LEARNED
13 July 2018, 07:31
I haven’t penned anything in a while. Life has been going too fast for me these days for me to sit and contemplate it.
It’s been a while since that day in the courtroom where I found out my true worth to a man I had thought care for me. But, my sense of myself, or more accurately, the lack of sense of self, was formed LONG before that. It just got used and misused by him. I’ve gone through almost a lifetime of learning in this last month or so, its a good thing I’m a quick study. There has never been a complete me in forever. When I was young, I couldn’t conceive of a complete me – I had all the pieces, but I didn’t see the picture of me. I didn’t see me others saw. I felt uncomfortable calling myself a woman. It felt like a level that I couldn’t achieve.
For a long time, I struggled to find my place in the world. I struggled with the thought of me being deserving, of me being worthy, of me being accepted and loved. I guess we all go through that. For a long time, I didn’t know what switches to flip, what lights to turn on or dim to make me the right kind of person, the acceptable kind. I am ashamed to say that I did a lot more than I’d like to admit to make OTHERS accept me than working toward self acceptance. But I guess we all do that, too. I was blessed to be with a nice guy for a long while in life – although, I put a giant part of myself asleep to be with him. He showed me how one is kind and how one can navigate life without malice. It is truly a gift, to truly know how to be kind and be able to love something else or someone else MORE than yourself.
But, even in this period of life, I wasn’t complete. A big part of me was asleep to make myself acceptable to this man, to make myself be the puzzle piece that fits to make that particular picture. It took me a long while to even admit that to myself.
This last little while, for seven years, I was a satellite orbiting a wonky star. I can’t even describe what I learned this last decade. I can’t even tell what was good and bad – it was chaos, it was crisis but it slowly woke every part of me up, although, still I hadn’t a clue as to what to do with my newly awakened self. The woke parts knew something was wrong. It didn’t know how to make it right. It didn’t realize what needed to happen. So when Doug left, the wake up call for me was jarring. From that, I learned to be grown up, for lack of a better word, this last little stretch, and for the last 10 months, I learned to hurt and stop hurting. I learned to value myself, and I learned to be stronger.
And I’ve been feeling my bits and parts coming together.
This last month or so, awoke a part of me I didn’t know I had. The million or so years I’ve been kicking around, I’ve always been the puppy who wants the love. A child wanting acceptance. I’ve always felt myself try hard to be noticed, try hard to be appreciated, try hard to be found acceptable. Not only was I acceptable, this last month, I was wanted. And wanted as a woman. Not as a smart woman, or a funny woman, but as an attractive woman, as a sexy woman, as a REAL woman. This was a part of me I didn’t know. Those are muscles that had never been used, a realization I’ve never had. That one piece that was new, that one piece that make me complete. I’ve had people WANT me. I’ve had one shining soul look at me with such desire, that I found it to be electric. I’ve never ever been looked at that way. I have never had a man look at me, and his eyes shining brightly as they drank me in. I have never felt such a thundering connection on all levels, INCLUDING that wonderful desire that made me drunk when I thought about it. For all the things that have gone wrong this month, that is something which was exhilarating and new. It was probably the last piece missing that finally found its place in me. Whatever else that happens, this was watershed milestone for me. As kooky as it sounds, I have all the pieces to be a complete actual woman. I feel like a real woman.
With this real woman in place, I have nearly pulled all my shit out of the fire and I’ve pulled my life together. I’ve gained a sense of self, and a healthy sense of self preservation. I’ve learned how to discern the hopeless and hapless, and I’ve learned I can’t save everyone. I’ve also learned how to save myself.
For all the things that have happened to me, especially in the last month or so, I am truly grateful. I have had two special souls that made me feel real, and wanted and desired – feelings I have NEVER had before. I can’t pay them back for that and I can’t save one from the harshness of life, of which he is suffering intensely right now. It breaks my heart that he gave me that gift and I can’t save him from the hammers that currently are pounding on him. I guess I want to thank him for what he has done for me, at the very least. I was deliriously happy for a brief moment, and the woman I became with him is still the woman I am now. I can even call myself a woman and mean it. Lessons I probably should have learned long ago, I finally have completed.
