GirlFromTexlahoma
New member
On to the part that did help me
One thing the book mentioned was that if you find yourself having a truly disproportionate reaction to something - a 10 where you think a rational reaction would be a 3, say - you might be triggering something in your past rather than reacting to the current situation.
Yeah, that happens to me.
I've mentioned before that the ONE THING that freaks me out about Andy dating others is the idea of him wanting another partner to move in. Well, here's a story...
My mom died when I was in middle school, and it was just me and my dad for a while. (Well, me and my dad and my batshit crazy extended family ) He dated, I liked most of the women ok, they stayed over sometimes (real meals!) and he stayed with them sometimes (house to myself! drunken parties!) Then, when I was 18, he met my stepmom. They dated for all of a month before I left for college - and she moved in the day after I left. Not that anyone told me. I found out when I came home for Thanksgiving, and there was a stranger in my house, one who had an engagement ring on her hand and had thrown out all of my stuff and replaced it with her own.
Things managed to actually go downhill from there. At Christmas break, my friends weren't allowed to come and go the way they had throughout high school. I had to ask to use cars I'd been driving since I was 16. I had a curfew for the first time in my life. That spring, a friend from my hometown died, and when I called my dad, my step mom told me his funeral was "not a good time for me to come home for a visit" . By summer, my step mom and I hated each other enough that my dad rented me and my BFF a beach house to keep us out of her way.
I survived, obviously. I focused on my friends, stayed with my crazy relatives, made it through school. But I never really *got over it*. I was used to having my dad mostly to myself, feeling like I could always depend on him, and suddenly that was gone. He was still there... But my needs were now ... Not necessarily his first priority. He was juggling, shuffling, trying to keep us both happy, which basically meant appeasing one of us and then the other. And there was no escape. I was a naive 18 year old, I'd never had a job, relied on my dad for college tuition, a roof over my head, food. So I just had to suck it up. Accept that i was no longer the number one, accept that things I'd taken for granted for years had been cut off, accept that everything now required negotiating with my step mom.
That's where my mind goes when I think of Andy getting serious with someone. That's the panic, the tightness in my chest. What helps us reminding myself that I'm an adult now. I can say no to living with someone else. I can walk away. It might mean losing Andy, but I gotta be honest, if he suggested another partner move in, I wouldn't be far from leaving anyway.
I also think those shitty experiences have colored my views on dealing with metas in general. The endless her needs vs my needs got so old. I lived for the day I could be on my own and not have to negotiate and compromise over Every. Fucking. Thing. And now that I am, the thought of forfeiting that independence is cringe inducing.
One thing the book mentioned was that if you find yourself having a truly disproportionate reaction to something - a 10 where you think a rational reaction would be a 3, say - you might be triggering something in your past rather than reacting to the current situation.
Yeah, that happens to me.
I've mentioned before that the ONE THING that freaks me out about Andy dating others is the idea of him wanting another partner to move in. Well, here's a story...
My mom died when I was in middle school, and it was just me and my dad for a while. (Well, me and my dad and my batshit crazy extended family ) He dated, I liked most of the women ok, they stayed over sometimes (real meals!) and he stayed with them sometimes (house to myself! drunken parties!) Then, when I was 18, he met my stepmom. They dated for all of a month before I left for college - and she moved in the day after I left. Not that anyone told me. I found out when I came home for Thanksgiving, and there was a stranger in my house, one who had an engagement ring on her hand and had thrown out all of my stuff and replaced it with her own.
Things managed to actually go downhill from there. At Christmas break, my friends weren't allowed to come and go the way they had throughout high school. I had to ask to use cars I'd been driving since I was 16. I had a curfew for the first time in my life. That spring, a friend from my hometown died, and when I called my dad, my step mom told me his funeral was "not a good time for me to come home for a visit" . By summer, my step mom and I hated each other enough that my dad rented me and my BFF a beach house to keep us out of her way.
I survived, obviously. I focused on my friends, stayed with my crazy relatives, made it through school. But I never really *got over it*. I was used to having my dad mostly to myself, feeling like I could always depend on him, and suddenly that was gone. He was still there... But my needs were now ... Not necessarily his first priority. He was juggling, shuffling, trying to keep us both happy, which basically meant appeasing one of us and then the other. And there was no escape. I was a naive 18 year old, I'd never had a job, relied on my dad for college tuition, a roof over my head, food. So I just had to suck it up. Accept that i was no longer the number one, accept that things I'd taken for granted for years had been cut off, accept that everything now required negotiating with my step mom.
That's where my mind goes when I think of Andy getting serious with someone. That's the panic, the tightness in my chest. What helps us reminding myself that I'm an adult now. I can say no to living with someone else. I can walk away. It might mean losing Andy, but I gotta be honest, if he suggested another partner move in, I wouldn't be far from leaving anyway.
I also think those shitty experiences have colored my views on dealing with metas in general. The endless her needs vs my needs got so old. I lived for the day I could be on my own and not have to negotiate and compromise over Every. Fucking. Thing. And now that I am, the thought of forfeiting that independence is cringe inducing.