Let Me be Your Freudenschade

I'm sort of seeing this guy. I'm pretty crazy about him in a lot of respects, but not crazy in that I'm falling all over myself just thinking about him--more like I sit and talk with him and think, "Why don't more people like this exist?" We have our reservations though. We're beyond him not being white (thought I'm not sure if 'beyond' is the right term since it was never something I had to get past). I'm over the fact that I'm almost six inches taller than he is (no pun intended). The only thing is that, well, he's 39. He doesn't look it though. He by no means has a baby face, he just doesn't look 39. When we go out, he always gets carded and I don't.

Age in and of itself isn't such an issue to me, but I know he's looking for a wife and that's fine but...I'm just trying to be practical. The vast majority of the time, I don't even remember it, don't think about it, don't care, but I think it should be taken in to consideration that he was in highschool when I was born. Much like my birthmother--which doesn't have anything to do with it, just sort of interesting or, dare I say, IRONIC. (I hate that word.)

I'm also enthralled with the fact that when I discuss abandonment and perfection issues as a direct result thereof, he doesn't tell me I'm silly. He doesn't tell me to suck it up. He doesn't tell me that my fears are absurd (though I'm sure he thinks it, but then, so do I).

He did, however, inquire as to whether or not I'd talked to anyone about these issues. Yes. A million times yes. Oddly enough, when I was in highschool, when I was failing out because I'd rather fail knowing it was because I hadn't done something rather than do it and get a B, when I was cutting, when I was eating like a fool, I was seeing a therapist. An adopted therapist who tried to weasel out of me that maybe I had a problem with being given up. Aside from the fact that I was a surly and dissident teenager, I was still at the point where I would never openly admit that I did have a problem with it, though at the time, it was far less recognized and acknowledged by me. So rather than talk about anything, I sat on her sofa and played with her puzzle toys and ate half the jar of candy that sat on the side table.

Looking back, I half feel as though I blew a massive opportunity in my life, and I half feel like even if I HAD recognized what was going on, if I HAD realized that I was very bothered by all of this, I don't know that I could have even done anything about it. I was so very broken for so very long.

Anyhow, because he 'gets it', or, at the very least, comprehends the words and strings together the logic of what I tell him and reasons on his own such that I make sense to him, I wasn't offended at the suggestion that I might see a therapist.

Honestly, it's an issue I keep coming back to. I was seeing a guy in the summer of 2006 because I went to the Lincoln Park Zoo and had a panic attack in the cat house. I talked to him, he put me on Wellbutrin, I went in every week, I stopped taking the Wellbutrin, I went to Hawai'i for two weeks at the end of the summer and I never saw him again. I called him once or twice in an attempt to go back and see him, but I was in a failing relationship that I desperately did not want to admit was failing, I was entering my last semester in college and trying to put together my portfolio, and then I almost cut my left index finger off and, you know, time, patience, and emotions were sort of at a premium. So I took Dr. Jew off my list of Things To Do, buckled down in the classroom, and just started drinking a lot more. Not excessively, just more. I actually rarely drank at the time, but I was with a guy who rarely drank, but then, he gave himself facials, had an odd fascination with blood, and ordered Biore strips from China after they were taken off the shelves here. He was kind of, sort of, a little bit of a weirdo, which was part of why I loved him, but kind of something I ignored as predicting the inevitable.

That was the longest digression ever.

The one, main, big, honkin' reason I just don't want to go back to therapy is because I don't want to start all over. I think it's so hard to get across to a therapist that, unlike the other yahoos they see, I happen to be remarkably self aware, I know exactly where I am, I know where I need to be, and I only need to use the combined powers of your Ph. D. and my PPO as a vessel to get me there. I'm over abuse. I'm over cutting. I'm over drinking (really!). I still have a few lingering trust issues, but I'm quite able to be in and maintain healthy sexual relationships that are awfully kinky, but I don't have rape fantasies and I don't cry and I don't ask to be socked in the mouth right before I get off.

BUT! Because adoption happens to coincide with the beginning of my existence, it goes back really, really far and the mere thought of therapizing over my whole life is not only slightly intimidating but pretty fucking exhausting and I want very little to do with it. Combine with the fact that there's always a chance for whomever I'm seeing to tell me that these aren't my issues, that it comes from something else, well. Kick me in the vagina already. I don't want it.

I can't argue with a $10 copay though, so I guess I'll go make the call when I'm done here.