Sunday, June 26, 2016

BarlowGirl - I Need You To Love Me (Video)

The song epitomizes how I feel right now. I need her to love me but I am ashamed of what I've done. I've hurt her again and I'd rather run away than do it again.








God Heard My Prayer

Yesterday, I choked. I failed to say what I needed to say... what I should have said.

Why didn't I just say the thing early on?  Because I was scared. I was scared that she wouldn't understand. The last person didn't understand. I said the thing last time and it caused all these suspicions. It just reassured that the next person wouldn't understand so I kept it to myself.

Anyway, I hurt P&J again. Of course, the self-loathing and self hate begins to start. I hate hurting her. Yet, I do. Why do I keep things from the people who love me? I keep things from my family because I have had to share every aspect of my life. The only thing I have are my thoughts. I need something of mine. From P&J, it is because if she knew she might not love me. That's the truth of it right there; I fear that no one will love with all of my flaws and current situation.

To be honest, P&J probably would understand the story. To tell it though, it makes me despise myself. In my humanness, I tainted it...corrupted it. It's messy but I am not messy. The God that resides in me, tells me it is a beautiful I did. A life was saved. A family was saved...or the family has hope for the future (I am crying even more now). The person says I am amazing but I don't feel amazing.

I'm sorry. I am rambling. I prayed to God this morning before I left for church. I asked Him to help  me in my mess. I asked Him to fix it. I hit "play" on my phone and this song played instead of the one that was previously showing:

Chris August - Let There Be Light

Sunday, June 12, 2016

Alone versus Lonely

I have always struggled with this classification of myself, Am I alone or lonely? According to the topics I have read, I am a both of these. I know wherever by myself I am alone. It is good to be alone. Alone allows you to be creative, productive, to accomplish thought. I am sitting here, alone in my room, writing this blog. That is a good thing.

Now, once I stop writing this post and have nothing to do, that is when I am lonely. Lonely is a feeling. It comes from being socially isolated. As human being, we crave social interaction. It keeps us alive. I hate feeling lonely. I know that outside of  my immediate family, I have no one. I don't have anyone I can turn to on a regular basis for a social connection.

I have no friends, not really. I do not have the type of friends one call every day to share some news or invite somewhere or be invited. I don't even have a best friend, someone I can call upon in times of trouble. I don't have that one person in which I can depend.

Jessica and I are broken up again. I guess I should say we shouldn't have tried getting back together. I pushed her into getting back together with me. I spent 3 months going around in conversation wanting her in my life. I broke her will. At the time and presently, I love her. I want to marry her. All the things I said about her previously are true. I believe them to be true. My family didn't want her because of me. My family knows that my greatest desire is to have a wife and ultimately a family of my own. That would cure the loneliness. At least, that is what I suspect. I have the person that I love the most and she loves me equally me.

The point I was trying to make is that I am lonely without her. I miss her. I miss knowing that we could talk and share things. We understood each other, more than I have ever known. I think she would say the same. She did say it to me. She also suffers from being lonely. She was my best friend and I hers. I want to talk to her so badly. I want to know if the new job offered her a decent salary. I want to what is happening in her life.

See? There I go again. "I want...I want..." I want these things of her. My selfishness. I wanted her to marry me knowing that my family did not want her. See how selfish I am. Maybe in time they could have wanted her and loved her but how long would that have taken? How much would her soul be compromised due to this?

Back to being lonely. Being the caregiver to my family has also created my loneliness. Caregiving creates further social isolation. I have been the caretaker of my family for 16 years and counting. I withdrew from life to ensure they had a roof over their heads, clothes, food to eat, and so much more.

This task started when I was around 20 years old. The time of your life when one is typically in college, which I was, making lasting friendships and exploring life. I had to withdraw from college. My initial plan was to go back to living on campus the following semester after my mother's back surgery. The surgery went wrong and hence I stayed. The friends I did have at college, I never saw again. I took on a full-time job. I became the single parent to my sister; taking her to school, cooking, getting her dressed. I became the part-time nurse for my mother; bathing her, bathroom trips, cooking, cleaning, etc. My mother and my roles reversed. I was the adult and she became the child so to speak.

I systematically became lonely. Not at first, because I was too busy to notice. Once things in life settled down, I noticed how lonely I was. I had no friends, no romantic interests, no social activities. I had no outlets to nurture my need for social connection. The jobs I worked put me with people and there was social interaction. Those people didn't satisfy my need for connection, friendship. They wouldn't understand my life.

