Want to take a train ride? That’s the question I always ask myself when someone wants to start a relationship. Why a train? Well, I have always looked at relationships as a trip. A trip that can be three months, six months, years or a lifetime. If I am completely honest, there have only been a couple of times that I have boarded and thought, “yeah, this is my forever and always”. Those couple of times, I had no contingency plan. I stepped fully into being loved by that person.
I have never been good at the dating thing of seeing several people in the same period of time. I date one person. They usually convince me to board that train. But the thought of going out with two, four, six or however many people at once just makes me say ewwwww. Could you imagine kissing Todd on Tuesday and Sam on Saturday? I kind of wish that I could have dated around at different times in life. Maybe it would have saved my heart. As a result of my dating style, I have strung together a pretty continuous series of relationships throughout my life. I have been single a very small amount of my life.
At different times, I have allowed myself to become quite bitter toward certain people and even God. I have even hated places, such as restaurants, parks, songs because I gave those inanimate objects power through the emotions I held, my truths. I bought into the belief that kindness is weakness and that it was better to never have loved than to have known love and lost it all. I even tattooed it on my body to remind me not to believe in love (“BELIEVE…the best part of believe is the lie). And although I’d find myself in relationships, I knew I only gave them pieces of my life, my love. I justified it with that I knew the person would end up messing up and I’d walk. It’s easier to sit in a bad relationship until you can no longer tolerate it than to be totally vulnerable and risk it all in a healthy relationship….and I thought I was intelligent.
It has been said, do not go where your enemy leads you. Enemy, I have thought on that one a lot throughout my life. The enemy has been a boss that cussed me and was too demanding, it has been the friend that talked about me behind my back, the man in my life that lied and cheated, and many others. Now, I recognize the enemy. The enemy is a singular being that moves in varying situations and relationships that I am involved in, Satan. He is the enemy.
Satan has trained me well in building my walls, making my contingency plans, one foot in the door and walling up my heart ways of walking through this life. Now, I wonder just how much I have let him rob me of, how much love and happiness he has kept me from receiving.
It is easy for me to love but hard for me to allow someone to love me. Because I viewed love as me offering kindness, help, and partnership (but I left out transparency and vulnerability). In truth, I guess I was more of their buddy and not even that. I don’t guard against my friends. I have no word for it really. I have had people tell me they love me and say they knew I didn’t want to hear it and couldn’t say it back. I always just thought, why would you say that even? It’s just “feel good feelings” that you’re having, they will pass. A couple of times someone has been patient enough to allow enough time for me to believe in their words and actions. Those people, well they got me and I bought into their promises, stepped into love with them, gave them the ability to shred my heart. In the end, that is exactly what happened. I hated them for saying their love and our relationship was a safe place. The process of forgiveness would have to be walked through and it is exhausting. So, I return to my
“foot in the doorway” way of life.
It has been a loop. I am hard headed. But I am finally tired of this lesson being on repeat. I am willing to own my part. I am willing to admit that I am just as guilty of giving my pieces away as they were guilty of taking.
My therapist said last year to stop going to the dumpster for my relationships. I was offended greatly. I defended my exboyfriends saying that deep down they were good people and just needed help to be okay again. But her words held truth and mine held excuses. I have recognized that I have gone to where my enemy leads me. I have gone to that dumpster where the most broken people are and let them chase me, woo me into relationships. I have hoped to help restore them. Yeah, I’m vain enough to think that I am white picket fence enough to convert them, save them from themselves, control our world until I could restore them and then we could be happy. I have done this because I bought into the lie of I am not good enough to deserve a whole person, a person that could give back to me what I offer in a relationship. I own that I pick broken men to have relationships with so that I can be guarded and not risk having my heart completely broken, just cracked here and there.
It is a hard pill to swallow, my ownership of allowing my time, heart, loyalty, devotion, and love being squandered because I have always known when a person wasn’t worthy of me but I allowed the relationships to continue. Why? Fear. Fear of believing God had someone for me that checked those boxes on his own. Fear of believing there was actually a man that was whole and healthy on his own, that didn’t need me to show him how to be white picket fence. Fear of trusting the one that loves me most, the one that wants only good for my life.
So, how do we trust? I have beat my head against the wall analyzing this one. My only answer is to just step out and do it, choose it. Ah, but much easier said than done.
Just Shae It 
A relationship is also like a train because you start in one car and work your way along a chain of events to some primary conclusion before you can add “cars” (or further plans). A relationship can become derailed or stalled in some station/stage.
Good metaphor! I could really brainstorm on that one.
I cannot date more than…well, maybe I could juggle three people…but, if each person became substantially heavy on my heart, demanding N amount of me, I might crumble under the pressure and worry about what the other two will say. An ideal situation would be closer to what some might call a harem. 😛
I cannot say I’ve ever been on much of a love train, though. The closest I came was a friend train which I thought was headed for love only to be derailed too soon. And, most of these relationship trains have required me to be the engine. I can only think of one person who was such an engine that she messed with my head. I didn’t know how to act around her. And, everything I did seemed to be wrong. I was torn between calling her a gold-digger and just a motivated, adventurous woman. I turned her into a challenging mermaid (because her first name sounds like “fin”) in my first completed book (one I wrote). Fun fact.
I know that feeling of hatred for places you no longer want to visit. My family consistently warns me I will run out of places to go if I keep it up. But, I feel what I feel; and, like nightmares, I don’t want to relive them. I don’t want to go somewhere that will dredge up a bad experience. No one wants sloppy seconds…unless you like sloppy joes–er, seconds.
No offense, but from my personal assessment of the above, it sounds like you love(d) like a dog. You integrated yourself into various homes but growled at passersby, possibly even those you claimed as master, like a dog that gets passed around but doesn’t stay long in any one home. You filled your voids and cracks with negative energy and gave your enemy the worst name, a name I refuse to give power/use. [I reference a movie called Merlin with Sam Neil? who made Morgana go away by ignoring her…similar to Harry Potter’s world referencing the ultimate bad guy as the one that shall not be named.]
Some would say picking “broken” partners is a sign of low self-esteem, that you value yourself less than say a guy who is “perfect.” You don’t feel fit for perfect; you think there are better women, more attractive women with certain assets, that can get those guys. Why shoot for A-class when you can feel more comfortable with C-class? You were offended by the word “dumpster” because you associated that with an even lower class. Your therapist has a different system for rating.
It IS kinda odd…funny…that you can throw yourself into love, guard against rejection, allow only pieces of you to be in use…and still question trust. You either did not throw yourself into love but wanted to believe you did while clinging to the guard railing…or you got burned once and slowly pulled back on the trust lever until you finally hit a crossroad. I’d say you are close to an epiphany on this matter, if not already there.
You appear to be a cross between a Jennifer Aniston and a Katie Couric. Your smile is lovely…but there is something glassy about your expression…like you are concealing a heap of troubled thoughts. You seem as tender and sensitive as you are tough and strong.
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