Therapy

I hope this post will be therapeutic - it may be one where I write, get something out of my system and come back and delete it later.

I feel a bit frozen right now - I know what I need is a good cry. Not ready for that yet though. Maybe I need to watch a sad movie to release the emotion.

This week has been a bit of a roller coaster. I had been dating J for the last four months or so. Things were sort of OK ..... in retrospect, I see that the reservations I had were well founded. I've learned again to listen to my intuition. Why don't I do this more often? It always comes back to haunt me. I suppose I want to give things the benefit of the doubt. Things just seemed 'off' with J at times - not quite right. We got along well - enjoyed each others company. Had so many interests in common that I found it stsggering. Yet, something wasn't there. I attibuted it to backward emotions on his part. You know - I complained to one of my girlfriends one time - we never talk about any personal feelings or emotions. Not even in a general sense. We'd never talked about love in general - our expenriences with it, our attitude towards it. I talk in those terms with my friends all the time - why not him. It seemed awkward not to do so. I can see now, it avoided the conversation and I never pushed it.

Things deteriorated somewhat over the last month - his busy work schedule had him tired and impatient at times. We had a few arguements - these always got resolved and we continued. At times I related the situations to my girlfriends and we remarked how selfish and inconsiderate he could be. I didn't really feel very high on the prioroti list of course I can see now that I wasn't.

Four weeks ago, I fell while running and suffered a sprained ankle. When I called to tell him, he didn't return my call for example - later he said he had been too busy at work to take the time out. Well that just wasn't right. We fought about that.

A week ago he left for a business trip to Atlanta - he drove straight through from Toronto. This is a considerable distance and I expected a safe arrival phone call. A week later, I still hadn't received one. Was he dead somewhere? In a hospital with amnesia? I had tried his cell earlier - straight to voicemail and the mail box was eventually full. This morning my close friend who is a criminal lawyer offered me the number of her private investigator. I considered it and then realized I knew enough information about the client in Atlanta that I could call him there - tell them I'm his assistant and track him down. I did this - I was first relieved that he was not dead and then angry. He agreed to call me back tonight to 'address the situation'.

So we have ended it. I am hesitant to call it a relationship - I never considered it one when we were together and I won't start now. When he informed me that 'we have to end our relationship' I asked him not to refer to it with that term.

His explanation tells me a lot. And I am relieved to have this information. He was in love with a woman in the spring. They ran together - spent some time together casually dating as friends. Did not have a relationship. Her life was too complicated - issues of an abusive spouse she couldn't seem to leave etc. He fell in love with her. They never pursued it and she eventually stopped seeing J. By late summer, he met me and felt he was ready to move on. We started dating and quickly fell into a steady thing spending several evenings and nights a week together. She contacted him earlier this week and they had lunch - she wanted to give it another go with him. He agreed. He is still in love with her.

So we did talk it though tonight - he is sorry. Sorry he didn't tell me about her in the first place - he thought it may have scared me off. Well of course you jerk - with good reason. And he is sorry that he made me worry about him for an entire week when he knew even before he left that it was over. I had to humiliate myself and track him down.

I told him that this is why women are wary of men. Why women say that men are jerks and selfish bastards. He agreed with me. There was no point in even yelling at him - he agreed with every complaint I levelled against him.

I had told one of my girlfriends last week that while he was away I would seriously consider if I should end it. I realize on many levels that I knew the emotional part was missing. Something told me if it wasn't there, it would never be there. I don't think it takes long to fall in love if you are going to. He wasn't going to fall in love with me. Thankfully I didn't fall in love with him either. What did we have? Am I sorry?

I'm not sorry. No. It was good for me to be with someone. It opened my heart up again - that is a good thing. It was nice to have someone in my life. And I did learn from him - oh yes - there was plenty of good stuff. But I hurt. I can't feel the hurt yet - I'm still to numb. I do need a good cry.

Thank god for the girlfriends .... the best thing about my life. They will see me through. I've talked to two of my closest friends already tonight ..... both of them are furious with J. As it turns out, both never really like him. No - they didn't just tell me that for the first time tonight. My girlfriends said his thing with the woman isn't going to work out anyhow - she didn't choose him in the spring and she won't really choose him now. It is a holiday depression lonliness call. She will hurt him again.I suspect they are right. It doesn't matter though. It is over in any case. He chose with his heart - I would do the same thing. I would be more honest however.

What is the lesson learned? I'll try to sort that out for myself in the coming days. It might mean that I am finally back here posting a bit for the next little while.