Single
Why are so many amazing women remaining unpartnered?
The Last Day…
It was my 43rd birthday if memory serves me correctly, (which it rarely does these days). We were on holiday in Cornwall and making each other pretty miserable. His unhealed bleeding wounds, rubbing up against my tender healing ones. Me feeling like I was the only adult in the relationship (or at least trying to be), with my attempts to initiate conversations and resolve our disagreements without pointing the finger. Him taking on the role of victim, behaving like an angry teenage boy towards his mother. He would withdraw to sulk in the spare room for days at a time whilst ignoring my attempts at healthy, adult communication….”Go away, I’m fine!” He was an ex marine, so knew a thing or two about weapons. His favourite weapon of choice during our relationship was silence. And boy was it effective. As my therapist used to say, ‘silence screams loudest’.
I can remember we started that last day with some very below average sex, which was rudely interrupted by my friend’s son walking in on us. I was secretly relieved for the excuse to climb off and stop my Meg Ryan worthy performance. From hereon the day only got worse. I watched my soon to be ex-lover shower and dress, wishing that he wasn’t so damn sexy. Rather predictably we argued again about some old nonsense. Two wounded egos butting heads. We then spent the rest of the day apart, either out (separately) or in different rooms, with him refusing any attempts I made to reconnect. What a shit show. Yes, yes, oh yes!
When we returned from this disastrous final holiday, I told him I was done. That the relationship was over for me. He immediately went off and shagged my yoga teacher, possibly as revenge for the rejection he felt from me/mummy being the one to say ‘enough’. Rather predictably and very swiftly, he moved on and indeed in with her, just a few doors down the road from where we had lived together. I would occasionally see them doing yoga side by side as I walked past her house with my dog. Namaste.
It was at this point in my life that I made a vow to myself and to the Universe, that I would never again date a ‘man-child’. I promised us both that I would never abandon myself again in order to try and make a relationship work (Spoiler: it doesn’t work). That I wouldn’t be in relationship with someone who had not done enough, or indeed any inner work and healing that allowed them to grow up and meet me as an emotional adult.
Cue tumbleweed…..