Needs vs Wants: Part One

Part One

For someone with a history of abuse, it's difficult to determine what you want. Typically this is something mentioned early on in therapy or group. We realize that we don't know what we want and we invest a lot of time into figuring this out. We have to discover what we enjoy on the path of determining who we are. Eventually we have to decide what we want in a relationship.

I saw a post yesterday that was about determining what a person NEEDED in a relationship. My first thought was, “I don't need a relationship. I just want one.” Something tugged at the edges of my conscious mind and I paused to examine further what I'd just thought. It is true, I don't need anyone to survive. I've been on my own since 16. I've raised three kids on my own, each with special needs or health issues. I've survived trauma that people only think happens in movies. I've lost many friends and family members to death, starting at an early age. I would walk through hell itself to face Satan and doubt I'd feel any fear. I don't “need” anyone.

However, when you look at the question again, that isn't even the point. Fine, I don't need anyone. I am happy and content single. I have a history of being happier single then when in committed relationships. Why? Maybe because I never considered what I needed once I was in a relationship! Ideally, in hindsight, I think perhaps a relationship may fare better if you've identified your needs prior to moving into a relationship.

My first thoughts on this journey were to think about individual things that I wanted or needed. Honesty, touch, etc. These are explained more in depth below. However, in writing these things out I made a discovery. What I “need” isn't a list of things I need the other person to do, or not do. What I need in a relationship is to feel safe and secure. I feel compelled to write other things such as happy, content, and so forth. Yet, the more I ponder it the more I realize that I really just need to feel safe and secure. The list of individual things I'll consider are simply the path or means to my feeling safe and secure.

This brings me to look at the one thing I've requested out of all relationships for many years: HONESTY. Not society's view of “honest enough”, but full fledge, I can trust you with anything, you'll never deceive me, no white lies, transparent honesty. Everything else was negotiable. It took me quite some time to realize this and then even more time to accept it. Now though I realize that this isn't a want, it is a deep rooted need. I need someone who is absolutely honest and transparent as that is what I need to trust someone. With that trust comes safety and security. It doesn't mean they won't ever do hurtful things, it just means that they will do so openly so that we can work through it. That is safety. That is security.

What else do I need? I do buy into the concept that we all have different “love languages” and that the way we communicate and receive love is important. I perceive love and affection through touch primarily. Holding hands, kissing, hugs, being held, a light touch here and there, arms wrapped around my waist while washing dishes; touch is very important to me. Some of the special needs my children have mean that touch is difficult for them. The usual mother/child elements of touch have been lacking and it was difficult with me to correlate that the lack of touch did not mean a lack of love. Can I have a full, loving relationship without touch? Absolutely! Does this mean touch is merely a want instead of a need? No. I don't think it does. If I fell in love with a man that couldn't manage touch, then I have no doubts we'd work around it and I'd discover other ways to have that need met, yet at his point in time touch is very much a need in a relationship. Touch that I do not have to initiate. So, the second thing I need would be: Touch

The next thing that comes to mind is well thought out surprises. This can come in any form really. A gift, a pre-panned date night, a impromptu outing. Something that is given to me simply to bring me happiness. This is another “love language” and although my mind wants to rebel at stating it as a need, I do believe it is. I feel that stating I need well thought out surprises makes me selfish, materialistic, or even greedy. Yet the whole point of this exercise is to identify the things that I need which are things that will make me feel safe and secure in a relationship. Well thought out gifts and surprises shows me that the other person is thinking of me, appreciates me, and wants me to be happy. This offers a sense of security as well.

That said, I've come to realize that much of the well thought out surprises/gifts are about perspective. For example, a guy I was dating once told me he was bringing me a surprise. He had never given me anything before and I was incredibly excited. My mind raced with ideas; flowers, a hard cover copy of my favorite book, a trip somewhere, a new scarf? All day I wondered what the surprise was. When he arrived he presented a black canvas bag. I opened it and discovered it was a steamer (the kind you can use to de-wrinkle fabric, clean with, etc). I was disappointed and I'm certain it showed. I grew up with a slew of adult women that always complained that their husbands only bought them gifts that would help them work at home. Blenders, crock pots, vacuum cleaners, washing machines, and so forth. Without realizing it, I'd adopted that same attitude so a steamer wasn't a gift, but something that was a chore. Yet, from his end it was a well thought out gift. One that he'd spent considerable time and effort in finding after I'd used his steamer on my clothing one morning, raved about how much I loved it, and said I wanted to find me one. He'd been on the lookout for a good one for several weeks and had gotten me one that was even better than his as mine had all kinds of attachments that went with it. It was a well though out gift that held consideration and love behind it, yet I missed that. In hindsight, that well thought out gift was exactly what I wanted and even needed, despite it being a gift that I'd use for chores. So, even though I am defining my needs, I need to remember to look at the other person's perspective when determining if my needs are being met. So, the third thing I need is well thought out surprises/gifts.

