Woe Is Everyone
I was having a good long talk with an old friend the other night. She’s going through a tough time and well, frankly, so am I. It seems we’re both at a crossroads in our lives and while her problems are more immediate and urgent, it brought up a lot of stuff for me, too. I adore her and have known her since we were in the eighth grade (over 20 years, chi’ren). I was both surprised and relieved that she, too, forgets that she’s a girl sometimes. That sometimes you spend so much time in your head that you actually forget your gender. Not that I think for a moment, “Wait, am I male or female?” it’s more just a forgetting of my own sense of self overall.
I mentioned the other day that I realized I have a very hard time asking for anything. Sometimes though, I think it might be because I don’t know what it is I want or I am either afraid of asking for something that may seem unreasonable or even ridiculous. This came up for me again while chatting with my lovely friend because part of her recent issues have been because of the attention of come of the men in her life. It has been so long since she’d had such positive attention that she is suddenly unsure of how to even deal with it. And we talked about what she wants and doesn’t want and how she could go about that. I couldn’t help but feel a tinge of jealousy. Not that I would take anything from her, she’s amazing and awesome and I’m not the only one who thinks so. But it was that positive male attention! Wow! I miss that!What? I know, I’m married. But it’s different. And things haven’t been the same, I think, since I opened the cafe…maybe even before that!
I was struck by the story of a friend of hers she’d known for ages that suddenly hit on her. Well, let me rephrase that. He said she was “infinitely beautiful.” She was so against the notion. She couldn’t even hear it let alone accept it. She said, “Look, I know I’m cute, but I’m not beautiful.” And I said to her, “But ya are! Ya are infinitely beautiful!” Because, let’s face it, this gal has never been in want of male attention. Same with me, but she puts me to shame in this realm. She doesn’t think so, but I know it’s true. I never stole a single one of her men of interest…but let’s leave it at that! She is beautiful. She is also charming as hell (she didn’t buy that either). So it broke my heart to hear that she still carries so many of the insecurities that I used to have. About aging, about body image…all that stuff! And here I am, older and fatter than ever and I’m actually totally okay with that and me. I mean, my body is rad. No qualms there. But…but?
But damn do I miss the attention. The wooing! The winning of my heart. Not just the chase and the dance that is the dating scene, but just having someone who still wants to impress you or not even that, just that they want you. I just want to feel wanted and needed and desired! Oh man! That is it right there. I forget that I’m a girl because no one treats me like one. So yeah, when someone suddenly does? You can’t help but notice. And I, vicariously, will have to live it through her. To hear the things that have been said to her? Swoon! How could anyone blame her? Well, they shouldn’t, anyway.
No, my marriage isn’t broken or whatever they call it now days. It’s fine. We’re just having a tough time of living, ya know? It’s hard to want to do anything when you’re so broke you have to consider breathing a fun pastime. I think we’re both depressed weather or not we wanna admit it. So who the hell feels like wooing anybody?! And even when I am full of that lusty desire, I freak out about showing or asking for it. And I end up hating myself for it, too. Ugh! I thought I was so confident, especially with my husband. But I am not. It’s a struggle. Even now. I can somehow manage to press on and open my own cafe, but asking my husband to seduce me? Ha-ha! I can’t do it!
What many don’t realize is that long-long-term relationships (13 years, y’all!) go through cycles. There are times when you’re just not in love like you were and you get through those times because you still love the person and find them dead sexy and all, but the spark comes and goes. A couple of months ago I fell for my guy all over again! It was like magic! But he didn’t know what the hell to do with all of the attention and so I laid off. I was surprised by this reaction, but I respected it. But shit, man! I just want him to want me like he used to. And it sucks knowing that he doesn’t (he hasn’t said so, I just feel it, ya know?).
And there is it and that is that. I share these things with you and I wonder why. But it helps. Sometimes I’ll write a post like this and have an epiphany either from a comment (please comment! Ha!) or just thinking it over again in my head and I get an answer! This is life and there’s never a quick fix. I know. But like I said, this helps. Just getting it out there helps. So thank you for reading this blog and my problems and always just being there to bear witness to it all or to comment and help or share your own issues. I am so grateful to have you all in my life and the fat acceptance community, too! <3
HA! I just had THAT TALK with my husband 2 weeks ago. in 2 weeks it will be our 1oth anniversary. Everything you said about sparks coming and going is true. Life is complicated and we loose focus on our relationship all the time. It ends up like we are roomates. But not even roomates with benefits. LOL And I even would make advances on him that got brushed off- ALOT. I was really TRYING at getting sparks back. The brush offs hurt worse than the complete neglect. Now that pissed me off. So I finally snapped. I had the whole convo in my head like 30 times. I sat him down I said,
“honey we have to talk. I am a young 33 year old woman and I am in the prime of my sexuality. I am beautiful and kind and loving. I love you beyond all reasoning and I am so attracted you it shocks me. So I will only ever have this conversation with you ONE time. If you do not start to show me some physical attention then I am going to walk. Because I deserve better and so do you! If you love me the way you say you do, then this is something that YOU have to start to work at. *I* have been working at it for the last year and it doesn’t get any results with just me trying to be romantic with you. Romance and relationships are a two way street baby. If you don’t start to put some effort into our physical and emotional connection; this whole relationship is going to die. Relationships are living things, and they need tending just like other living things.”
