Fear and Devotion Part Two

Last week, there was an app guy who got mad at me when I wouldn’t come right over, that I wouldn’t change out of my pajamas and drive across the city to see him,  a stranger I’d just started chatting with that afternoon.

Before I blocked him, he said something like “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but I work hard and I want to be loved in my off hours.”

(Dude, don’t we all.)

There was a language barrier, but still. After I deleted the app guy, I didn’t feel like he was gonna come get me or anything, I just felt like—what am I? Am I anything? Can anyone see me here? Disembodied. So small as to slip through the cracks of existence and just dissolve into the ether. This is a pretty regular emotion of online dating, of dating in general.

So, my devotion to The Shy One was a safe place. I wanted to, not pine, exactly, just live cozily in my fake-chaste fake-platonic love for The Shy One. I wanted to be just as unobtrusive as possible, and free as can be, just able to pull my love for TSO up over me like a weighted blanket. Loving someone who loves me, but who I couldn’t have—the safest possible place. I’m tired of putting my body and heart and mind and soul in the path of strangers, I wanted the soft touch of something known. Embodied and of-the-soul, safe, safe, safe.

But then, TSO wasn’t in touch for a few days, normal friend rhythm that left space for that old quest to creep back in—how could I get him to see me? How could I try again to get his unavoidably divided attention? I wanted to send him a sweet-hot picture from last January and say, “I think these two deserve a chance.”

(The young people have a phrase for this: “down bad.” So apt it makes me queasy.)

I wasn’t really gonna send the picture, but looking at it made me surge with sadness. With anger! With abandonment and betrayal. He will always, no matter how much we love each other, no matter how much I empathize with his reasons, be the boyfriend who dumped me right before a trip, Valentines Day, and a minor-but-fraught surgery.

As good as it felt (still feels!) to rest in devotion, it felt terrible to be going backwards. My heart doesn’t know how not to think of him as The One, even though I don’t even really subscribe to the concept of The One. I hope that will change someday, but I don’t think texting the darling every few days is the way there.

So I said goodbye to The Shy One again, trying to be honest and kind but feeling unhinged and toxic. It felt horrible, but I felt better the next day. Reality is scary. Forward motion is scary. Strangers are DEFINITELY scary. It’ll take time and patience and breaks and chocolate and weed gummies and tears, but being at home in myself and in hope-for-love is worth it.

My Dad Was an Emotional Sea Monster

Content Warning: Child abuse, spousal abuse, and a brief mention of sexual assault.

The first draft of this post had like a jillion paragraphs about my family’s messed up relationship with food but

A.   I really just don’t want to talk about it.

And

B.    The emotions I’ve been uncovering here, the feeling of being judged, surveilled, the I’ll-never-get-it-right feeling, they don’t really come from fatphobia or my mom’s weird controlling/mystical ideas around sugar. They come from my dad being fucking terrifying.

In the present day, my dad is a mild-to-absent part of my life. He’s part of my lifeboat of family liberals, though he does mention Al Franken a little too often. (Ever is too often.) He’s doing this weird thing lately where he regales me with his slight calorie intake and his enviable walking routine, but it seems sad rather than judgey. He bought me and my sister Elizabeth Warren’s book as soon as it came out.

But of course the terror of him from my childhood still lives in my body, makes it hard to feel privacy or autonomy and trust.

I’ve written posts about incidents of explosive violence from him, but I think the frozen feeling comes from the day-to-day of him. It’s hard to focus on my dad, even in the kind care of Summer Therapist, even now with a pink wine spritzer and a Hazy Summer Lofi playlist on. Let me light a few candles and some incense, be right back.

Okay, here I am. I remember the feeling of getting home early for a half snow day and my heart just falling when I realized dad was home early too. I saw him out back chopping wood and all my festive snow day emotions just left me. I felt apprehension, sadness, a beautiful day lost.

I don’t remember a specific instance of him calling us worthless. I remember “lazy.” My senior year of high school, I remember “cocksucker” when I won a photography contest and didn’t give the prize money to him. Also from the teenage years, I remember “You brought this into our house,” (meaning I’d brought violence into our house by being raped and assaulted at a party) as his fists rained down on me, just after he’d kicked my mom down the stairs.

But “worthless” was the insult that sunk in deepest, it was so present that it feels like weather, like, what’s the opposite of a snow day? It’s embedded in my brother too, who’ll use it on me at the slightest provocation. Which is part of why we don’t hang out with that guy.

