With my primary partner (this was true with my Owner, Daddy James, and Puppy too) I have a fairly specific set of feelings when they want to play with other people. Looking at the NVC book, here are some of the feelings I go through: agitated, anxious, aroused (yes in the positive sense), ashamed, distressed, downhearted, fearful, fidgety, frightened, furious, guilty, helpless, hostile, hurt, jealous, lonely, mad, overwhelmed, repelled, resentful, sad, sorrowful, spiritless, uncomfortable, uneasy, unhappy, unnerved, unsteady, upset, vexed, wistful, withdrawn, woeful, worried, wretched.

See why I don’t find this real helpful? How in the fuck does a block of text help? It isn’t one thing.

It is hot. I do feel aroused. It is terrifying. I am scared and fearful and I don’t know what is going to be the long-term result.

In my life I have not done very well when it comes to comparisons. I am not picked. I am too much trouble. So when it looks like Noah is going to go start having lots more comparisons to make…

I’m about to lose and lose big and I am completely and totally freaked out.

(It doesn’t help that my Owner spent years telling me I was “the One” then changed his mind because I was too much trouble.)

It doesn’t matter if Noah comes home and says I’m still his favorite. I’m being compared now. I may have “won” this round but I’m going to lose. I always lose. I am a fucking piece of shit and I don’t win competitions. I don’t fucking compete because I lose and lose and lose and lose and lose.

People around the world have very different amounts of contact with their loved ones. Here in America it is very common to spend 40-80 hours a week away from your family. Noah usually spends 45-65 hours away from his family because that’s my god damn limit.

I wish I got way way way more time around him. I have a hard time with the fact that I have to work really hard to get consistent adult contact in my life. I want there to be adults who help regulate me. I regulate my emotions partially off the people around me. I know I’m dysregulated because no one else is freaking out. I want them to be around a lot and arranging that has been so fucking hard in this lifetime. I never manage for very long.

For Noah to want to date means that the hours I already think are too many are going to grow. The hours I already think are too few are going to shrink.

Yeah, I know I’ve been dating. That’s been just about entirely absorbed by me giving up the alone time Noah facilitates. Which is fucked up and is going to cause me problems and isn’t sustainable. But hasn’t impacted how much time we spend together very much. And I’m using babysitters to cover a lot of the time. So whereas I admit that we are losing together time because of me… it isn’t that big of a percentage of the time I’m gone.

He doesn’t have that option. His time is already spoken for. I know I’m lying to myself about my time being away not counting as much. But, no really, him being gone is a huge thing. It’s bullshit and I see that. He shouldn’t be tied to the house just because I want him to be. But he was gone for about 12ish hours in each week he goes on dates. That’s like another part time job on top of his part time job on top of his job. And he likes picking up other outside jobs sometimes.

It all adds up. It all has to come from somewhere.

I have been bitterly fighting for a bigger piece of Noah’s attention for 10 years. Everything that threatens that is hard for me.

Whereas I feel like my time where I am not being Noah’s wife or a mom… usually can get counted on my fingers in a week.

I understand that his job(s) aren’t vacation time. I get it. But he doesn’t work that much because he has to. He picks up side jobs where he has to work alone because that is part of how he enforces alone time.

There is no fair here.

I have tried a lot of things over the years to fill that… awful feeling of having nothing outside my family. Writing… sorta helps? Not really. I tried filling it with relationships with home schoolers. Guess how many of them are still calling?

I tried filling it with platonic relationships with women in a variety of different scenarios. Most of them are… too busy or it didn’t work or…

I try.

I don’t feel secure. Which really sucks for Noah because he’s been trying for ten years. A long time ago I was told that trust is like dripping water in a bucket. Once it gets full enough any tiny nudge will cause lots of water to come spilling out.

It isn’t fair that I don’t believe Noah really wants me. I think, much like a guy I once dumped, he married me because he didn’t have someone better immediately lined up. (The dude I was dating was describing his first wife. He married her when he was young and not very accomplished. As he aged and… “improved” he felt he deserved better. I wasn’t interested in being wife number two under such an arrangement.)

Noah is not a monster who hurts people just because he has feelings. I think he deserves to have a partner who doesn’t hurt people constantly.

I hurt people by wanting things and not being able to handle it. I am not an adult. I do not know what my boundaries really are because pretty much the only thing I’ve ever done when someone crossed a boundary was just leave.