It is quite difficult to determine wants from needs. I'm certain this list may change as time goes by and I continue to consider it and ponder it.

The next thing that I feel is a need for me is conversation. I need to be able to talk about my life, hear about their life, share our perspectives and ideas. Conversation is a must. It aides me in understanding my partner while also allowing us to have someone to confide in. I can't imagine I'd ever feel safe and secure with someone I couldn't hold a conversation with. Without conversation, how would we ever be on the same page? Working towards the same goals?

….......to be continued

A Man, A Woman, and A Love Story

I look at you and see a man that has conquered so much.

A man that fought some demons and won but other demons he merely buried deep enough within him he thought no one would ever be able to sense they were there.

A man that has held a deep capacity to feel his own emotions but always kept them locked within certain limits.

A man who allowed the emotions of others to fully flow through him so that he could help them, no matter the cost to self.

A man that allowed emotions of others to live vicariously so that even though he kept his emotions under such tight lock and key, he still felt that he lived on some level.

A man that understands the full impact of whatever this is between us but most importantly, is strong enough and brave enough to not only embrace it but to embrace me in the same grip so that I am also strong enough.

A man that hides from the entire world and yet makes the world think that they know him.

A man that will live his entire life never being able to see how beautiful he truly is, but will believe it only because the woman he loved insists that it is so.

The woman who, already understands, that her life has forever been changed and altered in such a way that she will finally, at long last, have the safety and security she thought had forever been destroyed when she was just a small child.

The woman who would gladly give her life if that was the only way it could bring happiness to you.

The woman that knows, for the first time ever, that there is truly a reason to have faith in humanity and that reason is something she never believed existed:

A love like ours.

I Fell In Love

The last few months have been so difficult for me. Trying to navigate a situation with a controlling ex-husband out to destroy my life, children with unique and special medical needs, a friend fighting cancer and so smuch more. There wasn’t enough hours in the day, enough of me to go around. Everyone kept taking and taking.

Except for my best friend.

My best friend made me laugh when all I wanted to do was cry.

My best friend kept telling me that I could get through this, that I would be ok.

My best friend didn’t go on dates so he could spend time with me through my darkness.

My best friend drove over an hour to my home to check on me one night when I’d expressed despair and then didn’t answer his calls and texts later (I was sleeping).

My best friend kept accepting me, loving me and pushing me to forgive myself for falling apart in front of my children.

In the midst of it all, I fell in love. I don’t know exactly when it happened. Just that it did. I wouldn’t think about it. I just pushed the feelings deep inside and ignored them.

Until he leaned in and kissed me. Not the kiss of a friend that just thinks we’d have good sex. The kiss of a man that cherished me.

So I asked.

He answered that he loved me and was in love with me.

We spent hours talking. We both shared so much, even tears a few times.

We drank in each other’s bodies, scent, soul. We explored and learned. We ignored the outside world and discovered each other in my bedroom, where he has been a hundred times but never touched me.

I slept last night intertwined with him after following him home. In his bed. A bed we’ve slept in several times, never touching. A bed now that felt more like a cocoon.

I don’t know where this journey will lead us.

All I know is that I fell in love with my best friend and the world is a dozen shades brighter than it’s been for months.

Where does time go......

My last post was a month after I met him. I've been with him ever since. Until yesterday.

He and I both felt a connection that neither of us had ever felt before. It was as if we had an energy that bound us, flowed through us, and made each of us stronger. The depth of emotion we felt (well, I know I felt) was intense and unlike anything I've ever known. I was certain that the connection we felt was proof that we were meant to be together. I honestly felt, and even now feel, that we were created to be together. We fit, perfectly.

And somehow I fell into the same old habits. The same things I had promised myself I would never do again. I justified the sacrifices for what I thought we had.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. When his dishonesty was first discovered, I listened to his reason and accepted it as truth. With each subsequent episode of deception, I listened to his reasons and clung to his promises that he would never do it again.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I put forth all the effort for us to see one another.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I worked diligently to build a friendship with him.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I gave up my friends to attempt to soothe his jealousy, insecurity, and false accusations.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I begged and pleaded for his time, attention and energy.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I believed his reasons, even when I knew they were not true.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I settled for our few dates being only restaurants, and even then only his favorites.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I gave up plans, goals and vacations waiting for him to follow through with his promises to do those things with me.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. Throughout the entire time that one of his exes stalked, harassed and tormented me, as he stood by refusing to stop it, telling me I was a drama queen for allowing such harassment to bother me.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I spent three more months giving him opportunity to invest in our relationship and friendship, AFTER he told me that he didn't want to do anything with me outside of what we were already doing.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. Even after his assurance that he didn't want me for anything then we had presently made me feel like a used piece of ass.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. Past the point that I believed I had given my all.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. I kept believing in him, in us, in the plans we had made.
I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. After he told me that he was going to give to his ex, that which he had denied me.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. After he told me that ex had inserted herself into our relationship, and he did nothing to prevent it.