I dated here and there. I think I choose flawed women to be involved with so that if the relationship ended, then I knew that we were not going to end up together. The loss would hurt I would easily heal. I didn't think I was unworthy of love. I thought "what grown woman would choose this life?" My priority would be split between my wife and the needs of my mom. To be with me, meant that she wouldn't be the only one in charge of the household. There would be 2 women trying to control the house, 2 differences of opinion. The romances I did have made me think because those women loved me in spite of my caregiving situation. This gave me hope for the future. If a less suitable woman could imagine a life with me, then a more suitable woman for me could do the same and more.

Social settings, such as, bars or clubs were not going to work for me either. I am a Christian. Even though, it's not a sin to go to those places to dance or drink. I don't consider it much of a good time. They are loud, often smelly, and bad for real conversation. I would go every once in awhile with people from work but it caused more internal stress. I would just feel more alone and lonelier.

Did I mention that I am an introverted person? I am. Loud, noisy, crowded places drain me and stress me out. I am not some shut me in. I do leave my room and my home. I go to work, school and the places I need to go. I simply don't have anyone to do them with or want to do them with. I don't know what the solution is. I know I hate feeling lonely. I hate even more that I have no one to do things with or someone to just spend some time. I miss my friend, my love. God help me.

Thursday, June 9, 2016

Scorched Earth

I have had many thoughts since the last time I was on here. The main thought is that I am angry. I posted a picture of scorched earth as my wallpaper on Facebook. The picture is the epitome of how I feel right now with my anger. The picture shows the sun over a barren land. It looks hot wherever this place is. It is so hot and dry that the ground has cracked open. Nothing can or will ever grow there for many years to come.

There's plenty of people to be angry at right the moment: Jessica, my mother, my sister, myself, and God. The question then becomes who am I angry at the most:
   Jessica for choosing her family's approval over my love. Jessica for allowing me to come back to her before she talked to her parents and letting their disapproval weigh on her decision. Jessica for allowing her hurt and anger with my mother take priority over us.
 My mother for causing the rift between Jessica and I in the first place. My mother for being the burden I can't get unload. My mother who seems to be at the center of any discord in my latest relationships. 
  My sister shares some of the blame for the rift but I don't think I am truly anger at her, 
  I am angry with myself for not waiting for Jessica to speak to her parents before I returned to her. I am angry because I am alone. I am angry because everything I want or the only thing I want is still out of reach. 
  I can always be angry with God. I mean look at my life. At the age of 19 or 20, my mother had a back surgery that changed my life forever. A surgery that was only supposed to have a rehabilitation time of 2 weeks turned into a month. I had to withdraw from college. I had to be the sole source of care for my younger sister and my mother. Whatever friends I had I lost. A social life, romantic or otherwise, I didn't have time for or I didn't know how to incorporate them. I am 35 now. I have been doing this for 16 years with no end in sight.

When will this anger, this fury subside? I don't know. For now, I pour the flames of my mind onto the page. Maybe after all of the fire has been poured out, healing and growth can spring anew.


From Rage to Surrender

The other day, more than likely Tuesday, I changed my profile picture on Facebook to a lone samurai warrior, with sword in hand, walking towards the water. In the picture, the sky is overcast. To me, he looks defeated. His head is down. His sword is in his hand but not in a way that signifies he is going to attack. I searched for the image; "lone samurai warrior in surrender." It was the best representation I could find.

That is how I view myself, a samurai warrior. I am the defeated samurai warrior. I lost the war for the love of Jessica, my Peace and Joy. I still love her. That hasn't changed. I am no longer filled with rage from my defeat. I just know that we will never be one, so I must surrender. I am taking my fiery passion and going home to rest. I don't know when I'll be able to fight again but it is not anytime soon.

I am thankful though she left me with the gift of this blog to purge my thoughts. I am also fearful because she and her brother are the only ones who know I am writing here. I have noticed the view count on the posts I have penned over the past 2 days. Someone is reading. If the person is her, then she will get to see the sad, broken, flawed man that I am.

I can take solace in knowing that I was the wrong one in all of this. My family knew it. She discovered it through her praying to God after being wronged by my family. I was the one who refused to see it or believed I could out will God's sovereignty. If anything, I have accelerated her into her destiny, God's plan for her life. There she will finally meet a man, who has a family who wants and loves her sight unseen and seen.