Because I have never really had other options.

And now that I can’t leave I’m hurting people so much more. Because I still don’t know what my boundaries are. And I can’t get out of the way and let other people have what they know they want and can handle without me being a problem.

I am the problem. If I weren’t in the way things would be fine.

This feeling goes back to my mom crying because she couldn’t go rescue Tommy from my dad because she had to stay and take care of me.

It was my fault Tommy was hit by the car. My mom couldn’t keep him because of me. Because I was such a fucking asshole I caused fights and Uncle Bob hurt Tommy and we couldn’t stay together. Because of me.

I always hurt everyone.

And I never ever ever ever feel like I get enough attention and I am always trying to manage that and when I try to get attention from more sources Noah deserves attention from more sources and all the sudden he is gone for 20-24+ hours in a month dating.

Because I was a stupid whore who couldn’t keep it in my pants.

And when he tells me he isn’t going to and he tells someone else he really wants to….

I feel like it is all my fault he can’t have the things he wants and I should die to get the fuck out of the way. Everything would be better without me.

I am the problem. I have been the problem since the day I was conceived.

I ruin everyone’s life. I ruined my mom’s life. My brother’s life. Ok, not everyone. But I’m afraid I’m ruining Noah and my kids.

I am a selfish piece of shit. Who in the fuck am I to model what it means to be a healthy, functional, or good person.

I understand why people choose to not trust me with their children. I do not understand why people trust me with children.

My children should be taken away and given to someone who does not deserve to die.

There have been times in my life when it wasn’t hyperbole to say I had nothing. I am deeply aware of how much I do not need or deserve what I have right now. Everything in my life should belong to someone who is not a piece of shit. Someone who is better than me.

I know these people exist. I have met them. It isn’t hard. You can’t really swing a dead cat without hitting someone who is better than me.

I may or may not be a more effective tool than average. But I am not a better person.

You know what sucks about freaking out like this? I’m shooting myself in the foot. Because I don’t want monogamy.

I don’t know what I want. But I don’t want or need Noah to be monogamous. But at this point he’s pretty much convinced that is what he needs to do to keep me from hurting myself.

I’m not sure that would be an effective life-long way to keep me from hurting myself. Not really. I think other things will come up. I think that locking yourself in a box will… not actually make it go away as a problem.

I don’t know what the fuck would.

I don’t know what the fuck would.

If I were to list what I’m feeling right now: afraid, aggravated (with myself), agitated, alarmed, anguished, annoyed, anxious, apprehensive, ashamed, bewildered, blue, brokenhearted, chagrined, confused, cross, dejected, despairing, despondent, disappointed, discouraged, disenchanted, disgruntled, disheartened, disquieted, distressed, disturbed, downcast, downhearted, embarrassed, exhausted, forlorn, frightened, frustrated, gloomy, guilty, helpless, horrible, horrified, hurt, keyed-up & lethargic AT THE SAME TIME, listless, miserable, mournful, panicky, pessimistic, sad, shaky, sorrowful, sorry, spiritless, tired, troubled, uncomfortable, unhappy, weary, wistful, withdrawn, worried, wretched.

You want feeling words, motherfucker.

This stupid book tells me I’m supposed to make requests.

I have none to make. Because anything I request might blow up and then it is my fault I have hurt more people.

Because I never seem to get this right. I just do it wrong and wrong and wrong and I hurt people. Because I am a selfish, insecure, petty piece of shit.

I feel like the fact that Noah is willing to give me more attention because I lost my shit means I neither deserve nor want the attention. You didn’t want to give that to me freely of your own will. You want to give that to other people. It is now not for me and I DON’T WANT IT. I do not want to receive attention because I have extorted it. I do not want to steal the attention my friends deserve from them. They are fascinating, wonderful people and if they have earned that attention they deserve it.

I know how worthy they are.

You showed me that you didn’t want to give it to me. You wanted to give it to other people. All the nope.

It isn’t mine now.

I feel like I need to plug that gaping black hole of need for attention with anything painful I can find until I finally get it through my stupid, piece of shit head that it is never going to be filled and I need to stop fucking asking.

And now I’m deleting thousands of words at a time because I’m not sure who I’m going to hurt with that digression. Good job, bitch.

Well. At least I knew enough to delete that wander. I really don’t want the consequences.

Fuck. I should stop.

I am pretty sure I am not ever going to feel like I deserve to be actually important.