Trust issues

So cliche, "I have trust issues".  I tend to trust people and then am stunned when I find that what they said wasn't the truth or that they were being conniving and devious.  I know people do it, but I still have troubles wrapping my head around it.  I want to trust.

But that deep trust of the one you truly love?  As I get to that spot of trusting with everything I have, I'm finding that I kind of sabotage myself.  I need to get past that.  Yes, I've been hurt deeply, but c'mon, who hasn't?  Is it fair to put what someone has done to you on someone else that has never done anything wrong to you?  Intellectually I know the answer to that.  However my girlie side is a pain in the butt sometimes.

Tonight Stacy made some comment and I couldn't remember saying what he was referring to or something like that.....and I made a sassy comment, "must be your other girlfriend".  He said...."no other girlfriend" and of course, that is exactly what I wanted to hear.  I like the reassurance, but why did I have to do it that way?  As if insinuating I don't trust him?  His comment to me was something along the line of "you have troubles trusting don't you?  Do you think it comes out in your humor?"  Ouch.  And yes, and yes. Point goes to Stacy.  Not that he was trying to stick it to me or score a point against me, but I simply mean.....I get it.  Really get it.  Thank you for your honesty and observations.  Truth is what I need more than anything and you give that to me.  Along with patience.

Am I digging or begging for more?  Is it simply reassurance that I need (and yes, reading Mars/Venus, women do need that reassurance often).  Why did I make that comment?  I do NOT want to sabotage this cause I found a pretty damn amazing man and we have a lot going for us.

Insecurities that I need to get past.  I'm 52 for christs sake, I found an amazing man at this stage of life, chances of doing that I believe are probably not super high, so why do I question it?  I think know we both realize we have something good and I definitely know we are both committed to working on it and that we want forever.  I suppose I want to cement that agreement.  Makes me nervous to ask for the conversation but suppose I will.  We have talked about it all but I suppose I want it purposely said.....that this is it, we will be committed to each other, end of story, fini, the end, now I lay me down to sleep.  POOF!  I don't want the out option.  Give me this man and throw away the key.

I promise to be more secure in myself and simply love and enjoy life to the fullest with this man.  You know what?  This just came to me writing this.  I've avoided the M word like the plague.....in fact, he had the idea that I wasn't really interested in marriage in my future. Nothing is further from the truth, I just don't want to seem overly eager or something I suppose.  But bottom line is, I want the commitment marriage brings and then some.  I don't want the option of divorce.  I want this to be it.  I want to promise to be vulnerable, honest and me.  Call me when I'm giving attitude.  I want it all pure.  I will venture out and put my vulnerabilities out there.  The "marriage penalty" is being explored.....marriage could put a financial hit on us in a few different ways.  So who knows?  If the promise, love etc is there what difference does it make?  IDK for me it's always been the fairy tale.  Can't explain well, but it just hit me that is part of it I suppose.

Regardless.....trust.  My issue.  NO MORE.  I will not put anything that has been done to me in the past on you in any way, shape or form.  There is nothing you have done that has broken my trust or even made me question it.  In fact, my dear sweet man.....you have been so open and so pure and so sharing with your life, that I KNOW I have no reason to do anything but trust you.  This is my open letter .... the ramblings inside my head ..... my thinking out loud to figure out WTH I'm really thinking.

So take THAT, trust issues of any sort.....jumping in feet first with no life preserver.  Let me prove that I can trust and love like you've never seen.

....dang it Stacy you really make me think about stuff.  xo

Better

So how does that happen?  That someone brings out the better things in you?  Or do they really?  Are the better things there just aching to get out and you just can't be yourself except with the right person/people?

Happiness, contentment.  Haven't known these in years and have been bitter in the past.  That is gone and I finally got to the point that I was ready for someone in my life.  Because with the RIGHT person, I'm better.  I'm not good alone.  Wrong person?  Bitch extraordinaire!  Right person?  Calm, relaxed, happy.

