I’m swiping left to six-pack abs and beer slinging selfies. I want a man who tells me he is in therapy on our first date.
I spent my 20s dating the man who was too cool to work on his childhood issues. He smoked a joint or drank a beer or tried to turn me on when memories from his past haunted his psyche. This man thought disengaging from his emotions made him super strong. He was strong, even sexy when he fought off his emotions with fleeting pleasures. But eventually his rock hard ego cracked, and instead of showing me his vulnerability, he became detached and pushed me away. It can be heart-wrenching to witness someone is dissociating from deep pain. I desperately wanted to heal this man. The more I tried to help him, the more he pushed me away. Eventually, he left for someone who cared less about his self growth and more about the pleasures of the moment. I walked away from our relationship feeling confused, used, and even emotionally abused. I grieved the emptiness I felt during our time together and the hopes I had for him to show up as his whole self. The man of my 20s left me with a gaping hole of longing for real emotional connection.
0 Comments
Because a good man is hard to find. “A good man is hard to find.”
I remember my mom saying these words to me when I wanted to start dating. The words pressed pause in my psyche and made me question my heart. Was the guy who asked me out not good? Was my mom giving me this warning for a reason? Did she not trust my judgment? Or, were good men really as rare as my mom said they were? Not everyone deserves your vulnerability. I recently got naked with a lover. Not the physical kind. We actually never met in real life. But we had more intimacy than I’d had with some past lovers, which is proof that emotional nudity is way more revealing than the physical parts we keep hidden from most of the world.
I actually haven’t gotten physically naked with someone in over 6 months. It’s been a conscious choice. In the past, the physical always made feelings develop more quickly and perhaps inorganically. The oxytocin released during sex and physical connection isn’t real love — at least not for me. My heart was hallowed out by unfulfilled longing before I even had my first kiss. There was a void in me. It grew and expanded in adolescent and early adult years filled with crushes that didn’t crush on me. The void, let’s call it longing, shrunk a bit after my first kiss. Then it grew twice is original size, weeks after our lips parted. He disappeared after his best friend died suddenly. One day he was planning to come visit me at college and then,
Poof! —he was gone without a trace. |
About MeSoul Writer. Single Mama. Life ponderer. Nature Lover. Therapist. Introvert. HSP & Empath. Life is my playground and each day a blank canvas. Archives
November 2019
Categories
All
|