He was shocked, but I must tell you; he has put 10x the effort into making me feel special. I thank him for it and praise his efforts. And I am a more balanced person who doesn’t run around trying to suck love and attention off of everyone else around me.
Hope that helps.
Heck yes it helps! Thank you! So why do I feel like an asshole for even wanting to have that conversation? I feel like a needy greedy bitch. And you hit the nail on the head with this: “trying to suck love and attention off of everyone else around me.” My poor friends! I hardly ever see them and now I know why! ha-ha! I wish we lived closer, Sue. You amaze me every day, I tell ya! *hug* You rock!
Part of it, too, is that he doesn’t care about the internet or anything I do on my blog or in the FA community. He has never even read my blog. He might be able to tell you the URL, but I doubt he could tell you much else. He’s never heard a podcast and just seems to not give a fuck about what happens outside of our apartment most days. Neither of us wanna talk about work (neither of us are happy there) and when I mentioned now talking he said he was glad that I had this new intern in my life so that at least someone around me has something positive to say and contribute. WTF?!
my hubs hates his job and feels so much stress taking care of his bills and he is been outcasted by his family, had a shit ton of family problems too. All this CRAP just buries them and they loose all the fun they used to have. My hubs is supportive- in a hands off kinda way. like yours. he comes to all my shows and listens to my drama too and sometimes he just cant handle anymore. I told him i understand all that; and i can feel buried dealing with so much shit too!
But he needs to find a “happy place” tell him that you will help him. tell him that you want him to be happy and you cant stand seeing him that way. you cant change your situation; but what you can change is your attitude. there has to be one little tiny fucking light of positivty in his life, and as a loving wife you might be only one who can help him find it. My husbands happy place is working on his car. i support him in that; and i make sure he has car time so i can have a less grouchy husband. tell him that you will work of THAT for him—if he works on romance for YOU. A bargain, if you will. you know what makes you happy, you just have to help get him to his happy place. because you two are beautiful people and your life is more than money problems and work problems. you deserve more babe.
Yes! The issue there is that he recently took up fishing. EW! I’m against it for many reasons, but I told him straight off the bat that I am happy that he has found something that he enjoys and can do whenever he wants. I explained that I had no interest in going with him (grosses me the hell out and I don’t eat fish) but that he should enjoy it as much as possible. It was fine at first, gave him some time away from home and me and the pup, but now suddenly he insists I’ll enjoy it and won’t let up about it. Ugh! I think it is his happy place and wants to share it with me but it’s so unbearably boring (and quite and just waiting and waiting). It’s torture for me, I’ve explained, but he insists! I don’t know where my happy place is, but I I do know that I am in serious need of some fucking attention, affection and shit! I want to be treated like a catch again! Lately I feel like an old black banana peel! I think the dog thing is closer to the truth than he or I know. We have turned our attention and affections for each other onto the dog and thus left our relationship out to dry, ya know? You make a ton of good points. I need to mull this over awhile. Thanks, doll! <3
Hey darlin…
I don’t know if I have any epiphanies for ya, but… I am so grateful for your blog and what you share. I don’t blog much (wish I would get around to it more often!), but I know when I do that it means a lot just to have people tell me that I’m not just conducting internets masturbation… so here you go. You are helping me by sharing your struggles. And for every one of me that comments and tells you so, there are 10 or 100 that appreciate you but don’t stop to say it. That talk ourselves out of commenting because we don’t feel like we can help or fix it by commenting – not realizing that just saying, “I’m here. I’m listening. I ‘see’ you” IS helping.
Let’s schedule that lunch or coffee or whatever. FB me or email me with some times that might work for you and we’ll go from there…
Hugs,
A
Thank you! I know you’re right. Sometimes it feels like internet masturbation, for sure. But I do know others are struggling, too! I mean, who the hell isn’t right now? But thank you! For reading, for commenting and seriously? Just being you! And yes, let’s get together soon!
also tell him that showing a little interest in your interests can and will help you come together. even if it’s just reading your article. because it makes you guys feel more like a “team” and not just separate people and separate lives
and make sure when you say this it isnt an “attack” on him, but word things as your feelings and experience or he will just get defensive and shut the whole thing down. I have also had luck with these type of convos in an email to him in the past. and he has explained his feelings in an email to me better than in person. he always says he “needs time to think” so he does better in email
Yes! I always express myself better when typing than speaking! The issue for him is that he pretty much hates technology, the internet, all of it! He checks his email maybe once a month? He’ll go online from time to time to check out fishing info, but that is it and he seems to not even like doing that. I’ll bring it up though, maybe he’d prefer to write it.
