So, my counselor and I had an excellent conversation today, and I really look forward to seeing her every week! Yea!
Anyhoo…we are talking about relationships, because as you know from my last post, me and relationships just don’t get along too well. Let’s put it this way: I have a 100% fail rate for them! ‘Nuff said.
As we were talking about the ‘why’ behind all of my relationships ending, I began to see so many of my problems lie in the fact that my boundaries are pretty poor. In fact, if my boundaries were a fence, even a chihuahua could escape. Easily. Having bad boundaries makes it very easy for people to get in. And for me to get out.
One of the many ‘wonderful’ characteristics of being bipolar is impulsiveness. And I’m not talking impulsive as in buying a new shirt I don’t really need. I’m talking about impulsiveness throughout every area of my life, including relationships.
Ever since I was a kid, I’ve never done things half way. I do them the entire way, and then some, or I don’t do them at all. When I was 30-something, I was still carrying around baby weight (from a 65 pound gain…I couldn’t eat just one Oreo when I was preggers, I had to eat the whole damn sleeve) and wanted to lose it. I called my dad who had been a runner since I could remember, and we met at a track. I couldn’t finish an 1/8th of a mile, so I did what any rational person would do. I signed up for a marathon. When I started acrylic pour painting, it wasn’t enough to create a canvas or 2. I had to buy every painting supply known to man…fix up a studio in my basement…and make so many canvases that I’ll be giving them out as Christmas gifts long after I’m in a nursing home. See what I mean?
I do the same thing in relationships. I jump in…without looking…without thinking…without considering the consequences of what that jump could do to me. Once I’m in, I’m in. I fall too quickly. I love too hard. I give too much. I want even more. And the problem is this: once I get outside that boundary which should be in place to protect me, I’m VERY hesitant to get back behind the little fence there is. After all, freedom is better! Take my Edward. He’s such a good dog, but if I’m taking out the trash, and leave the gate open, he’ll take off and never look back. I can tempt him with every known treat, and he’ll still value that freedom more than the safety of home. Even though it’s dangerous! Even though it’s unknown! Even though something could happen to him that could cause great injury! For some reason, being outside of a gate is so much more fun than being inside it.
Like Eddie, I want that gate open, especially in relationships! The simple fact is, I love love. I hope you read that correctly…let me try it again: I LOVE love. 🙂 I love falling in lust…building up love…getting to know someone…unlocking the secrets of someone…cuddling with someone…knowing I have someone in this world just for me. Little old me. OK, little OLD me.
It’s intoxicating, isn’t it? That first tug of the heart. The first kiss you share when your heart is beating so hard you wonder if it will ever be the same again. But like anything intoxicating, it can be so dangerous too. 
We learn to ‘feed’ off the impulsiveness. It becomes almost addicting. It becomes something to us that puts us in a tunnel. And then all we can see is that tunnel and the person in it with us. We can’t see the dangers associated with it, just like a drug addict might not see the consequences of their use. Our rational mind has been blinded, and our impulsive, emotional side has taken control; face it, it’s MUCH more exciting to listen to our hearts than to our heads.
Hence, people like me put up with a lot of things they shouldn’t. After all, we slid ourselves into this tunnel, we’d better learn to like it; we ran outside the gate, we’d better take advantage of it. So we’ll let people say horrible things to us without calling them on it. We’ll let them use us: financially, emotionally, and sexually, because saying no to them, trying to build up another fence while we’re out wandering around, is just too damn hard to do. And anyway, whose got the time or tools for that? We’ll let them cheat on us, with no consequence other than making them ‘promise’ they’ll never do it again. We’ll let them put their hands on us, when we swore to ourselves that would never ever ever happen.
But after a while, you do get tired of this. Tired of being in such a dark place. Tired of exhausting yourself justifying to others your objection to leaving. Tired of having a hollowness inside of you that nothing outside the safety of a fence will quench now. Tired of looking in the mirror…and then looking away…because you don’t want to see, or acknowledge, the pain you can no longer hide in your eyes. Tired of feeling less than. Tired of feeling like a thing, instead of a person. Tired of not being ‘you’ anymore. You are just so fucking tired.
Since my last relationship ended, I have come to understand that the safety of a fence is actually so much more comfortable and satisfying than running around without a leash. I finally have gathered some tools now. I finally have time now. I have the know-how to build my fences, and keep them in repair. I have the want to protect this person I’m getting to know better and better each day. A person I’m actually starting to like. Maybe loving myself is right around the corner. Maybe I’m the ‘one’ I’ve been waiting for all my life.
I guess I’ve just come to the realization that I’m worth taking care of. And if that’s not motivation to get busy nailing these boards together, I don’t know what is.
Kristi xoxo
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It’s All in Your Head 