I Don’t Know You, But Let’s Sail Away Together

I agreed to meet another man I met through an online dating site.  In email he was charming, funny and complimentary. In person, he was more than surprising!

He wanted to meet at Daniel’s Broiler for dinner, but I suggested we meet for drinks instead.  A few minutes after I arrived and sat down at his table the hostess brought over a long-stemmed yellow rose in a vase.  I looked around to see if the hostesses were putting roses on all the tables and thought it was odd they’d place long-stem roses.  The only rose was the one on our table.  I thank him for the gesture and explained my initial confusion.

A few minutes later, he pulls out a travel brochure for the Albuquerque Hot Air Balloon Festival.  (He had asked me if I had any recent trips planned or if there was anywhere I wanted to go and I mentioned a hot air balloon festival in Walla Walla, WA.)  He presents the brochure to me and tells me this is the hot air balloon festival to go to if I were to go to one.  He then says that he would plan out our trip – arrive Thursday because the activities really start Friday during the day.  (Keep in mind that this is our first meeting and we’d only exchanged a handful of emails.)

I was a little put-back by the suggestion of a weekend getaway when we didn’t even know each other, but somewhat laughed it off.  Then he produced a second brochure; this time for a cruise to Greece!  (Again, this is our FIRST meeting!)  He flips a few pages into the brochure and points to the cruise he suggests we take and then starts to rattle off dates in late August; it’s now only early-May!

Next, he produces a business card for a travel agent he met with that afternoon to get information on the hot air balloon festival and Greek cruise.  It was all way too much for me.

He did confess that the travel agent asked how long we had known each other and that she laughed when he said this was our first meeting.  He also met with a business partner prior to my arrival and his business partner saw the travel brochures and asked about them.  When his business partner learned this was our first meeting he too laughed and strongly suggested
keeping the travel brochures for another date in the future.

It was all just too much to take in and process – especially when there was no romantic chemistry to begin with.  I think the over-zealous nature with the travel brochures would have killed any potential chemistry.

I thanked him for his consideration and invested effort, but said I couldn’t agree to either trip and reminded him that this was a first meeting.

Somehow the conversation transitioned to what I did for a living and he offered me a job running a company he wanted to spin off.  It all felt a little too needy, enthusiastic or obsessed.

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Sometimes Our Hearts Get Stuck

Ever felt strong emotions or a strong attachment to someone you probably shouldn’t?  I’m there.

I’m inexplicably drawn to a man who stirs up emotions I have never felt before.  It sounds wonderful until I say that he is not emotionally available.  I think sometimes he wants to be, but then other times I think it’s a game of cat and mouse that he likes to plays.

It’s the worst game of back and forth with poor communication mixed in.  Riding this ride is a natural wreck for me.  It triggers
feelings of not being good enough and wondering what I did wrong – only I know I didn’t do anything wrong.

I’m not sure how to get this guy out of my head, out of my heart and out of my system.  There’s always this small nagging pull.  It’s even worse when he randomly reaches out.  I can logically tell myself that his random texts asking how I am doing have no substance, but they are enough to cloudy my mind.

So it’s even more important for me to remind myself of my basic must-haves and that a loving relationship should be just that … loving.

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Taking Your Own Advice

I’m not sure why this thought hit me today, but I am glad it did. I realized that I would tell a friend to move on and end whatever relationship she was in if he/she were experiencing the same “dating woes” I am.

I’m a firm believer that if someone is interested in you they will make the time to see you. Lately, this belief has been over-shadowed by phone calls and text messages. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to see someone investing an effort to connect, but there should be a warning bell if that’s all there is. You have to spend time with a person to really get to know them and figure out if you are compatible.

If the person you are getting to know or seeing doesn’t value your time and doesn’t make opportunities to see you, he/she won’t in the future either. The getting-to-know-you phase and honeymoon phases are when people are on their best behaviors, so if your needs are met now they probably never will be.

