It was my 15th wedding anniversary. My ex and I were in Maui to celebrate. Things had been rough for several months, and I was going to counseling to try to work on myself. I wanted to do everything I could to help my love and I through what I saw as a *rough patch*. Before the trip, I talked to my counselor about what I hoped would happen. I told him that I needed to hear my husband say that he still thinks I'm beautiful. He hadn't said it in months, and I was thirsty for affirmation of any kind. I wasn't the kind of woman who needed constant reassurance and compliments. But I needed something resembling affection. The counselor suggested that I tell my husband exactly what I needed from him.
On our second day on Maui, my husband asked if I wanted an anniversary gift, or wanted to go to a certain restaurant to mark the milestone. I told him "No gifts or restaurants necessary. I'm just happy to be here with you, and have you all to myself. There is something I'd like to hear from you though. I need to hear that you still think I'm beautiful after all of these years."
His response?
"Well that's awfully NEEDY of you."
I replied "I thought that telling you what I need, instead of making you guess, and then being upset with you for not guessing correctly, is very healthy of me."
His response to that? *grunt*
He refused to say I'm beautiful. He refused to compliment me in any way, ever again. Three months later, he left.
Something inside me broke that day.
It took me over a year to tell my next love, that I was in love with him. When I did, he reciprocated. But never said it again. Three months later, he left.
Both of those men taught me that it wasn't safe to be vulnerable. They both punished me for expressing my feelings. I used to be SUCH a good emoter. Mad? Be angry! Sad? Bawl! Happy? Sing it from the rooftops!
Last weekend, my friend told me I'm beautiful. It was unsolicited, and part of a soft rejection. The first rejection I've experienced since the life explosion, that I knew without a doubt, wasn't about me...but about him taking care of himself and his own life situation. A handsome, eloquent, funny friend called me beautiful. I turned to instant girl-goo internally. In the moment, I thanked him with all of the formality of someone who held the door open for me at the post office.
Every day for the next 4 days, I typed out a text 'thank you'. Every draft was deleted and never sent. For some reason last night, I got brave and typed up a text that said "I wanted to tell you how nice it was that you told me I'm beautiful on Saturday. I haven't heard that in awhile. I don't need to hear it all the time, but I didn't hear it once from TD (text dumper). Until you said it Saturday, and I turned into a puddle of girl-goo inside, I didn't realize how much I missed hearing that. So thank you." I hit 'send' with no hesitation. Well.....with little hesitation. His response was perfection. His response helped me realize that not every man in my life, romantic interest or otherwise, was going to squish me emotionally for showing vulnerability. That sometimes they will even applaud me for showing my gooey, girly, and sometimes dark and twisty insides. It was incredibly healing.
I also realized that it was a (weird) gift to know exactly what emotional event had caused me damage. I don't have to dig through that pile of emotional baggage to know which moment needed healing. I finally saw my ex-husband's carelessness with my feelings as HIS damage. That wasn't about me at all. He was already seeing his mistress, and had checked out of our marriage. I just didn't know it yet. I wasn't ugly or unlovable.
He was.
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