"had enough of waving brave goodbyes"

The exercise of the moment: learning that people who love you will say no to you about things you believe you need.      And sometimes be upset that you believe that you need them.  And maybe the grownup thing to do is to hear the no, and not try to fight for what I want, or understand why the other person is saying no.      And no one gets to have me fearless, because there's not an omnia that exists that is fearless, and I can be more or less confident in relationships with specific people, but it takes time and work, and there can be setbacks, and it's okay that I'm not consistently confident.

I know, the lady doth protest, if I really believed all of this I would not have to say it to convince myself, much less say it in this public forum.  (oh gods there was a time when he eagerly read these and now i can't believe that is true and that hurts like whoa)

For a little bit today, I contemplated just repeating the line "I don't care" over and over inside my head, a mantra, internal self-castigating elevator music, trying to create armor where I have none.  But I think that part of me still likes the part of me that cares so deeply, that I don't entirely want to be the person who doesn't care, because it feels like I'll lose something if I am, it feels like I'm letting all the horrible parts of the world win.

There's a tanktop out there that says "Sometimes I feel like giving up, but then I remember I have a lot of motherfuckers to prove wrong".   It's so hard to remember that I can be a functional loving person when I keep feeling like the world says "no" over and over again.   But I am going to prove them wrong.   I'm going to prove the woman who said "I wish you were more loveable" wrong. 

For a long time, it felt like I was begging for scraps.  And then it didn't.  And now I don't know anymore, but whatever is happening, I've gone back to bracing for the next bodyblow, the next loss. And maybe it's not true that it's harder for the having relaxed, having become unwary, but I don't know I'd feel such an aching sense of loss about something I never had in the first place.

"No, you can't contain all of that rain"

I imagine the worst in all the silences now, and it aches.   I had found out a place where I could believe the best of him, believe that he thought of me, believe that he was managing his time so that he got to spend if not as much of it with me as he could, at least a lot of how much he could.  And now I imagine sea monsters, I imagine that not only am I less important than all the important and scary things he has to do, I'm less important than everything, and all the things I'm supposed to cut him slack for he, he's not asking anyone else to cut him slack for.

I need something to do with my hands.  I want so, so badly to start smoking again, give myself those little pauses, the interludes where I don't think about anything but the sensations, where even the inside of my head is still for a moment. 

There's a way that my anxiety feels, a tightness in the center of my chest, my shoulders climbing up to my ears, a taste like metal and garbage in my mouth that I identify as fear.   My hands shake a little bit, and if I'm not careful, I start digging my thumbnail into the web between the index finger and thumb of the other hand.    And dominoes tumble, I recognize the feeling, and I feel ever unlovelier, messier, more unwanted, more of a burden.   Not only have I done whatever it was that I did wrong in the first place to be put in a position that makes me anxious, I'm now also broken.

My old therapist spent a couple sessions trying to explain to me that when one has a panic attack, one isn't actually dying.   We miscommunicated for at least two fifty minute sessions, because I didn't understand what she was trying to say, and she didn't understand that at no point did I think I was dying.   Yes, it's hard to breathe sometimes, yes my heart races, yes my fingers go numb.   I can see all of those things as anxiety, and move straight into the beating myself up for an inappropriate reaction and at the time, I thought that she was trying to tell me that my belief that my reaction was inappropriate wasn't really true.  (I did not stay with this therapist)

I think this is probably  my fault, I let myself feel safe, I let him make me cry on purpose so he could then comfort me.   And I thought that if he wanted me that laid bare then, he always would.   I thought it was a virtue that I had saved myself, and didn't need him for anything other than himself, he told me it was restful.   But now I feel like the thing least on fire is the one that gets the least care, and while I am certainly on fire, I am certainly in a very bad place, I am still able to talk about my feelings, I'm still able to mostly articulate my concerns, I am still committed to making sure we have good things too so I can't be that much on fire.