It’s great to give people the benefit of doubt, but there is a cut-off point where you have to be real with yourself and realize hope is not going to turn into reality.

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Unlearning My Past

I’m not very good with developing healthy relationships with men. Although I think I finally understand the root cause of why my relationships with men are so dysfunctional, it doesn’t make it easy to break patterns and learn new behaviors. Bear with me for this rollercoaster ride – I’m going to divulge more than I ever have before for the sake of being authentic with myself and even perhaps prodding myself to the next level.

On a subconscious level, I never registered that I have power over sexual relationships – at least just as much power as anyone else. Instead, I always felt sex was an obligation. Don’t get me wrong, I do like sex, but there are many emotional land mines for me when it comes to sex. I tend to disconnect, freeze and run away.
I’ve only had one healthy sexual adult relationship and perhaps one healthy sexual relationship when I was 21. Other than that, most of my relationships with men have been unhealthy and dysfunctional. I think this is because of a long history of exposure to negative sexual behaviors and trauma.

I was almost abducted twice when I was young; once in the first grade and another when I was in the third grade. Both attempted abductions were very similar. The first time I was playing with a class friend in the school playground after school and the second time I was walking to the library with my cousin – two young girls alone in both situations. Both men approached in a car, stopped and asked for directions and acted as though they couldn’t hear us so we would move closer to the car.

With the first guy, there was a fence around the playground he wanted us to climb over. We climbed up it so that he could hear us, but we didn’t climb over. That’s when we saw he was naked from the waist down and masturbating. I don’t remember what he said at that point, but I remember him unbuckling his seat belt and moving to the passenger seat and opening the door. We ran to the principal’s office who called the police. The police were great up until I overheard one cop telling my mom the guy I identified had threatened to kill anyone and their family if we testified against him.

The second attempted abduction was similar, only this time I memorized part of the license plate as my cousin and I ran home. (Memorizing the license plate was something I had learned to do after talking with the cops from the first instance.)

I don’t know the odds of one child encountering two possible abduction scenarios, but I do know I am lucky. Unfortunately, those experiences created a further fear of men. I say a further fear because my biological father was mentally unstable after he returned from the Vietnam War. As a baby, I became scared of men because my biological father was always yelling. My mom has told me I would start to cry or even go to hide when I would hear a man’s voice or see a man enter the room.

The exposure to dysfunctional sexual behavior continued through elementary school. A neighbor’s adult son was mentally handicapped and would expose himself through open windows and doors. He never approached us, but if he saw us playing outside, he would stand in the window or door naked and masturbate. I remember thinking it was creepy, but not really understanding why. I do remember everyone telling us to be careful of him and to stay away.

I think these experiences by themselves are enough to make one misunderstand sexuality and sexual relationships, but unfortunately, my story doesn’t end there.

My first and second sexual encounters with men were not consensual. My first experience involved a much older guy who didn’t want to stop when I asked him to. He put his hand around my throat and told me not to make him hurt me, so I was quiet and disconnected. I was scared, ashamed and believed it was my fault so I never told my family. My second encounter was a partial result of the first. I was still hanging around a crowd that was much older than I was and I drank until I passed out. I came conscious to a guy on top of me having sex.

It’s no wonder I learned to disconnect and become an object. I became an object with several boyfriends and even my ex-husband. What’s sad is that I never told any of them this wasn’t okay. I even married my ex and loved him deeply for many, many years – that’s how warped my sense of self and sense of sexual relationships was.

I’ve progressed a lot in my thinking of what a healthy sexual relationship is, but I haven’t progressed as far as I would like when thinking I deserve to be treated with respect, compassion, dignity and affection. I still freak out, get super scared, disconnect and want to disappear. I don’t ever wear turtlenecks and only started wearing scarfs about six years ago because I can’t stand to have anything tight around my neck. I still have a hard time saying no and think it’s easier to disconnect than to endure whatever might happen if I say no.

