Letting Go - I cracked within 24 hours

Dear Boy,

I am writing you because I think made a mistake. Pushing you out of my life may not have been the best choice.

Last Wednesday, my therapist and I talked about trying an experiment. I wasn’t going to touch you. I was going to wait for you to touch me. I did it for two days. But before I tried it, she cautioned me. She wanted me to monitor how I was feeling. She made it clear that I needed to take care of myself.

I know that giving you space and time is healthy and that this may be necessary. But I am not doing well. The pain is unbearable. I know that it will get better with time. But time is moving so slowly and the pain is so excruciating.

I was reading a book (b/c that is how I cope) and it likened a relationship to a bridge. Each person is one of the bridge supports and their relationship is the bridge in between. It talked about how if one or both of the supports has too many cracks than the whole thing collapses.

You taking time to yourself will/should allow you to fix those cracks in your foundation. But right now I feel like I am being destroyed. I don’t know how to get through this.

So if you can think of a plan B, I would love to hear it.

But I don’t want you to wake up one morning and discover you’re trying to please me and trying to make the relationship work, but you’re not trying to become the person you wish to be.

How has the last 32 hours been for you? Has it been a relief? Has it been a relatively normal couple of days? Has it felt horrible?

I worry about sending this email. Your pattern is being reinforced once again. (Girl pursues guy; guy holds back).

I am sending it in an attempt to take care of me. Our being apart is destroying me. If there is any way that it may not be necessary, I wouldn’t mind talking about trying something else.

Merle

Letting Go

If you love someone, set them free. If they come back to you, they will be yours forever. If they don’t, they never were.

Is that really true? Because I am betting a lot on it.

Yesterday was a bad day, but today was worse.

Yesterday I was working hard to complete my presentation for the Center. I was supposed to spend the day with "the boy" but he hadn’t finished his essay either so we were both busy. I then found out that I hadn’t even made the first SSHRC round. I wasn’t going to the competition. I had already lost. I was really upset. I became quite sad. But the presentation had to be finished. So I got it done. "The boy" wouldn’t let me help him with his essay even though he was really struggling. That made me so angry at him. I needed him to let me help him because I am really good at it and I needed something to focus on besides myself. I lost that one too.

He ended up coming over around midnight. He hadn’t finished his essay but he said that he needed a break. We went to bed as usual. But this time, he wanted to fool around. I hadn’t really been touching him for the past 2 days. It was an experiment to see what would happen. I don’t know if it had an effect or if he was just horny, but we finally made out. It was so wonderful. It was so wonderful to touch his body and kiss his lips and be touched in return. It was amazing.

Then we had the talk again. The talk that we’ve been having since day one. He likes me a lot. But he is not ready for a relationship. I was challenging him because I believed his ideas were faulty. He told me that made him feel like I refused to listen to his feelings and was just trying to force my opinion on him. That I would say anything to make us stay together. I apologized. I told him that I would do better listening and asked him to start again. He did. I mirrored what he said. I sympathized with his feelings. And I realized that we were doomed. I couldn’t be what he wanted me to be. I couldn’t be his friend. He couldn’t be what I wanted him to be. He couldn’t be my boyfriend. I realized that the same pattern that occurs in all his relationships was happening again. The girl loves him way more than he loves her. He is hesitant and holds back. The girl pushes for more. They both end up unhappy and they break up. He feels like I don’t respect him. That I push and push to get what I want and don’t care about his feelings. That isn’t true, but I can see why he feels that way. I certainly keep pushing. I am rather determined to wear down his defenses; I keep believeing that he will fall in love with me. I think I am wrong.

So I told him that the only solution was for us to stop seeing each other. That I had to set him free and hoped that he would come back to me. I told him that I didn’t want to see him or talk to him or have him on facebook. I also told him that I wanted to make love to him to say Goodbye. He agreed. We did. It was a lot of fun. He taught me what to do. I was extremely anxious. I didn’t really know how to please him. But he was patient and explicit. I didn’t orgasm but I still loved it. I loved every moment of it. He did come. I told him when we were finished that I love him. Then we spent two hours holding each other and talking and laughing. It was so amazing. We were awake the entire night. He fell asleep around 7:30am. I had a doctor’s appointment so I left him asleep in my bed. I felt so close to him. I felt so happy. I thought that maybe by some screwy twist of fate that now he had changed his mind. Now we were going to be together.

