I haven’t been well, lately. I’ve been trying to get my shit together, like getting my teeth fixed and nosing around to see if I can find a doctor who can actually put me on medication that’ll help stabilize my moods. I’ve been active a lot more now that my boyfriend introduced me to an app that let’s us be a little competitive with our exercise. And all that’s been good change, but I’ve been slipping a LOT, lately, in terms of controlling harmful thoughts.
They’re invasive, and they don’t ever really go away; sometimes, I’m just more aware of them than other times. And I feel like shit. I feel like I ought to be able to turn them around better than I have been.
One of the stupidest thoughts, though, has to do with paralleling my current relationship with my last one. I’ve actually been in contact with my current boyfriend, now, for about 9 years. Though I’ve had terrible luck with relationships formed with people I’ve met online, I have to attribute a lot of our mutual comfort to the fact that we weren’t ever looking for a relationship when we met. We came together over mutual interests and spent almost a decade just slowly getting to know one another...and we’re STILL getting to know one another.
It’s a GOOD relationship. When we talk about the possibility of my moving up to live with him ( AL to NY ), he doesn’t pressure me about having to do it within such-and-such a time frame. He asks me what I’d NEED in a living space instead of expecting me to live out of boxes and storage tubs. He takes my anxieties into account.
Honestly, I’m just floored by how considerate he’s been. I cry over it, sometimes. And part of it has to do with those stupid thoughts that say “You’ve lowered the bar so much, common decency seems like godsend”. Part of me feels like it shouldn’t be SO out of the norm that I’m moved THAT deeply by it. And in conjunction with that, it just makes me feel broken - like the last guy fucked me up so bad that I have to feel paranoid that my current boyfriend’s kindness is gonna get ripped out from under me one of these days - which I know, logically, is TOTAL BULLSHIT. And knowing that it’s bullshit, but still feeling that way regardless, makes me feel even WORSE. It’s all just...cyclical.
Tonight, my mother asked if I’d heard from him. Even though we both use the same messenger, we don’t talk every day; sometimes, we’ll go almost a week in silence. But it’s never tense or awkward. I have an erratic schedule and he’s busy with school/work and other projects. But when Mom asked... It made me think about how things imploded toward the end of my last relationship. I took a week-long hiatus from talking to my ex because I needed to step back and assess how I felt about everything. He proceeded to sic his best friend on me to harass me through Facebook Messenger - trying to get me to talk to him again - until it all eventually devolved into the BOTH of them calling me abusive for taking time away from CONSTANT, EVERY-DAY contact.
It’s hard for me to express how grateful I am that my current boyfriend understands that I need space, sometimes. It’s hard for me to express how grateful I am that he TRUSTS ME to come to him when I need to or feel ready. It’s hard for me to express how grateful I am that I can TRUST HIM not to hold my anxieties and depression against me.
He’s brought so much happiness to my life, sometimes I don’t think I deserve it. I can’t remember the last time anyone made me feel this secure. Sometimes, I don’t think saying ‘I love you’ is enough, and I just hope he can glean even a fraction of how much I feel for him.
