15 August 2004

Oh no! I just read my last entry and realized I never came back and finished. Which is too bad because that night had a lot going on in it and I think it's important that I remember what we said and what we were feeling. Or at least what I was feeling.

There was a point in that night where I asked him if we could be "fixed." He admitted he didn't know. The night ended with a kiss out on his driveway. A kiss he asked for. A strong kiss that held so much emotion. The kind that made your mind sway because it said so many things that couldn't really be verbalized.

I do love him. It was a good night even though the long talk we had was a hard one to work through. It didn't necessarily solve anything. But it brought things to the attention for both of us. We both learned a little more about each other and for awhile after that day...

I felt a rush that I hadn't felt in a long time. I even breathlessly exclaimed to my mother that I felt I had "fallen in love all over again."

Well, okay, it wasn't quite that dramatic in reality, but I did know that I felt something different. An excitement. A hope. A genuine desire to see and be with Jeff that I hadn't really had in awhile.

It faded slowly. For both of us. I think we sort of half-heartedly try but it's too easy to fall back into old habits. Is it better? I suppose. Life, is still life and all the things we deal with day in and out never really go away we just learn to deal with them in different ways.

Are we "fixable"? I don't know. I don't know what a normal, long-term relationship looks like. I've never been in love with anyone else to have something to compare it with. I know that this idealistic idea of couples and perfection does not exist. I know no one is completely ideal and that we all struggle with our own imperfections and apparent imperfections that we see in others. I look at my own parent's marriage and I believe it has been a good one. They will have been married for 30 years in October.

They aren't perfect. They do argue sometimes. And as I get older, they both seem to have relaxed in finding a confidence in me. I know they both have their own hurts and issues with each other. But my guess is they've existed all a long. They've been there from the beginning and you learn to deal with them. You hope you can personally cope with the differences and ideally learn to grow and possibly change and accomodate the other person. Or maybe not.

I think we do things for our own reasons. Sometimes it's just part of our genetic makeup. Perhaps we can learn to control or do things differently, but in essence it's who we are and practically impossible to move away from that. Then there are other things that we probably develop from our own life history. Becoming bits and pieces of what we've seen, who we've met, what we've learned. Probably much of that is how we are raised.

I can be quite happy sometimes when I just go and I don't think. Is that scary?

I have been blessed with an amazing life. I have been handed opportunity that I know I take for granted and don't even realize the advantage I have that makes me successful in what I do. I don't know how to make myself aware of all of it because what do I have to compare it to? Maybe what we should be doing is experiencing what other's are, even just to better understand ourselves. Is that possible?

And who do you experience, who do you seek when its the unknown. How do you go looking for something that you don't understand or recognize?

I am in my typical PMS state that often inspires these d-land chats. I get....so sad. I mean, to a point that I don't understand. To a point that I begin to think maybe I'm just going crazy. Everyone, including myself, jokes that I am a hypochondriac. Not to its true clinical definition, I'm sure. I don't constantly concern myself with some pressing disease that I may have. But there is almost always something wrong with me.

I like to think that I'm just sensitive to my body's changing states. That I AM experiencing everything that I do and hopefully it's all normal and what not but you don't know. I have experienced strange symptoms that don't make any sense. But, when I'm like this, I feel sincerely depressed.

But I feel like, if I tell anyone, is that just one more thing to add to my list of bizarre symptoms? I don't know what would help. I think it is a hormone imbalance at "this time of the month" but how can you treat that?

Should I feel as sad and hopeless as I do? It's worse some months than others. It's a terrible place of darkness that scares even myself. And I feel a complete lack of control over my emotions. Not even that, a complete....the effort to control myself is just beyond even grasping. I know my attitude and mood is very hurtful to my family. And I just let myself go. I hate when I'm like because it's completely inexcusable.

Especially with my younger brother. I talk trash about him not controlling his ADD and then I look at myself and it's like...pull yourself together! God, if he feels what I do, I mean in a similar sense where something is so powerful over you--that must be really terrible. I feel so bad for him. To be trapped like that. Knowing that how you're behaving isn't good or right or even normal and not being able to stop yourself or even care...that you're doing it at all.

I usually care, and I'm not always aware but when I am, I do feel bad about snapping at my brother or just plain freaking out on my mom but...getting to that next step where you care enough to stop...I can't seem to get there. I mean, the level of effort to just breathe, and function and do whatever needs to be done is so completely exhausting.

So exhausting...that when you're options are to control yourself and be to the max of your ability to keep it up or to snap and feel awful about doing it....how could you not feel depressed? How else are you supposed to feel?

Because I feel sad sometimes to the point where it is like a drug. A heavy drug with a weight that covers me and I feel like I'm sinking. Sinking, crushing...and I just want to sleep and go away. Not go away permanently--I mean I know that sounds bad when I say I want to go away I just...I don't want to go away I want the awful feeling to leave. And it's somehow easier to just go to bed then try to deal with everything inside of you that doesn't make any sense at all.

You don't want to feel it and you really don't want others to see you like that or to pass it on to them.

I feel pretty alone sometimes. Knowing that I'm balanced on a family that I want to move on from--not abandon, but simply grow as a person outside of their control--and then having Jeff on the other side as my rock. Knowing I'm hinged on two things that could easily collapse before me...is scary. And the other major thing in my life, my job....

I fear leaving with Jeff because it means losing my family and my job and basing it all on a relationship that I'm not sure can be "fixed." Whatever that means. I don't want to live the rest of my life...not being everything Jeff needs--and not being with someone who loves and knows who I am.

I sometimes think it would be good to escape. To start fresh.

and then the thought of leaving everything I have hurts. I love him. I love him and I want to be with him. And I don't feel like....I worry it may not work. The problems we have aren't going to disappear by moving in together--whether here or by moving away. I don't want to disappoint him. I don't want to feel like being me is there awful thing. That boo hoo aglaia is tired again and ruining everyone's fun.

It's like, fuck you. I want to go home.

We saw a movie tonight. And we got back to his place a bit after midnight. I guess he thought I was coming in and I already had it in my head that I would be going home. When I said I was leaving I saw it flash in his eyes and in his body language and in his tone of voice.

A mix of disappoint and disgust, maybe even a little anger. It was an "of course"--as in...he should have known better than to think...whatever it was he was thinking. So I let him down and for a second I was crushed. And I'm angry that I have to feel that way. I'm angry that I have to feel like a 'failure' for wanting to go to sleep. That knowing if I went inside with him that we would probably lounge on the couch or go down to his room where he'd probably want to have sex and I would be drifting off to sleep.

Once again ruining everything.

I shouldn't have to feel bad about it. It's like...he's the one who has a problem with me, but I'm the one who has the problem. I'm the one with the defect.

And then I begin to wonder....would it be any different. Could I be with anyone else and not have the same problems Jeff and I have now? Am I forever flawed with some universal problem? Or have I been so "scarred" by our relationship and its issues that I will now have developed some sort of baggage that I'll drag along with me no matter what if I ended up seeing other people?

I don't know how to "fix" us because I don't feel like I need to fix anything. He's the one with the problem with me.... I don't think I can change. I can try to be more aware of some things and try to really work through it, but really...it's not me.

I don't want to feel bad about being me anymore.