Way back about a year ago January, I figured I was ready to be involved with someone.  I wanted someone in my life.  I tried match.com and eventually okcupid.com.  Yea, the online dating meat market.  But where the heck is someone my age going to meet people when you live in the middle of redneck country Texas?

So yea, online dating.  WOW.  Men were still like 15 year old boys, or at least the ones I was running into.  About April I was more convinced than ever I was ready for someone.  I bought a frame that says "live, love, laugh" on it with spots for three pictures.  I was convinced that this would be my magnet and that I would be filling these picture slots up before too long.  I wanted that.

Come December, almost a year exactly from when I thought I was ready to meet someone, I saw a profile highlighted in the recent activity section of okcupid.com.  I liked the snippet I saw, opened the profile, probably went back to it three times and every time kept trying to give myself the nerve to message the guy.  I finally did, even though he lived in San Antonio.  But dang, his profile was awesome and I REALLY REALLY liked what I read and told him so and asked if it was worth chatting even with the distance.  For me it was worth the distance if he was as awesome as his profile was telling me.  He read my profile and responded like I did.....and we met at Chili's midway between our homes.  A month of middle ground meetings and I finally quit dragging my feet and took the leap to spend a weekend at one of our homes.

That was end of January.  Now middle of May.  This man is mine and he makes me a better person simply by being who he is and caring about me.  I suppose it's the comfort that I am loved and accepted and the one he wants to spend his life with that makes me a better me, more me, happy, free and content to be who I am.  Dating at this age was very different in that we talked reasonably, future, what can you put up with, here's my issues and what are yours?  Like my brother Steve said....."What????  Not rainbows and unicorns?  You did it right like we all should have the first time?"

So my life is going to make some big changes, our lives are.  We are going to combine our lives and make a home together and pursue forever.

I'm looking forward to filling up my picture frame....love that man.  He does bring me peace and I sleep much better when he is with me.  MINE.

Men are from Mars....Gotta Love 'em

So, who has read MEN ARE FROM MARS, WOMEN ARE FROM VENUS by John Gray?  I now think it should be required reading.  I hadn't read it but if you asked I would have said I had.  Guess that the title is just so stuck in my mind that I figured I must have read it.  Well....I got to Stacy's this weekend and walked in to find a stack of books with this note on it.....

Three or four out of the stack were Mars/Venus ones.  So, I had to start with the basic.  I sat by the pool reading and soon was laughing, stabbing my forefinger at the book saying YES! YES! YES!  (about how women think) and then wham!  I hit the how men think and gulped in air and went oh.my.god.  I have an idea why I've not been good at relationships.  Men don't think like I do.  Things that make me happy and I'd love, make them feel controlled and want to run.  WOW.  And recently I had done some of these things.

I asked Stacy if he'd read any of the books before and no, he hadn't, just knew the Mars/Venus books is an icon and he figured he'd had poor relationships in the past, he needed to figure it out.  I am still sitting here stunned that I was the perfect example for the book in things I'd recently said and done.  And his reaction?  Straight from the book and I was thinking, what the heck?  I finished the book in one sitting, realizing...everything is going to be awesome, what a tool we have.  I look back to my frustration, confusion and now understand. 

I'm sorry that I didn't have these tools before, I think this is a book I want to rub everyone's nose in and demand they read.  But Stacy had a couple good points.  First, he said, if he hadn't messed up in the past, we wouldn't be together today.  Excellent point and now we have a chance to do this right.  Other thing he said is that relationships take work. YES.  And we now are both open to using the tools we have, learning, change and working toward a future.  

By the way.....he loves me  <3       And yes, I'm totally over the top in love with him.  These tools are gonna get some good use.  Now, if you haven't read it, GET OFF YOUR FANNY AND DO SO, you will not be sorry, I promise.  I may even buy or send you a copy, it's that important to me to share.