take away control, drama, and they would have evaporated into nothing.
Carlos was the first person, without him every realizing it, that treated me well. He was a man in every sense and i felt safe, taken care of, and "taken care of"......without any pressure of having to do things for him, act differently, think differently, or be anyone but who i am.
No it didn't work because he is that kind of man to every woman he dates. It is who he is. Being a good man doesn't mean he wanted to be MY man. He didn't have those feelings for me. And so it ended. I keep him in my heart for what he showed me....how i want to be and SHOULD be treated by a man. How i shouldn't give myself away to someone who hasn't earned me. How i should value myself first, and the man in my life second. Because if i don't value myself how is he supposed to? It's not selfish. It's necessary. It's not pretend, it's felt.
And so, when i met Bill he put me into a tailspin. He reads me like an open book in ways that make me very uncomfortable. I don't think anyone has ever seen so far into me the way he does. And he takes care of me. We had a few turning points that led to time apart where i walked away and meant it. But when he returned after truly making changes HE decided he need to make, I accepted him back. Because i love him. Why? He knows me and I recognize myself in him. We are very different and yet very much the same. I feel him. Without losing myself. I choose to be with him.
I will never lose myself again. I have walked away from men in the past and hopefully will never have to again. He knows where i draw the line. And I know that me being head over heals without a question in love with him and only him is a big one for him.
Funny, because that is something we agree on 100% and have in common.
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