I have spent a couple of weeks now trying to solve an internal conflict. It started with discomfort during my brief foray into the dating arena. I embarked on that short venture with a great attitude. I was going to learn how to date. It was an exercise for me, a way to develop and strengthen a new set of muscles. My personal goals were to 1) learn how to date. After all, I hadn't been on a date in over 23 years, and even then I only went on about five dates. My dating was back in college. I dated a lot in college. I felt like I had a handle on dating back then. We were in a small town on a small campus. No one could live off-campus or have a car (although there were exceptions---as there always are). We all ate at the usual places. Nobody went far, obviously. It was, in other words, a controlled and safe environment. I now live in a huge metropolitan area. Life and dating are exponentially more complicated. 2) I wanted to become comfortable at dating again. (There is no need for explanation here. I've been basically a married woman since 1974.) This goal moves beyond the first; it would mean that I would get to a place where I didn't cringe at the idea of a first date. It would mean that I would feel I could handle a variety of men and situations (within reason, of course). 3) I wanted to learn to look for red flags because, based on my two failed marriages, it is abundantly clear that I don't see the warning signs early on. And early on is when you need to detect and act on them. That's particularly difficult at the beginning of a relationship because that's frequently when I have a 'crush' on a guy and stars in my eyes. But it's better to get out early on than after damage and hurt have happened. And 4) I wanted to learn how to break off a relationship if it wasn't making me happy. That's right. I don't know how to break up with a guy. I thought it was time to learn to say the words, "This just isn't working out for me." I had a pattern of staying in sour relationships long after they were over because I couldn't break up with the guy. I couldn't say those words. I would either wait for the guy to break it off or break off things only when I found another person I wanted to date. Not very gutsy. Not in my best interests.
Ah, but moving into the dating scene had made me feel uncomfortable from the beginning. Why was I uncomfortable? Or better yet---why was I dating? There was a fight going on inside me. Why? What was it? Then I remembered. Mom had installed tapes in my brain and they were on 'autoplay'. Did Mom know the message she had sent? I would answer that with an emphatic 'yes'. She purposely sent me messages from very early on. The messages said 'You need to be married. You are incomplete without a man. You need to find a husband who will love you and take care of you. That's all you need: to be loved and taken care of.' For anyone who knew my mother, it would be clear she never experienced that. She had two marriages. Both were disasters. She ended up going back to work when I was nineteen and supporting the family for the rest of her life. But there wasn't much life left in her then, and she died when I was twenty nine.
But Mom wasn't the only one who made head recordings for me. Her mother and sister did the same. Those two had much better luck in turning those tapes into realities. My aunt, after a terrible marriage as a fifteen-year-old (quickly followed by motherhood, of course), met a great guy and he loved and took care of her until she died 55 years later. My grandmother married the richest boy in town, a boy whose family owned every house on the street, including hers, a boy who was the only student in school with a car, a boy her mother called 'the boy with no legs' because he was always in his car. Ten years into their marriage the big stock market crash came, his father got stomach cancer, and the family tumbled into financial obscurity. Undaunted, my grandmother continued to live her life as a pseudo-socialite, do-gooder, bridge player, interior decorator, and wannabe. She made 'honeydo lists' for my grandfather who woke up every Saturday with inexplicable migraine headaches that rendered him incapable of performing any those chores. But the marriage lasted 68 years and in time Grandma wore him down and he capitulated to all her wishes. He loved her and took care of her.
So what do I do when my head tells me I want to be on my own? When one day I wake up and realize that for decades, perhaps even since the time I was still married to my first husband, I've had a craving to be on my own? That doesn't conform to the taped messages in my head. What do I say to the tapes when I don't want to do what they've been telling me to do? What if I think the tapes are telling me to do something I don't think is in my best interest? In fact, acting on the tapes right now could possibly be harmful to me. That's what I'm feeling. What do I say to Mom? "Mom, I don't want that now. I just don't want to date. Maybe I'm still hurting from Bill. Maybe I don't want the complication of dealing with another person's intimacies right now. Maybe, just maybe, Mom, I want to be by myself. Maybe I need alone time. Maybe it would be more beneficial to me to get to know myself as a single person. Maybe I could get myself to a point where I don't make choices that are bad for me. Maybe I could learn to act in my own best interests. I know I am hard-wired to be in a relationship. I know I am loving, committed, loyal and faithful when I do commit to someone but do we have to jump right back into that? Isn't that one of the things that went wrong with Bill? I didn't tell him to go away from me for a while when we first met. I should have had alone time then but I didn't because the tapes were controlling me, my thoughts, my actions, my self-control. Maybe, Mom, it's not such a bad thing to not be in a relationship for a while."
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