It’s been a lifetime since those early experiences and they created a foundation I have to break. Outside of a small circle of very close friends, I’ve never discussed these stories or experiences. Perhaps this is my first step in making a healthy change.

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Something’s Sinking In

I still have a long way to go in terms of dating, but I am seeing progress and the application of lessons learned!!!

Remember Guy #4 from one of my earlier posts this month?  Yeah, well he is still a flake.

I don’t think a guy has to call, text or IM a girl every day.  In all honesty, while flattering, it’s a bit too much –but that’s a new and separate lessoned learned.  I do think that when you make this a pattern and suddenly become sporadic, the person is distracted or not interested.  Perhaps both.  That’s what has happened here.

Guy #4 randomly IM’d me and we began talking again.  He began IM’ing me every day along with sending texts and calling me.  Again, I was flattered at first and then I wondered what the urgency was.  I just broke up with my boyfriend so I didn’t want to jump into anything right away and wanted to take things slow.  Oddly, given all this “attention”, he never asked me to go out other than an initial invite to go to his place for dinner which he would cook.

I think dinner is an intimate gesture and at the time I didn’t feel comfortable with going to his place.  Dinner leads to drinking a glass of wine which leads to sitting on the couch talking which leads to kissing which leads to …

Anyway, although this guy continued to invest a lot of effort for us to connect online or with phone calls, that was it.  Then he started texting later and later.  This can seem innocent enough if you truly live different schedules, but I think there’s an element of lost respect and expectations when you begin texting someone after midnight asking what they are up to or if they awake.  This was warning flag #1.5.  (The .5 warning flag comes from the high-level of attention he was paying me initially.)

After a pretty intense and personal conversation, where he revealed a lot of past personal hurt, the tone of our texts changed and his calls were non-existent.  I decided it was better to call whatever this was between us off than end with one disliking the other.  After expressing my concerns, he expressed his continued interested in me and said we would connect during the next work day.  There was no IM, text or call.  Warning flag #2.5 … no need to go to #3.

In an earlier conversation I mentioned to him that flakiness is not something I accept and I think it just makes a person appear unreliable and immature.  He agreed and said he knew he can be flakey at times.  So while he is aware he can be flakey, he is either unaware or uses flakey behavior either to avoid awkward situations.  The reason isn’t really important.  The fact that I recognize his flakiness and am saying I deserve better is HUGE!!!!  I’m not into casual relationships or friends with benefits.  I don’t have a crazy biological clock or an urge to get married.  I simply want a real relationship without immature behaviors – mine or his.  I’m not going to compromise myself because I know what I am asking isn’t too much or hard – and I deserve it.

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The Dating Game

I recently broke up with my boyfriend and all of a sudden several guys from the past have cropped up. It’s like this cosmic test to see how much I have grown or how lonely I am.

• Guy #1: I met while on vacation. There was a definite attraction, but there were several red flags that cropped up. He’s very accomplished, but yet insecure; he’s intelligent and manipulative; he’s caring and attentive and then can turn and be purposely hurtful on an emotional level. He’s had some crazy personal experiences in the past few years which he says has changed his personality. I won’t don’t want to break his confidence and relay the details, but they are significant enough to where I have extra compassion for him.
• Guy #2: I met online about a year ago and went out on an initial coffee date to meet and see if there was an interest to pursue anything further. There wasn’t. The guy was nice, but he had crazy ugly teeth and his thoughts about people and his job were far too different from mine. He worked for the government to collect back-taxes. He didn’t seem to have any compassion for the people he pursued for back-taxes. I’m sure he has run across some jerks in his career, but not everyone who owes back-taxes owe them intentionally or are jerks.
• Guy #3: I also met online. He’s an attractive, good-hearted man with an amazing soul. There wasn’t a romantic connection when we met and we decided to be friends. Eventually our dinner invites faded and we stopped exchanging emails.
• Guy #4: I met through work and went out on two dates about three years ago. It never progressed into anything – we didn’t even kiss. I was fresh out of my divorce and he was a bit flakey. I also learned of a nickname of his that led me to believe he was a man-whore. We didn’t end on bad terms … I started dating my lovely hippie, masseuse guy and he started dating another girl. Oddly, we worked less than about 50 feet from one another last year and rarely exchanged hellos. We simply had different lives.

