Seven years, no contact and suddenly - They text you.

 

It’s been a few days since my last post. I felt a bit bad about it, I want to keep this up as it’s a good place to just offload some thoughts, share them with the people who may be interested and also just keep a record of this point in my life: a transitional stage, full of drama, heartache but also joy.

I had a situation a few months ago, where an ex-girlfriend contacted me after 6 or 7 years of non-contact to ask for some help during a situation where they were being harmed or threatened. They just asked “I need help.” At the time, this made me feel really good. It was nice to be remembered as someone who, even many years down the line and after a lot of bullshit and grief, is still considered to be a “helper”. It quickly wore off though, as within a matter of minutes – I was just upset for them, I felt their grief and their desperation - they must have been desperate to hunt down a figure from their past, but they must have also *known* that "Joe will help and listen". That's an amazing thing.  However, you don’t always get it back. When things started to go wrong and I asked for some help from this person, I was immediately ghosted. It really hurt. I They didn’t really need me, but they wanted someone to back them up and someone they could talk to completely openly. I don’t know, but it feels like there’s lots of people out there that don’t have that person. It’s just important to me that if I’m in your life, in whatever context, that you know you have that person. It’s in my DNA. I know that now, and any desire to be more selfish and ruthless, as I have wished for in the past, is folly. You can’t deny yourself. Even if people are going to hurt you and take advantage of your nature, your nature is your nature. Listen to it.

When you do some weights, or push yourself hard during exercise, those muscles hurt, but they grow back stronger. It’s the same with us, and our hearts and our minds. Shit happens, we get wrecked and then we pick ourselves back up and we are better prepared for the next time it all hits the fan again. The last week for me has been pretty good, all things considered. Sure, I’m not where I want to be right now. I’m taking a sabbatical from work; I find it incredibly difficult to leave the house and walk where I live and I’m beset by anxious rumination and just… sadness. But this was the first week where I felt like I could at least feel positive about the journey and about myself. I was reaffirming some boundaries, holding myself accountable for my own role in my latest meltdown and just trying to surround myself with things that make me feel happy, relaxed and content.

Most of all, I learned a lot about myself! I’ve been seeing a person once a week and we’ve been talking about a little bit of everything. They help to point out little nuggets of my personality and my nature that I fail to sometimes see.  Sometimes it just helps to have a friend, or a professional, reframe your own interpretation of events or of yourself. I am very sensitive. I am easy to injure, to upset, but I am also sensitive to the emotions of my friends and my family. It helps me keep constant vigil of how I am feeling, and more importantly to me, how others are feeling. I am an empath and my mood is constantly being influenced by the mood or the judgements of people around me. For months now I’ve HATED this. It just brings me grief, means I find it harder to move on from traumatic events, or from people or friendships which have passed. Now I’m starting to own it and respect that part of me.

The right people for me will flock to it. You just gotta keep the faith <3

See you next week.