Me, Myself and I

This process of disentangling the best parts of me from the fearful, I-need-to-fantasize-to-stay-alive, the-truth-is-too-painful-so-I-don't-want-to-see-it parts, is long, it's arduous and it can be very lonely.

Slowly, slowly, slowly I am realizing that my need/desire to check out of that process every so often is just making it harder, and no one brings that truth home to me faster or more clearly than my daughter.

Last night, after a series of yucky interactions with her, I was feeling lonely and frustrated. My favorite person to talk to about this dynamic and my part in it is the New Englander -- he has this way of seeing and celebrating both of us at the same time, and always seems to have helpful suggestions to help me navigate the situation -- but I couldn't call him.

I mean I could have, but I've recently more clearly identified the dynamic we keep falling into that isn't working for me, where we have a talk like the one I just described, and I go right back to that place of feeling he is my person so why isn't he here with me, only to find him still in the space where he doesn't know if he is my person or that he wants to be with me. And that doesn't help. It qualifies, instead, as a manifestation of my desire to check out of the process every so often that I referenced above. It fits squarely in the category of let's just pretend that this works because for now it is making me feel good. No. Not now that I can see how that keeps me locked in this cycle that puts me right back into abandoned little girl mode. That's not what I need for myself, and it certainly isn't what my daughter needs from me.

I found this song from Beyonce that expresses many elements of what I'm feeling this early morning.

There's the feeling of thinking you're sure of something only to find yourself repeatedly in a situation where it might make some sense to make room for the possibility that you're not:

I can't believe I believed
Everything we had would last...
...Silly of me to dream of
One day having your kids
Love is so blind
It feels right when it's wrong

I won't go as far to say that the love I feel for the New Englander is wrong, but I can admit that my willingness to suspend reality and go with the fantasy is alive and well within the context of the situation in which we now find ourselves.

And there's the feeling of self-empowerment, the one where I say hey, wait a minute, I am strong, I am wise, and I can do this on my own for right now, even if I don't want to:

Cuz I realized I got
Me myself and I
That's all I got in the end
That's what I found out
And it ain't no need to cry
I took a vow that from now on
I'm gonna be my own best friend

But I'm not going to go as far as Beyonce:

Me myself and I
I know that I will never disappoint myself
I must have cried a thousand times
All the ladies if you feel me
Help me sing it now
I can't regret all the times spent with you
Ya, you hurt me
But I learned a lot along the way
After all the rain
You'll see the sun come out again
I know that I will never disappoint myself

Because I do disappoint myself sometimes. I did last night, in fact, in some of the interactions with my daughter. But I'm ok with that. I understand that's all part of the healing process. And I'm on board with that, even when it's difficult...