With Guy #1 I have to be careful that I don’t fall back into a role I played with my family. It’s sometimes easier to put others in front of my needs. This is something I have to remind myself of and try to change when I realize I am doing it. I also have to remind myself that my boundaries are most likely more distorted or accepting of unhealthy behaviors than other people because that is what I grew up with.

He lives in Chicago, so I don’t really have to face the reality of dealing with him on a day-to-day basis or really consider a potential romantic relationship with him. (Although he has offered to fly out here or fly me to him.)

Guy #2 IM’d me a few weeks ago asking if I was interested in meeting for coffee. I was out doing something, but forgot to sign out of IM. By the time I got the IM it was several hours later so I never responded. There’s no reason for me to respond. I had told him after the first coffee date that I thought there were too many differences and not a romantic connection.

I don’t think Guy #3 reached out to me for romantic purposes, but it was out of the blue. We hadn’t communicated at all for at least 6 months or more. Then all of a sudden he sent me an email telling me about new things in his life and asking how I was doing. He since made a decision to quit his job and travel through Asia for a while. We have exchanged a few emails and IMs, but haven’t had any significant conversations.

Guy #4 always made me nervous. I’m not the giddy type, but for some reason around this man I get nervous and sometimes tongue-tied. He randomly reached out to me on IM and began flirting. I was confused about his intentions and how bold he was being, but agreed to meet for drinks to talk and ask questions. He said that he didn’t reach out to me randomly or out of the blue and that he has thought about it for a while. We talked about the events we experienced during the past three years. I told him I could offer friendship and see what might develop from there.

He has since invested a lot of energy to IM me and to call or text every day. He’s been very bold in his conversations, but there’s a large element of caution I have. I was honest and told him I am not interested in a casual sexual relationship or sex between friends. Although he said he wasn’t interested in just sex, sometimes his actions indicate otherwise. For example, yesterday we exchanged a few text messages and I told him to call me if he got bored. He texted after midnight to ask if I was asleep. He has also called late at night another evening and asked me to come over. (Keep in mind we have never kissed and since re-establishing contact we have only met in person one time.) This all adds up to a booty call in my head. Perhaps I am reading more into it, but I don’t think you invite a girl over late at night if you are interested in getting to know her outside of a carnal sense.

While I am not ready to jump into another relationship, it is comforting to have hope about a future relationship. I guess I just need to be patient and believe I will meet someone when the time is right.

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Breaking Up – It’s Never Fun

I broke up with my boyfriend the other week. I feel horrible for breaking up, but I know it was the right decision. He’s an amazing guy, but there are certain differences and behaviors we can’t bridge. I guess it’s more of me not being able to bridge or accept those differences.

I’ve talked about concerns with his drinking and those concerns came to a head one recent weekend. It made me realize that I don’t want to be someone’s caregiver in that way. I most definitely want to be someone’s lover and not a potential lover’s mother.

The break-up was as good as a break could be. There’s sadness on both sides, but I know his heart is broken more than mine is. I don’t think he understood how deep my concerns where when we talked about them before the break-up happened. Now he is running through the what-if scenarios. I HATE hurting people. Too often I compromise myself in order to avoid hurting someone.

What I find interesting is the selective memory that follows a break-up. I find myself remembering only the amazing qualities and fun memories. I guess it makes sense in a way because you aren’t seeing or dealing with the stuff that you don’t like.

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It Just May Be A Lunatic You’re Looking For

It Just May Be A Lunatic You’re Looking For

I started to see a therapist because of concern about how I was thinking about and approaching my relationship. How crazy is it that I think I am being crazy with a relationship in the early stages and go see a therapist to change my behavior and ways of thinking when I don’t even know what this relationship is.

