Week 1 apart has officially ended.
Everything went according as I had anticipated 5 posts ago, before I took off for a post-breakup holiday and actually saw him.
I predicted the cycle, and, according to predictions, ‘Week 1’ is the time where:
1- He misses me
2. He can envision a relationship
3. He feels completely in love with me, he sees me in his future.
One more week of this on softer terms then we will venture into week 3 of detachment, the week where he rebalances himself alone and I begin to feel like an added burden rather than the magical love of his life.
So this week yes, he has been amazing. He has been calling and texting and even using the word ‘planning’, which after two years is typically quite normal, especially as we are planning a mini weekend in two weeks, however for A, it’s truly a special occasion.
He HATES the word ‘planning’. In fact, to plan anything at all with him I have to say ‘we’ll see’ and ‘who knows’ for about 3 days straight to anything that has to do with us seeing each other. Only when he feels like I am making no plan at all does he feel like — actually, we should make a plan.
It’s important I remind myself that this is classic ‘Week 1′ behavior, as it’s very easy to fall into the trap of believing that this time it will be different.
Most likely, it won’t.
Sorry, let me rephrase that, IT WILL NOT.
When he is really trying, but it never quite feels like it’s enough
Coincidentally, he could only travel with me in the only week in which I am busy which makes it extremely difficult for us to plan anything at all.
Now we are stuck with a shitty long weekend. Okay. Fine.
I’ll take what I can get.
My chest feels contracted. I feel sad. But why?
Am I not in fact getting exactly what I wanted? A plan?
Was I disappointed that two days ago he asked me to see him at his place and meet his family and that had magically disappeared as an offer overnight and it has now become a long weekend away or was it something else?
I realized that despite him trying so hard to be there, to stay connected, to plan, a weekend away is really not going to cut it.
It’s the mindset which really does not feel good enough for me. It feels like I am always an option whereas I plan everything around him.
Plan what you want to do with your friends and then we’ll figure out the gaps together.
This is what he suggested I do. Plan without him and if it fits then we see each other and if not…honestly, what kind of a plan is this?
Am I really that unimportant to him?
Does it really mean so little to him?
As any kind hearted human in love would do I began wondering:
Is it me?
Am I not good enough?
Does he not love me enough?
How does he still not factor me in as his partner two years into us going on our first date?
Am I just triggered by the past or is his current behavior or his way of being simply not for me?
Why am I feeling all of this pain?
Can the world ‘relationship’ truly have such different meanings for different people?
I believe a relationship is a bond two people who choose to build a life based on a strong sense of connection and belonging.
They become the center of each other’s lives.
All of a sudden, or not so suddenly, you think times two.
Your person’s priorities become yours.
Your priority becomes ensuring your partner is happy, that they feel loved, feel cared for, understood, supported, no longer alone.
From the moment they put their heart in your hands, it becomes your responsibility to hold it and make sure it never hurts again. After all, is this not the greatest gift you can offer someone who is out there, who has been wounded, and who is still, despite all the pain, out there hoping for love.
In a relationship, you can make plans for a shared future, one you cannot wait to live together. You dream together, you plan together, you build together, you hold each other closer when times get tough and you support each other through thick and thin.
You try to anticipate the other’s thoughts and needs, you try to surpass them or at the very least you try your very best to give what the other needs.
You learn about yourself in the process, you learn about love, about patience, about boundaries, about connection and, especially in your 30’s and above, you unite two different worlds.
You meet their friends and they meet yours, you learn about how they interact with the world, how they love their family, how they love you.
You find yourself no longer alone.
When you feel more alone than when I’m actually alone
Yesterday I felt this strong pain in my chest, the pain of not being understood, the pain of not being the number one priority.
He is there for me, he is trying.
A friend reminded me that it’s actually a good thing that he is taking time to align and to fully feel ready for it as opposed to those guys who jump all in and deliver nothing.
I tend to agree.
But it has been almost two years…it is a lot of time. How much time does one need to feel fully into their beautiful relationship with someone who loves and cherishes them and that (according to them) they love so much?
I wish I could love just a little bit less but I know me, even at 1% my heart is as capable of loving as 100% of someone else’s heart.
There is only one thing we can do when we are feeling that pain: we can love ourselves just a little bit harder
My sister in law taught me this beautiful truth a few years ago and I swear by it now.
When we feel like someone else is letting us down, when we feel like we are alone, like we need extra love and it’s not coming our way, we have an infallible supporter: ourselves.
We have the power to be there for ourselves, to put ourselves in situations which make us happy, we have the ability to take some time off, to meditate, to do sports, to take a walk, to listen to a podcast we love, to hang out or call our best friends or book a massage.
We can even just feel, feel angry, sad, happy or all of the emotions at once. We can allow ourselves the incredible gift of feeling without feeling guilty about it, without being scared of how someone else will respond to it, without having limits of expression of that emotion.
We can just be and accept ourselves for wherever we are in that momnet.
We must get to know ourselves well enough to be able to take care of that part of us that is feeling lost, lonely, hurt.
Rationally, I know that nothing bad is happening however my gut is telling me that something hurtful is likely coming my way again.
I woke up this morning sad. It took me three and a half hours to convince myself to get up, get dressed, and go to my amazing barre class. I knew I had to leave the house.
I put in a leave in hair mask, I grabbed my laptop and I came to a little cafe where I can write out and about to check in on you, my fantastic readers.
He called.
I was happy he did, though that was not enough to heal my wound.
And maybe it’s simply not his responsibility to heal that wound. maybe it’s mine.
It sure wouldn’t hurt if he were at least trying, and I must admit, even though he has no idea of how to do it, in his own way I think he is.
I realized that my life alone is amazing. It’s harder to think I am living life with someone but that person is never around. Now that, makes me feel lonely.
Here I am my friends, in my workout clothes, looking outside of the window into a sunny London, with a disgusting macha latte (seriously how many do you have to drink to get used to the taste??) doing my very best to give myself the love that I so strongly crave.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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From The Good Men Project on Medium
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Photo credit: Svitlana on Unsplash