Where does that leave me? I am once again trying to find what God wants for me in this life. The search for love these 2 years has certainly gotten me distracted from God's heart. At the same time, my future wife isn't just going to appear out of thin air and into life. So, there must be some searching that must be done. I think I said in a previous post or one I am still drafting, that I will not pursue another relationship until I am free from my family's obligation. At least, I know that I cannot hurt another woman with my desire to love and be loved. I still have school to finish. There are no classes now so I am awaiting the new semester. I certainly haven't felt God's calling as I try to finish, only frustration. At work, I am still waiting for promotion, another increase, or something new. I am sure I can work on removing the resentment I have with my family for seemingly standing in the way of me finding love for myself.  These tasks are something to do while I rest and recover from my battles.

Wednesday, June 8, 2016

A quick thought

My love or rather my desire for love destroys things. No, I am not being self deprecating. It's part of my hubris, my fatal flaw. I'll get around to explaining the thought later.

A Correction

I need to amend or add an addendum to one of my posts. I criticized Jessica for wanting her family's approval more than a future together with me. Again, I didn't want to her to destroy her relationship with her family, meaning to never talk to them again for a life with me. I wanted her to not care as much for their approval.

  Recalling her words from Sunday, "She needs her family. She misses them. She hates being in Lexington, alone away from them." Her impending new job, according to her thoughts, will keep her in Lexington for at least 3 years. If we stayed together, we wouldn't be married until sometime in 2017. Even then, I wouldn't know for certain about job prospects, either transferring or starting something new. That would still have her driving 3 hours to see her grandparents, 2 hours to see her sister and her family, and 6 hours to see her brother and his family.

   I, on the other hand, don't need my family. I need them on some levels but currently I view them as a prison. I am not free. I haven't been free for 16 years. I relish the thought of one day not being needed emotionally, financially, or physically. Free to only have a concern for myself or a romantic partner or my very own family.

I know I sound horrible. On the contrary, I have sacrificed my very life for the well being of my mom and sister. I didn't have my twenties to be irresponsible and discover my place in life. I had to be perfect, driven, and dedicated to jobs I hated. Caregiving is a burden on one's heart and soul, that unless you've lived it, one can't fully understand the complexities.

   That is where Jessica and I differ. She sees her family as an escape from her troubles and they can encourage her through the rough times. Yes, mine can encourage me as well but they are my troubles. They are my hard times. I can't escape them. I do love her family. I even envy her to some extent. I hope one day I can see my mom and sister as things I need to uplift me versus hold down. For my sake and the sake of my future wife and kids, I hope that it is in the very near future.

Monday, June 6, 2016

A little ancedote

While my food cools, I'll see if i can write about this recent incident that happened last week. I am car shopping. The car I want is a 2014 or 2015 Honda Accord Hybrid Ex-L or Touring model. I saw one last week in Nashville for a reasonable price. I would of course ask for more off the asking price but it was enough to talk to banks and secure financing. I shared the car with my family, My mom and sister for those who don't know who I am talking about.

I went to look at the car the next day. The car had been sold before I got there. My mom called as I returned home. She inquired why I was out. Then gathered that I went to look at the car. She then begins to tell me that she and my sister talked about me buying a car. They both felt I should buy new and wait to save more on a down payment. I told her that those cars new are $10000 to $15000 more. I would essentially be paying the same amount monthly payment wise if I gave a cash down payment. That didn't make any sense to me and I don't know if it resonated with her. This angered and frustrated me because once again they are having meeting about my life and wanting me to do what they think is best.

But here's the problem with their thinking: It's easy to say don't do this or that when it's not your money or personage on the line. They are not putting one red cent into this car. So I appreciate the sentiment of them thinking about me but they are wrong.

I wish I had shared with Jessica this story this weekend when I was there as she began to tell me about her parents not liking the idea of us getting back together. I don't know if it would have inspired her or changed anything. At this point, it doesn't matter. I guess we will never know.

It happened so fast...

Game of Thrones had concluded. She asks me if I'm going to be able to make home. I have a 3 hour drive back to Tennessee. It's a little after 10 pm eastern time. I say I guess so or I don't know. It wasn't necessarily an answer that inspired confidence.

She said she was mad at me. Of course, I have no idea why. She says that she asked me earlier what time I needed to leave. At the time, I said I'll leave after Game of Thrones. I didn't know that wanting to watch a tv show with the person you love would be the cause of a fight. Or rather be the end of the relationship that was recently renewed 2 weeks earlier.