The therapist is a great sounding board and brings a level of perspective that is very welcome at times and not so welcome at other times. In fact, if I were to assign scores to the sessions we have had, she has ruled against me more than she has ruled for me. She is the voice of reason telling me no to self-sabotage; not to cut-and-run; and to give this guy a break. (It’s not like I am a horror to this guy, but I can be a bit unforgiving with my thoughts at times.)

She’s the one who pointed out that most of my previous relationships, romantic and platonic, have been filled with chaos in many different ways, and this is the first normal, balanced and healthy relationships I have had. She’s warned me not to create chaos and not to high-tale it outta there.

Anyway, the other night I went out to karaoke with friends and someone sung Billy Joel’s song, You May Be Right, and the lyrics resonated with me. Here’s an excerpt:

You may be right
I may be crazy
But it just may be a lunatic you’re looking for
It’s too late to fight
It’s too late to change me
You may be wrong for all I know
But you may be right
You may be right
I may be crazy
But it just might be a lunatic you’re looking for
Turn out the light
Don’t try to save me
You may be wrong for all I know
But you may be right

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Feeling Numb

Sometimes I wonder what’s the matter with me? I have a protective strategy where I disengage and push emotions deep inside until they are almost hidden everyone – me included. I’m concerned I have turned this into more of a daily behavior than an “in case of emergency” one.

For example, I thought I was falling in love with the man I am dating. Perhaps I did, but somewhere along the way I pulled back and I don’t know what I feel. I know what I am supposed to do and say if I love this person. I also know what this person expects of me. This allows me to continue on in a muted state without much visible difference in the way I act. I don’t think this is normal. Yes, everyone has their ups and downs and every relationship does too, but this is different. I feel like a scripted character.

Here’s where the problem becomes complicated. I don’t know if I am feeling this way because I am scared of committing or if I am not into the relationship anymore. It’s hard to know when you don’t trust your judgment.

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When Is Good Good Enough?

I have been dating a wonderful man for a few months now and will admit things have progressed quickly. As with almost everything, time provides prospective and this is no different. I still don’t know where I am right to be concerned or even annoyed and where I am being a bit too inflexible and impatient.

On paper this man sounds wonderful, and he is. I just don’t know that he is wonderful long-term for me. I’ve had a few “transition” relationships since my divorce and am starting to think this may be one too – just on a higher level.

With my past “transition” relationships I was unwilling to become emotionally invested and kept myself at a distance. It wasn’t that these were only physical relationships, but there was just a limit to how much I could allow myself to feel and become attached. I knew there wasn’t a future in these relationships and I was okay with that because I didn’t want a future from these relationships.

The man I am dating now, and the relationship I am in, is different. I do care about this man and I thought there was a potential future, but am not sure. Let me clarify, I don’t have a need to get married or be in a deep and committed relationship. This is just the first time I have let myself and met someone worthy of thinking of a potential long-term relationship.

As I get to know this man more, I grow more confused about when to compromise. For example, I can’t expect everything to be my way although I am used to living on my own. One of my must-haves in a partner is financial responsibility, but I have realized people define financial responsibility in many ways. I’m not sure I am financially compatible with this man as our thoughts on savings in almost opposite. Coming from a marriage where my spouse was financially irresponsible and a mother who is a shopping addict, I’m not willing to bend much on my definition of financial responsibility.

I also come from a family full of various chemical addictions and hid the addictions of my ex-spouse. I don’t want to return to that way of life and have concerns this man may drink more than I am comfortable with.

Many people reading this blog would probably say any concerns in either area, finances or addiction, are reasons enough to end the relationship. I’m unsure. Am I overly sensitive or simply clear on my boundaries? I honestly don’t know. So, when is good, good enough? When is good a means to settling and giving up?

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