Oh man, I am seeing red flags all over that last comment, Not Blue! Seriously, it sounds like your honey is really, really depressed. I have two brothers who have been diagnosed with clinical depression and I have – as I’ve mentioned before – gone through an extreme bout of a more situational depression, and that’s exactly what I was like through the whole thing. I sometimes wonder why the hell Mr. Twistie stuck with me through the life-sucking misery I was inflicting on myself and everyone around me.
I would literally sit in front of my computer all day long and do nothing but click links and obsess about Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I hardly ever even cooked dinner, let alone baked lovely things. I couldn’t believe that Mr. Twistie found me attractive, so I didn’t act on it when he made advances.
Okay, even now I have interests that Mr. Twistie cannot begin to fathom and wants no part of, and he has ones I can’t discuss intelligently… but I’m doing things and I believe in his desire for me, and we share a lot more than we don’t.
As for your inability to ask for what you want, I’m betting that the background of poverty is certainly part of it, but I wonder if your history of abusive relationships also enters into it. When you spend that much of your life tiptoeing on powder kegs and praying they don’t explode, it’s really difficult to let yourself think about much else. You get used to tamping down your needs, your desires, and your thoughts because they just aren’t as important as living through another day. Just a thought.
Oh, and so much yes to how relationships wax and wane over time! Mr. Twistie and I have known one another for thirty-one years, began dating twenty-five years ago, and will celebrate our eighteenth wedding anniversary in June. We disgust other couples with how sappy we still are, but there have been a few empty times in our marriage, too. The good news is that the good times have far outweighed the bad ones on balance.
He IS depressed. He was prescribed anti-depressants, but…I’ll just email you about it! Ha-ha!
And while I was writing my comment, a lot of other people wrote comments, so the one I was referring to was your second one, Not Blue.
aaaaaaa. anti depressants kill your sex drive! There could also be a physical reason for his actions…..
Just wanted to throw in my .02 on your ability to share here- definitely not masturbating into the void, but I guess that could be sort of fun?
I really think you’re heading in the right direction as you try to unpack your feelings, and it’s really helpful for me to hear where you’re coming from. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of other fans who feel the same.
As usual, Twistie and Sue are giving you the straight shit, and this is all advice I plan to share as well. Sorry you’ve got this going on, so sending a virtual hug instead.
Thank you! I’ll take all of the virtual hugs I can get! Hugs back at ya! <3
I guess there are some people who still do the lust chasing thing, but we really don’t (married at 20, been together 7 years or so…I think…lol). Our relationship has just changed. It’s a deeply-seeded root bed, a “glowing ember” holding the lust fire, as Bruce Lee once talked about. *I do MISS the wild days of nothing but sex and sleep* but other than that, this is very nice, they become as naturally a part of you as…breathing… It sounds like this is a rough patch. These are (collectively) tougher times than most of us have seen in our lifetimes, it’s hard not to let it beat you into the ground. I don’t like giving people advice, b/c I’m not an expert on anything, and b/c we never really know what is going on outside of our own heads, but I know that these can be worked through.
I 100% get the needing to be sought after. In my younger days, I desired to be sought after to the point where they would break a social rule to get to me, b/c for a moment, in a world that generally knocked me down, I felt worth…something. My husband…ah, I still wonder sometimes how I got this man to marry me. And he is chased feverishly by more socially acceptable looking girls/women. B/c he is a good person/husband/father and is very nice looking. I have never really had “self-esteem”, and it’s sort of a dirty word in my book for some reason b/c it can easily have negative implications, but my lackthereof sort of causes me to feel like I must be WANTED by him to be valid. It’s probably not the same thing you are tangoing with, but it’s something I wrestle with often. (I’ve heard it called a part of a “fat girl” complex by a few of my friends who say similar things, but if you are fat, what isn’t chalked up to that, right?) It boils down to the fact that I feel strongly about my husband, and do believe on several levels that I am not good enough.
Since I’m no help really, ditto internet hugs, and inspirational quote…
“Love is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love were only a feeling, there would be no basis for the promise to love each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge that it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and decision.”
— Erich Fromm
Thanks so much! It IS bullshit that everything gets chalked up to fat! In this instance though, it has absolutely nothing to do with fat. I think it’s just another lull in our relationship. It happens, even to the most secure of us. I will simply have to find a way to talk this out with him. Thanks again!
Oh man…what is it about right now that makes communicating so damn hard?! You know I have no answers or solutions for ya, but I send hugs, and the hope that you get the perfect moment to sit down with him and talk everything out, and that he will be receptive. Sometimes it’s hard to say “I need more of this from you” without worrying that it will sound like “you are inadequate.” I agree with Twistie, this is even more hard when you’ve been in abusive situations before. It feels, for me at least, that it’s easier to keep it inside than bring it up and potentially ruin a calm moment. Of course, until you have day like today (for me) where you’re both stressed. You know how that goes 🙂 The good news for me is that at least I got my new medication that allows me to not hurt. And a purring cat in her usual spot perched on my boobs. I dunno what she’s gonna do when she gets a little longer, ha!
Thanks for the hugs! Sending more to you, as well! Yay for new meds and purring kitties!!!
Preachin’ to the choir.
‘Nuff said.