Later after we both slept, I asked him to redefine us. What were we now? I got we were more than friends, which was good. But I also got we couldn’t have sex anymore, which was bad. Things hadn’t miraculously changed. He still felt hesitant. He still wasn’t ready.

So I followed through. I told him that it was over. We couldn’t see each other anymore. That I loved him and that if he ever was ready to be with me, I would be here. But in the meantime, I wanted us to be apart. We will destroy what we have if we stay together. I would rather end it now with the possibility of it continuing at some point, than lose him forever. I cried. He said he was sorry. I hugged him and held him but eventually it was just too painful. He had to leave. So I “kicked” him out.

I took him home. We kissed good bye. Then I took him his cell phone (which he forgot) and I kissed him good bye again.

I love him. I don’t know how I am going to handle this. Right now it is deceptively easy. I have just had 30 hours with him. My basket is full. But it will be empty soon enough. I don’t know if I am strong enough to get through this. I am anticipating that it will be absolute torture.

I would love to believe that he will come around. That he will heal his heart and be ready to love me with all that he has. But it is a big risk. Will we be able to pick up where we left off in say two months from now? How long does it take to heal your heart? Will he heal and then fall for someone else?

But most importantly, am I strong enough to get through this?

Because I really truly love this man.

One of the Best Days of my Life

I have never fallen passionately in love before... I met him at a party. I spent one evening with him at a bar. I talked with him on the phone til 2am. I liked him. Alot. I joked with him that he was a drug. As the days ebbed and waned, my desire to be around him would cool. But then I would talk to him on msn or the phone and all I wanted was to be near him. I didn't want the conversation to end. He is intoxicating.

We decided to spend the afternoon together studying. We met at the university. After working for most of the afternoon, we came to my house. And that was the beginning of the best 24 hours of my life.

I remember him watching me cook him dinner. I felt anxious and confused, but he seemed to enjoy it so much. It made me laugh. To make myself feel better, I made him wash the dishes with me. We sat on the couch and talked for hours and we played mastermind. The last game we played, he won by a huge margin. I was astounded at his drastic increase in skill. It turned out he had counted all the pegs so he knew which ones had to be hidden. I couldn't believe his tenacity and I couldn't stop laughing.

We watched Aladdin and Robots. I lay on his lap and held his hand. I listened to him laugh and felt blissfully happy.

At 2am, we slept in my bed. We didn't consummate the relationship. We just lay there together. We didn't even kiss.

In the morning, we talked and he held me in his arms. He stroked my back and my stomach. I nuzzled myself into his chest. I inhaled the scent of his cologne. I had never felt more loved. Time passed, but I had no awareness of it passing. We stayed in bed until 2pm in the afternoon. I felt like I was in some kind of alternate reality. I knew that the real world was out there. Just outside my house. But I was so happy just being our world. I didn't want our world to end. I had no idea what I would feel when it did.

We got up when a desire for food forced our hand. He made lunch and we sat together while he ate. Up until this point, I was in control. I knew that I was blissfully happy. I knew that I wanted him very much. But I was ok with only having his friendship as he feels that is all he has to give. I could wait. He would grieve his past girlfriend and then he would be mine.

But lunch changed all that. One of the hardest parts of my Asperger's is that I can't eat. I hate food. I only eat grains and dairy and I am so sick of it that I rarely derive any pleasure from food at all. This past Christmas was so difficult for me that my eating has been worse than ever before. I have eaten so little these past two weeks that I have lost weight... again.

I tried to eat my crackers and peanut butter. But I just couldn't get much down. Eventually I gave up. He was quite curious about my eating troubles and I had been educating him. So there we sat together. I was frustrated with my eating diffculties. He was taking a break from his own lunch. And he suggested I eat a bite of his pasta. I was ready. I was strong enough. But he gave me the will. I ate 12 pieces of something I had never eaten before. I didn't gag. I didn't hate it. It was better than trying to force the crackers down. And as I ate each new piece, he looked into my eyes and told me I could do it. He rubbed my back. He praised me.

And then I was his. I had falled head over heels in love with him. I have only known him for two weeks. But he made me more vulnerable than I had ever been in my entire life. He gave me a gift no other human had ever been able to give me. I ate.

I love him. And with all my heart, I hope that he comes to love me too.