My dad loomed over everything like the worst supervisor. During the process of grieving the Shy One relationship, one of the hardest things was the way I could still feel TSO with me, fucking judging me all the time—I wasn’t getting over him fast enough, wasn’t doing dating right. I was wallowing too much in my feelings. Mostly, my brain had made up this snippy version of my probably genuinely-rooting-for-me ex, but he was buzzing around my brain for months, reminding me that I’d failed, that his rejection meant I wasn’t lovable, telling me to just fucking give up.

Worthless.

My dad was like a sea monster. You never knew what was going on under the surface or when he might come screaming out of the sea and sink the ship. The simplest things could turn from rumbling menace to terror on a dime.

Once, when I was around ten my sister and I were changing for something and, in the middle of a fight with mom, he decided he needed to come in our room and yell at us too. We locked the door but he kicked it and kicked it until it broke. My sister and I stood there naked and frozen with fear, nowhere to go for cover.

In present-day moments of panic, I feel that day: exposed, afraid, unable to solve the problem or shift the moment. Unable to protect the more vulnerable people around me. I knew there was no privacy or safety, that I didn’t and couldn’t own my own body. There was no place where he ended and I began.

There were school mornings I couldn’t get out the door because I didn’t part my hair correctly. I would stand on a chair, looking into the little mirror on a wall sconce, combing and recombing. I would climb down from the chair, he would check it and find it crooked. I would have to climb back up on the chair and try again. The endlessness, the hopelessness, the feeling of just being too stupid to figure it out.

Worthless.

I feel so much regret, remorse, and loss for the for the ways the father I carry projected itself onto the relationship with The Shy One. I know part of me wished I could Get It Right this time, that that would somehow solve the childhood ache. Though TSO was in no way abusive or scary, I chose someone withholding, uncommunicative, snappish, and exacting, and set out to win him over, to make him into a safe home. I wanted him to make me worthy. Tale as old as time.

As my two months off from dating draw to a close, this is what scares me the most—will I really be able to hold out for someone emotionally available, or will I slip into this fantasy again, hurting myself and some unsuspecting guy in the process? Will seeing the pattern help me be kinder to myself, to believe in the chatty, joyful, equal relationship of my dreams? I hope so! I’ll do my imperfect best.

 

 

A Bad Date, Good Hookup, and a Helpful Google, Part Three

There was something about Hookup Guy having such a narrow window of time that made him seem a little sus. Sure, he could have just been horny and urgent (like, you know, ME) but it felt like he was on more of a cheating husband schedule than a divorced dad schedule. I knew I had to look him up before I let him come over anymore.

These moments never don’t remind me of Psyche bringing the lamp into Cupid’s room and wrecking everything. Darn lamp!

I couldn’t find anything under the name he’d given me, aside from a lower-rung Marvel actor. A facebook search turned up various not-hims. He’d told me that in addition to his teaching work, he had started doing real estate on the side, so I tried “fake name realtor” in the search bar and still found nothing. I know not everyone is an internet open book, but sheesh.

So I typed in his phone number and up came the same him with a different last name. He did seem divorced on his (mostly professional) facebook page. And there he was, a ways back, holding up his “I’m vaccinated” sticker, so at least he wasn’t lying about that? I suppose anyone could get a sticker though. Should I be asking to see vaccine cards? I mean, you can fake those too! Will this fall’s adventures land me in Deltaville?

It’s very Nineties to wonder if fucking is going to kill me. And also very now, very always, I guess.

I texted him to ask why he’d given me a wrong last name, but I knew there wasn’t any answer he could give that would change things. After a few skeptical-but-hopeful hours, I blocked and unmatched. People are just gone so fast sometimes.

I felt more off-balance from Hookup Guy’s lying than from the morning’s bad date, but the combination of the two left me feeling discouraged, self-slut-shamed, and generally turned upside down. The sense of unreality that permeates all of 2021 life and especially online dating descended like a not-cute cloud.

I talked it over with Pagan Boy’s Crush (I’ve come to think of PBC and Sweetie-Now-BFF, along with my new therapist, as my emotional board of directors. I stole that idea from someone, but I forget who.) and realized that I’d been handing out so much trust and generosity lately, and I needed to turn some of that towards myself.

Now, a week later, I’ve basically stopped swiping for the time being. New therapist referred to The Lovely Guy as my “regular (his name)” and I think I’ve got us into a nicely casual place. (knock wood) There’s This Charming Man who has nothing to do with The Smiths and everything to do with ropes and good texting! I should probably write about him soon.

