Reflections on 10 years

As I woke up this morning next a wonderful man with whom I am building a lovely relationship, I was struck by how much has changed over the last 10 years. As I sit today, I am sublimely happy but I also know that isn’t an accident.  I worked my ass off for this happy.

10 years ago, today, I married for the second time. The man I married is a lovely person and deserves all of the good in the world – he was simply not my person, and I knew it. Just as I was about to walk down a very hot aisle, I almost asked my father to get me out of there.  I knew in my bones that this was a huge mistake, but I also couldn’t figure out how to unravel that mistake. I knew he was a good man; I knew we had similar life goals, and I was 37 and I wanted to be a mom more than anything in the world. My gut was telling me the truth, but I didn’t trust myself enough to listen.  More importantly, I didn’t love myself enough to listen. In truth, I didn’t love myself at all.

We had a lovely if not insanely hot wedding and the next day left for a beautiful trip to Ireland. Even though it was beautiful, I was on pins and needles the whole time.  I was sinking into the reality of the decision I had made. I was trying to work out in my head how to be ok with a relationship that was missing so much – passion, intimacy, connection, communication.  We were good buddies and we liked to do the same things, but we were not intimate romantic partners. As the days ticked through our honeymoon, I struggled with even asking him when he’d be moving in my house.  That’s how unsure I felt in him, in me, in us.  Upon our return from our honeymoon, I said to myself over and over again “I can do this.”

I can do this?  THIS was how I was feeling a mere 2 weeks after marrying someone?  I CAN DO THIS?  I should feel that way about a chore I don’t want to do, a conversation I’m afraid of having, a spinning class that I know will kick my ass.  But marriage?  I can do this?  That’s how I viewed my marriage. I think a part of me died in that moment and I was bound and determined to not bring her back to life.  It just hurt too damn much.

Fast forward a few years and it became clear to me that we would not have children, I was profoundly sad and lonely, and I had taken my own self-loathing to a whole new level.  I couldn’t even look at myself in the mirror – that’s how much the simple idea of myself hurt. On New Years Day 2013, I told my husband that I couldn’t go on like this anymore.  Something had to change and he said he was willing to do whatever it took to make me happy. We began therapy and a few things came into sharp focus very quickly for me:

·      For me to be happy in this relationship, he would have to become someone different.  That felt profoundly unfair as there was nothing wrong with him. I merely needed something different that I had been unwilling to previously articulate.

·      For me to be happy, I had to do the work necessary to learn how to love myself. 

·      Damn it.

I realized quickly in therapy, this was my battle to wage and it wasn’t at all about the relationship, it was truly and only about me.

 About 4 months after we eventually split up, I found myself at a retreat with a coach I had long admired.  She had us do an exercise to help us get to the root of what we truly wanted and in the moment that I put pen to paper and wrote the words – my entire life changed.

 The words?

 I want to be truly known and truly loved.

I have written and spoken about this many times but I truly don’t think there are words to accurately reflect what that moment did for me. After a few weeks of sitting with this realization, I made a commitment to myself that I was going to do the work – whatever it was, wherever it led me – to learn how to not hate myself.  Learning to love myself felt truly unattainable but I thought I could possibly get to the point where I didn’t at least loathe myself.

With the support of many coaches and a wonderful therapist, I was able to unravel my story. I was able to understand how I had gotten to the place I was and what I needed to do to find myself again. Like most change, it happened in small and incremental chunks that can only be truly recognized from a distance.  The woman I was on July 24, 2010 is not the woman I am today.

THANK GOD.

The woman I was then was scared, sad, lonely, full of self-hate and shame.  She believed the only way anyone could love her was if she made herself as small as possible and hustle as hard as she could for love. While I absolutely do not miss her, I still ache for her. She was so sad and so scared and was doing anything and everything she could to fill that one simple need:  to be truly known and truly loved.

The woman I am today – god, I love her because I worked my ass off to find her again.  She was always there but so deeply hidden that she’d barely appear as a whisper in my mind. The woman I am today loves herself. She isn’t afraid to take up space, she’s willing to be vulnerable – even when it feels scary as hell, and god, sometimes it feels almost impossibly scary, but I also know it is the lone path to the ultimate goal: to be truly known and truly loved. Even more than that – I know, without a doubt, that I will never again for a moment abandon myself. Never.

When I first uttered those words, I believed that was just a goal to find outside of myself.  At that point, I wanted to find a partner who would truly know me and truly love me as a way to somehow prove to myself that I was lovable. The hard truth of it all?  The person I needed to truly know and truly love me was….me.  Only me. Once I found my way to that place, the rest has begun to fall into place.  The idea that one can be whole without anyone else was stunning to me and yet – it’s the most amazing feeling.  Again and again I return to the idea that I shall never abandon myself again.  To do that would be to betray the lone person upon whom I can totally trust – me.

As I sit here on a day that would be a 10 year celebration – I still celebrate.  I celebrate me.  I celebrate the life and love I have built.  I celebrate the hope of bigger and better and more.  I know, deep in my bones, that as long as I always choose me, I will always be ok.  Even when it’s hard, I am always ok because I have my own back. It took the good part of 4 decades for Amanda to love Amanda but I am beyond grateful that I am here. I am the luckiest but I am the luckiest because I did the work.