I don’t know what it means now that I have gone through this. All I know is things are very different for me.
I am happier than I have ever been. I feel like I am no longer doomed to repeat myself, acting out the same long term relationship patterns I have always repeated. I am making new discoveries about my relationships with my parents, my friends, my love interests–even strangers–every week. I surprise myself constantly with the ability to make new choices and to choose new behavior (and find the tools for creating new behavior) that steers me into new directions, and away from things I have struggled with my whole life.
And, of course, the relationship front has changed. For the better, obviously. Just as soon as I was no longer able to access certain deep seated pain (I was still trying every day), along came someone who, at first, I thought was another “no”. By the end of the first date we had plans to see each other again but I still thought, “this probably isn’t going anywhere”. By the third or fourth date, when it was clear he really liked me, I remember thinking to myself “I am going to break this man’s heart”.
Until I went away for 5 days and realized that I was missing this person. What a very different start to a relationship than I have ever experienced before. And that was only the beginning. Every single thing about the start of this relationship has been different. I tried to be the “old me”, tried to keep him at arms length but I found I did not want to. Nor was I blinded by infatuation. Because before, it was one or the other – there was no in between.
Now I’m experiencing an “in between” that I can only describe as…healthy. He is emotionally healthy. He is available and present and not self involved. He made it (unintentionally) evident very early on that he sees me, sees the person I would normally hide.
I am honest with him regarding what I am thinking. Sometimes I try to hold things back, but it doesn’t last. maybe a day. Then I have to speak my truth. Sometimes this scares me but his reaction is always the same: don’t hold anything back.
I am cautiously testing how else I have changed and keep discovering new areas that I would never have guessed would be connected. Small things that sound trivial but boil down to being more open to change and fretting less about what people think of me. I’m not sure how this works or is connected, but it’s real.
I’m trying to continue with these healing therapies but find I am not getting so much out of them anymore because I am no longer in pain. So I am shifting to actually looking for areas that need “shifting” in my life, like my relationship with my family and with new friends and people. I am sure I will face more challenges, but I think I’ll be more able to deal with them.
I still feel strange disclosing what exactly the tool is that I discovered (well, I found a few but one worked very quickly) so I will refrain from sounding like a patchouli wielding hippie for the moment. (Though If anyone is going through significant pain, message me and we’ll have a conversation.)
Britt at Large 