And there’s friends. And work. And sleep. And time’s almost up on my 2021 goals. I’m happier and less scattered than I was a week ago, so that’s good. And it’s only mostly because of the ropes. 😊

Divorce Times Week 10: Oh Yeah, Grief and Fear

It’s hitting me so hard today—the feeling that I’ve failed. I failed to make my family, failed to find the right love, and now I may have lost my chance. I feel one million years old. All over my life, people know how to do this, and I don’t: falling together, clicking into place and figuring out what works for them, settling into the dailiness of love, and I’m writing while my ex-wife catches up the bills in the other room. I hate it so much and I don’t know how to get to the other side.

A week ago, for the past while actually, I’ve been feeling good about things, feeling like my momentum would just carry me along to wherever I need to be. For whatever reason, today that left me and I see the precariousness of the situation, I can’t feel any faith.

I am so scared, everybody, that no matter what I do or try, it will be forty years from now and I’ll be on my deathbed realizing that I never realized the dream that meant the most, the only thing I ever really cared about, that I never found true love. What if I have to spend the rest of my life just WATCHING love and never having my own?

Because what if whoever made me just forgot to put the lovable part in? What if I’m just not supposed to be a part of it?

Response to BDSM Safety Discussion

This is a FetLife post I just did in response to a BDSM safety talk we attended last weekend. The talk was given in response to local predator issues.The letter touches on a lot of the stuff I’ve been working on here.

"What a great night (Sweetie) and I had on Saturday. Rope class, the discussion, and the play party were all so much fun. Thank you for having us.

I’ve only been in parts of the various safety discussions that have been going on, so I’m sure I’ll repeat some stuff that’s already been said. Feel free to correct me if I heard anything wrong…

First I wanted to say a bigbig thank you to (Rope Boss and Party Mistress) for hosting the talk, and to the people who participated, too. It was wonderful to get to sit around and talk about some of the things that had been concerning me, and it made things seem less scary in general. I was worried that I might not want to play after a discussion that deep, and the fact that I was ready to strip right down after speaks highly of the feeling of safety you’ve created.

A lot of the advice that I heard is so valuable, especially the need for subs/bottoms to know how to say what we want and don’t want. Being reminded to treat ourselves like we are worth caring for and protecting is good advice for anyone. I liked the insights that I got about others’ relationships, and I’ll be glad to keep learning more about you and yours.

However, I did feel like the talk was a bit unbalanced. In addition to what bottoms can do to make ourselves safer, I would like to have heard more about what tops’ responsibilities are beyond just the physical “don’t break your toys” rule. Those kinds of conversations would be really helpful to me because I would love to know what the norms are, what’s reasonable to expect.

Focusing mostly on what bottoms can do to protect ourselves had the (unintended, I’m sure) effect of feeling a little bit like blaming the victims. I think it’s important to say that no lapse in judgement, no rookie mistake, no foolish leap of faith will ever mean that someone deserves to be violated, physically or emotionally. Whether we’ve known someone for four months or four minutes, the right to be safe is the same.

I was especially bothered by the advice of “Don’t go over to a guy’s house unless you are ready to have sex with him.” First of all, it sells guys so short—I would have missed out on so many good relationships and friendships if I looked at life that way. Even if I’m ready to have sex, there might be aspects of play that I still need to say no to. Besides, I may be ready for sex, but I’ll never be ready to be raped. It’s just not the same thing.

For the most part, people don’t hurt each other on purpose. It seems like a lack of respectful communication leads to the majority of troubles between partners. For that reason, I feel that fear-based prevention ideas such as and “Warn people of what the consequences are if they violate your limits” are not the way to go. Approaching someone like an adversary doesn’t seem like a good way to begin a trusting, collaborative relationship. Fear may be a way to keep us safe in the short run, but in the long run an us-versus-them attitude is just going to lead to more miscommunication and hurt.

So I guess what I’d ideally like to see is kind of a team-building approach. What are the ways that men/women tops/bottoms, etc can work together to foster more communication and respect?

Thank you again for the discussion and everything else that you do. I look forward to more talking and more fun in the future."

Some Fears I Would Like to Grow Out Of

Yesterday I was having breakfast with a friend who is in the process of transitioning from female to male. I was telling him about my recent dating adventures and subsequent fears. He told me that a lot of the fears I have about men, he has about being a man—they’re things he was worried about turning into. That really made it hit home that my fears are prejudices—no one should have to be scared to become a man because of stereotypes, and I shouldn’t be afraid to date them, either.

I work in an afterschool program with elementary students who are very dogmatic about gender. At least once a week, I give them a rousing speech about how limiting gender generalizations are. I’m a social justice-y egalitarian-minded girl and I’m ashamed to be walking around with my own terrible generalizations. Part of the reason I started this project was to learn my way out of my terrible ideas about men, so maybe listing and debunking some of those fears will help.