I gave
     and
           gave
                and gave. Him my body, my love, my soul, my devotion, my loyalty, my sincerity, my honesty, my openness, my sacrifice.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even after I told him that I needed him to put forth some effort.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even after I told him that I needed him to meet me in the middle.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even after I pleaded with him to allow us to develop a friendship.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even after I told him that I needed his honesty.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even after I sacrificed all I had to give.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even after I told him that I felt as if I were being treated like a piece of ass.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. After I told him I was empty.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. After I told him that if things stayed the same it would destroy me, shatter me, and break me.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even when I begged and pleaded for some sign that he wanted our relationship and friendship to succeed.

He took
     and
          took
               and took. Even when I told him that I just needed him to make some teeny tiny effort for me to stay.

I have sat today and read through each blog post that I've made as Splintered Crimson. I have wondered how I made the same mistakes I was certain I would never make. Why would I justify those things simply because of a connection and absolute conviction that we were created to be together.

I am broken. I am shattered. I am splintered.

In the words of Soundgarden, "I've given everything I need, I'd give you everything I own, I'd give in if it could at least be ours alone, I've given everything I could."  

I can stand here today, separate and apart from him and know that I gave him much more than my all. I handed him my entire being. I gave him the parts I'd never given anyone.

Again, in the words of Soundgarden, "Nothing seems to kill me, no matter how hard I try. Nothing is closing my eyes. Nothing can bet me down for your pain or delight. And nothing seems to break me, no matter how hard I fall nothing can break me at all. Not one for giving up, though invincible I know.   

I still know that he and I were created to be together. We were designed as one, and we fit together. Perfectly. 

I still believe but have no hope. 

I now doubt. Was his words the truth or were his actions? Does he love me and want to spend his life with me or does he want to give me nothing except on his terms, and the way he likes, while dismissing my needs? Was I merely company, conversation and sex and nothing more or did he long for us to be more but let his own issues interfere? 

I no longer can hope. I can no longer be certain. 

The only thing that I know is that he and I were created to be together. 

     I thought that meant we would be. 

          I thought that meant I could give everything I had to him & he'd cherish, appreciate, protect it. 

     I thought that meant that the investments would be worth the gain. 

I thought that meant we'd spend our lives together. 

We all have someone out there made for us. Someone we are supposed to spend our lives with. Someone that will be the yin to our yang and balance us. Someone that will be our opposite to everyone else's eyes due to the balance we must give one another, but when it comes to who we are inside the two will be the same. 

Yet, that doesn't mean that it will work. Everything in life is a choice. We have to choose to deal with our baggage. We have to choose to deal with our past. We have to chose to battle our demons and win. We have to chose to do the hard stuff so that we can have the good stuff. 

For the first time in my life, I know that I will no longer make the same mistakes. I will never again give myself to someone that doesn't appreciate me. I will no longer give myself to someone that doesn't want me to. I will no longer give myself to someone that denies me a return. I will no longer give myself to someone that rejects me, criticizes me, betrays me or forsakes me. 

I will no longer fall into all the sacrificial givings that I have fallen prey to. 

I can be confident of this. Because I have no doubts that I will never date again. How could I be with another knowing that I was created to be with him? How unfair would that be to another? 

Life is a bitch. I'm pissed at God as I've remained for some time. You can not miss that which you do not now exists. But now I long and crave and desire with a passion that seeks to consume me that which I now know exists but has been denied to me. 18 years he and I were around each other on and off, but never did our paths cross. We were sometimes less than a football field away from each other, but never met. Yet now, now the forces that be bring us together only to deny us that which we are destined to have. Yeah, life is a bitch. 

             

A Sapiophile's Love

I can not, in any amount of words, express to you the amount of renewal that has taken place in me over the last 20 hours. My dear readers, how can I explain to you that which still has me basking in emotions I have not felt in way to long? Could words ever encompass the realm of human emotions, those of us that feel so very deeply that we can see, taste and even smell it?

Last night, I went on a date. An intelligent man that I've had the pleasure of knowing online for a year. We recently met in person and though he was otherwise engaged in a dating relationship, and I was insistent on remaining celibate with no dating, our attraction immediately manifested as an electrical current that ran between us. Though I sensed this electrical current, it was something I had not felt in so long that I quickly dismissed it as being all in my own mind.

Yet, after the dissolution of his current relationship, he expressed his interest in me. I was quite surprised, and a bit dumbfounded. This is, by far, the most intelligent man that I have ever met. His mind is a rubic's cube that I long to figure out. There are compartments, valleys, plains, and mountains. A galaxy filled with glorious nebulas with beauty rarely, if ever, beheld by man. I am captivated, enraptured, and brought to eternal bliss by his mind, his thoughts, his visions, his emotions, and his logic.