The reason I wanted to stay was to watch one of the shows we both watch together. In the past, I would see all of the shows we watch the day after it aired live on tv. She would watch the shows later on in the week. So naturally, I couldn't share the details of what happened but I would like to tease her as I watched. So there was a chance for us to do this together, I jumped at the chance.

I had started to doze off at the beginning of the show. Reason being, we had finished eating before the show and I was laying on her lap(or against her). I was full, comfortable, and in the arms of the person I loved most in this world. Ironically, Game of Thrones was not the exciting episode of last week or the week before. It did have a good cliffhanger but we knew it was going to happen.

So she's mad because I'm tired or relaxed and unsure if I'll make the 3 hour drive back home. She says I don't listen to her. Tears start to flow from her face. She talks and then I just do want I want. I am definitely awake now. As her words flew from her mouth, I am thinking "Why can't I just sleep here like I did last night? My car doesn't have to be returned until 10 am. Do you have somebody coming over after I leave?" (I wouldn't dare say the last one but it popped in my head.) She explains that her dad does not approve or like the idea of us getting back together. She told her mom first and she didn't like the idea either.

I already told her before I would talk to whoever I needed to talk to help them get over their reservations. I told her before I already talked to my mom about giving you a real chance but that doesn't mean she's going to be bouncing around like a happy puppy the first time you meet. Kind of exactly how her parents are now; they don't want her to get hurt or be in a relationship with a selfish man. Hurt and pain are a part of life. Hurt and pain can be good and bad. I AM NOT HER BROTHER-IN-LAW. The very definition of my life has been one of sacrifice! The only thing that makes me selfish is that I am willing to put my wants above the feelings of everyone else, save the person I am in a relationship with. I am also not going to do or say something that I might regret. I am saying respect our choice. You may not like it but it's not your choice to make. Our life together is how WE make it.

I believe one of us is being unrealistic as to how much our families will be involved in our very household. Granted, I have no idea where we would living but I find it hard to believe that we would be going to see her mom and dad, my mom or sister, my grandfather, her grandparents every other week, or even once a month. We would have our own lives to lead, our own adventures, our own traditions. I am also not saying  that I would keep her or myself intentionally away from our families. I am saying that our oneness takes priority over them.

So in my anger, I shut down. I gathered my things quietly. There's nothing to say. She doesn't want to fight for me. I wanted to know before I left if we were done. She said I don't think we should have gotten back together. Sooo....we are done. I am at least done. I am not driving back to Lexington, or going to Murray, or Madisonville. If she wants me, then she's going to have to come to me this time. God is really going to have to work on my "heart" in order to reconcile this. But who am I kidding; there will be no reconciliation. she is not coming. she has her family. She will find some nice man with an easy family to be happy with but it won't be me.

What did she expect?!!!!

So it looks like this blog will be one of pain and fury. I don't understand how a question of whether or not I was going to make it home turned into "we shouldn't have gotten back together." I thought I could be destructive.

Yes, we never really stopped talking during our 3 month break up. I did have a conversation with my mom as to why she said what she said. Guess what it has nothing to do with God but it has to do with her biased for the internet. No, I cannot control her opinion but that also doesn't make it fact.

I will never understand your original decision to end things. I love my family and they love me. We are each our own individual persons with our own ideas of how life is supposed to look. Marriage between a man and a woman is between that man and that woman. The relationship prior to is between that man and woman. Family is the observer, the onlooker. They don't know the whole parts of the sum of the relationship. Only God knows this. Our families can counsel us and give us their opinions of what they know of the situation. That by default makes them limited and not all knowing.

I knew what i was saying and asking during the past 3 months. I have to assume that if I am here writing that you didn't fully think about the topic. Marriage is the destruction of 2 separate lives and the rebuilding of those lives into 1 life. You cannot make everyone happy! People will always disapprove of what they don't understand. You can speak for hours trying to explain the matter but still they may not understand.

The only thing I want to do at this point is to give my mom your number and let her invite you to dinner. My anger tells me just to be done with you. My pride says there will be no other pursuit. THIS was it. You knew what I was asking. You knew what I wanted. Life is full of rejection,  disappointment, hardship, and faith testing. Life is not a cakewalk. WHAT DID YOU WANT AND WHAT DID YOU EXPECT?!?!!!!!!

Enraged

I want to scream! I WANT TO BREAK SOMETHING...ANYTHING! ALL THIS ANGER IT NEEDS TO FOCUSED AND DIRECTED INTO THE DESTRUCTION OF SOMETHING!