1. Doll-phobia.  Most of the fears are me-specific. For example, I don’t think that guys want every woman to be a sex-doll, I’m just afraid that my emotions are so ugly and crazy that men will only want to enjoy my body as separate from my personality. As with all of these fears, I’m not sure why I don’t apply them to women—Sweetie seems perfectly fine with my mess of a personality, just as I adore hers. Also, I have lots of platonic guy friends, so I guess that this fear only applies to men who are attracted to me. Which brings me to:

2. Attraction feels like aggression. Whenever a guy is attracted to me, especially in the toppish way that I crave, it feels very dangerous. I guess I have a hard time thinking that guys are capable of feeling genuine affection towards me, so the pursuit I’m craving feel scary and I worry that it is just a way to hurt me. This is a terrible thing to think about people. I always wished I could have gotten to know Bill separate from this idea, but maybe I sought him out because he proved the fear—I’ll never know, because I never really knew him.

3. I’ve always worried that I’m missing some essential quality that would make me appealing to men. I’ve always felt like other women just had some secret that I wasn’t let in on.

As much as I enjoy being a bottom, one of the qualities that I worry about being without is compliance. I’ve been really shocked and hurt by the way that men have tried to control me outside of scene situations. Not ALL of them, of course—the Mayor of Kittentown was a loyal reader and was super supportive of all of my other endeavors as well. He never displayed jealousy, but instead, like Sweetie, seemed to genuinely root for my other adventures to be fruitful. He never made me feel like I had to change or hold anything back. I also have so many wonderful and generous guy friends who have supported me every step of the way. I guess this fear is also top-specific, but I know that the right top would not expect me to be compliant outside of scenes.

4. I’m-Not-the-Pretty-Sister Syndrome: I am afraid that there will always be a woman that he loves better, and that means that I’m afraid that I can’t ever have a relationship with a guy who truly belongs to me. That is a dangerous fear for a polyamorous woman to have—feeling like I’m always going to be less-than is going to be a nightmare if I end up in a constellation. I think the key to this is to make myself start dating only guys who are emotionally available, whether they are in other relationships are not. When I feel loved, validated, and free, I don’t feel competitive.

5. I’m afraid that my size makes me unlovable and untoppable (again, by men). When I first started thinking about dating men, I had strong fantasies about being taken, especially just being shoved into a wall and kissed. But I had this idea that because I am so big and bossy I could never feel what it’s like to be pursued, for someone to want me enough to take the initiative and the lead.

When I was in middle school, my drama teacher told me I was too tall to ever be the leading lady, and I certainly have watched men respond more positively to smaller women.

When I first joined FetLife and started going to play parties, I started to see the reality that men like all different shapes and sizes of women, and that every woman can be a hot showoff sex goddess the way that I want to be. I started to feel that for myself.

Yet somehow, I still get the idea, that guys see me as less than other women because of my size, maybe not les fuckable, but less datable. I was convinced that Bill wouldn’t go out in public with me because he thought I was too fat, and I never had the courage to ask him.

Society does seem to teach us to value fat people less than skinny people, big women less than little. Being not-skinny does come with all kind of stereotypes and assumptions.

One of the worst of these, and one I have to fight myself from thinking, is that a fat girl better fuck anybody who asks, because we’re lucky to be asked at all. That’s part of what makes it difficult for me to wait for the right person/people to come along, even though I want to feel like I deserve the right connections.

6. The other night at the poetry reading, a guy read a story that suggested that the plain woman had to give up the idea of finding a guy she’s attracted to, or she would deserve whatever heartbreak she gets. I’ve felt guilty these past months because physical attraction is important to me, not the only thing that’s important, but still.

7. And I am very worried that I am too ugly for a man. I don’t have a pretty little face; it’s very pronounced and expressive. Remember MySpace profile pics? I never could master the slack, dreamy, passive look we were all supposed to have in those, any more than I can stop myself from smiling in photos where I’m being submissive—nor should I ever have to!

I know that men are not shallow automatons who choose whatever face and body type they are told to. I see all different looks and bodies on women who are in happy relationships with guys. Again, these fears are mostly me-specific.

I hope that by naming some of the fears, I can start to move past them. They seem pretty stupid when I write them all down. I would love to let guys in to prove the fears wrong and start moving towards real connections. I want to stop selling guys so short, give them time to get to know me, and let myself get to know them. Like Sweetie always says, I have a lot of dreams.