I lost track of the time we spent talking to one another. Delving into each other's psyche, threading our energy threads amongst the other's. I have only felt such mental stimulation, and the contentment that comes with it once before, many years ago. Even then, it was not at such an intensity as this. Then, the other party was constrained. Yet, this man with me let's his thoughts, his energy, his colors flow freely. I am captivated and swimming amongst the melody his very thoughts create.

I am unable to express all that flowed through me as our language does not provide the necessary words to describe it. I bask in his inner light. I crave his knowledge. I long for his mind to touch mine and be connected.

I worried that parting from his physical presence would sever the connection.  Yet, throughout the evening I have been aware of him. I realized, while driving, that I was intensely curious about something he was then drawing. I feel him relax when he inhales on his cigarette. I know when his reply to my message is coming even before I receive a notification.

Somehow, I sense him. I have known him long before my time here. He, as well, knows me. Our energy is closely intertwined in a way that, regardless of how our friendship and/or relationship progresses, we will always feel connected.

I am blissfully content.

REQUIREMENTS

The fact that I've had to make this list says much about me and what I have lowered my standards to in the past three years. However, I'm printing the checklist and hanging it on my fridge. If a man doesn't meet the requirements, then forget about him!

100% HONEST 100% OF THE TIME (this is by far the biggest)
Faithful and monogamous
Supports self financially
Supports his children financially
Manages his own responsibilities by taking the initiative to do so
Has stable employment
Has a vehicle (or if in town a mode of transportation that he utilizes such as subway, bicycle, etc)
Has SELF RESPECT
Is honorable
Knows what he believes in and will fight for it
Does not hang out with or associate with known drug abusers or alcoholics (unless he's their therapist)
Does not use, manipulate, take advantage of, con, trick, bully, mislead, rob, insult, talk negatively about, back stabs, or hurts another human being in any way, shape or form.
Has goals for their life and are working towards those goals.


I'm sure I"ll add to the list as time goes on. However this seems a pretty good start.

OH MY FLIPPIN GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What the heck?? Does the crazy come out in everyone at once?

HIM....the wonderful, supportive, proud of you for working on you, respect my decision not to date and remain celibate is suddenly pushing to see me, for us to be together. Seriously?? Cause it was only the other day you supported my decision!! What exactly changed between now and then? You're giving me a week and then want to see me. A week? What the hell??

But that isn't enough. Oh no. My most recent exboyfriend (yes, the one that took my pills and lied t me about it) has suddenly decided to......

TELL ME THE TRUTH!

I totally expected him to continue on his merry little way, down the path that he chose over being with me.

But no.

He's confessed. Said that he knows he fucked up a really good thing. Says he wants to be with me. Says he loves me. Says I know him better than anyone else does (well no shit, I've known him a hell of a lot longer than anyone else and was his confidant for years).

I told him that each time during our relationship that a problem arose, that I always had to be the one to fix it. I told him that I have been there for him, supported him, helped him, and loved him throughout a lot of shit and that I was not going to fix it this time. That I should not have attempted to fix his fuck ups the other times. That if he wanted me then he would damn well stand up, commit to it, and work for it. He said "OK" to which I replied, "Really? Cause we both know you don't like to commit and work at anything." (Not making a low blow, but he prefers to alienate himself, put up walls, and not allow himself to get to close and he knew I was referring to this).

He wants to spend tonight with me.

I told him no sex. He said he still wanted to come over. I questioned it and he replied, "I know you better than that."

Damn him all to hell. He's right. He knows my Scorpio side craves sex on a regular basis and I've been starved for two weeks.

But I also know that sex with him will open up the emotions. Will make me feel vulnerable.

And damn it all to hell he doesn't deserve sex with me. I don't trust him. At all. He wants to fuck me he can damn well make sure I trust him first. Cause right now having sex with him would be like having sex with anyone just for the sake of sex.

Ahhhh shit. Who am I kidding?

 I want to find validation in his touch.

I want to see that look he'll give me which reminds me of the depth of his emotions, despite the walls he puts up.

I want to have him hold me all night, keep me warm, wake me with something to drink and anything else I may need.

I want to feel like he missed me.

Like he loves me.

Like he's going to fight for me.

I know that he misses me. I know he loves me.

I don't know that he's going to fight for me.

In all reality, I seriously doubt he'll fight for me.

Why does life have to be so damn confusing?

Why do we have to be so dysfunctional?

Why can't I just stand my ground and make him prove to me that he is committed, trustworthy, and worth all the possible pain and hurt that could potentially happen?

He told me he didn't know how to "fix" us.

To be quite honest, I don't know either.