not sure where to start. it’s nice to feel better about doing things on the front end at all and not like i’m somehow creating more opportunities for vulnerability, though.
– R things, of course
– listy list shit
– bod
– a real garden variety of life shit that will vacate my mind immediately upon trying to write this
Writing in the sun is hard. Sometimes, anyway. It’s been a while since I did something like this, but it’s relatively nice out and there’s some sunbeams on the floor of the living room, and it was recommended to me to use them for warmth. Good for mood, yes, but maybe not for attention.
My re-commitment to physical therapy starting around New Year’s has been paying off. My knee isn’t in a default state of low-key pain most of the time. The trouble with that is that busy season started, and my knee flared up again. Wearing the brace helps somewhat. It’s still disheartening to feel like I have so little control over solving this shit; like, months of effort thrown off-course by a few days of doing my stupid job. I backed off a bit on the standing/walking exercises and went back to focusing on clamshells and leg lifts. The other symptom that started around the same time as increased knee pain was a super tight right back, especially in the column of muscle next to the spine… ah. Erector spinae muscles. Looking at the diagram of where that muscle group starts and ends, my pain + tightness makes perfect sense. I’m not sure how to relax those muscles other than just not engaging them harder than they’re already engaged, though. Stretching and changing my posture hasn’t helped so far. It’d be great if I remembered how to wrap my knee like the therapist showed me. I… need to do my PT for today after I write this, heh.
Work. Like I said, it’s busy season now… it feels extra shitty this year and I haven’t pinpointed why. We have an okay group of sales reps who all try to communicate shit, but orders keep getting forgotten, and a lot of time lately has been dedicated to redoing things that were either requested incorrectly or got fucked up at some point after my department. It really fucking sucks. I’m stressed out, and I keep coming in late. Small potatoes, like 5-10 minutes late, but consistently late. I feel badly, but every morning when I think about going in, I just want to put it off as much as possible. I feel like folks don’t really like me, and there’s this shitty culture of overtime that makes it feel like an expectation, like it’s normal, to spend 2-3 extra hours every day at work if you’re in certain departments (like mine). I need to do something to get in the habit of waking up for real when my first alarm goes off, instead of treating it like a luxury or excess that I can wallow in until I’m rushing and just slightly late.
Things that would help: getting to bed earlier maybe? drinking less, for sure. And honestly, sleeping alone. I’ve been sleeping in the same bed as R a lot lately, and it’s kind of a mixed bag. He prefers to sleep a lot colder than I do, so when it comes time to wake up in the morning, it’s really hard to get out of bed, both for temperature reasons and reasons of craving affection/not wanting to pass up opportunities for sex if there’s a chance.
Things with R are getting more complicated in the way that developing serious relationships do. There have been multiple times now where I got noticeably upset because of how a sexual encounter turned out. Last weekend, I had this happen and had enough trouble opening my mouth to talk about it that it took almost a full day before I could talk about it directly. And then when I did, it…. I’m afraid I didn’t do a good enough job of communicating my side of things. He has expressed having some of his own hangups about sex and intimacy having to do with his own body on top of just having a lower sex drive than I do/not “seeking it out” so often. Even so, when we spend so much time together cuddling and hanging out (and so much of how we started this relationship was rolling around making out partially clothed on various pieces of furniture, like, oh my god), being sexual with him feels like it would be a natural expression of my feelings for him and an important way to connect with him. But for all that I feel that way and try to act out of feeling that way, it seems like he feels differently and isn’t super interested in reality. Often if we wake up together and I touch him sexually, he’ll immediately have to get up for some reason (food, bathroom, etc) or make a little protest noise.
Shit, dude, it’s hard not to take it personally when it used to be all we did. I know that not taking it personally is something I want to work on, although it’s not going to be an immediate change by any means, and… what I want from him is help not taking it personally. If he teases me and then stops really abruptly, or if we’re actually Doing Something and he stops really abruptly, I just want… to not feel cast aside. Like, if you’re in the middle of feeling really good bc of what someone else is doing to you, or if your brain is starting down that track of sexytime where your thoughts get very one-track and you feel very excited, and then their attention is just suddenly… elsewhere, like completely moved on from you + what y’all were doing, there’s a couple impressions I get from that. One, that there may have been a mismatch between what I thought was going on and what they thought was going on, or between what each party wanted from the other or would feel interested in/satisfied by. Two, at a more basic level, that the person leaving thinks it’s okay to do that. Whether that’s because of the aforementioned miscommunication, because they’re not thinking about it, or whatever else it could be.
To be left like that, I feel kind of… used and unseen, or maybe just… alone, and maybe not respected. If your attention is already somewhere else… then you’re not enjoying this like I am. Something that I thought was a shared experience maybe wasn’t. I’m in a vulnerable or open spot, and when you turn away like that, I feel rejected and unwanted. It’s not about the sex. I don’t think I did a good job of communicating that last week. It’s not about the sex, it’s the overall… intimacy and connection between us. When you play with my body without acknowledging or showing awareness of any of the feelings going on inside it, I feel lonely. My body isn’t there just to be fun and convenient for you, it’s mine. I understand that this can totally change in a kink context, but I don’t think that’s our baseline. If you’re touching me, I hope it’s because you want to be touching me, not because I happen to be around. I don’t know, I don’t feel like I’m encompassing it yet, although this is closer. To not have my feelings acknowledged, to not being on the same level about what something means.
Nor do I know where the line is. At what point is my frustration something to work out by myself rather than something to try to connect back to him/keep trying to draw him into? There’s definitely a het, monogamous component to placing all these expectations on him, or certainly can be, if I’m not thoughtful about it. I don’t want this to be that. I’m afraid that’s what I’m doing in a lot of ways.
He says, “You’re so nice,” and seems like he means it as a real compliment. I kind of… have a variety of feelings about it. I’m afraid it means I’m just being easy, compliant, undemanding, you know? That if/when I do a better job of communicating this kind of shit and asking for what I want or asking for my needs to be met, he’s going to be put off. That he doesn’t really like me for me. And fuck do I have a hard time talking about serious stuff like this. Especially directly. Especially immediately. It’s just…. really fucking hard. Even when I find some of the words, they get stuck on the tip of my tongue. And too, “nice” reminds me of my parents, whom I often describe as “polite white people”. Nice is bland. Nice is accommodating. Nice is empty. Nice is going nowhere. Nice is…. probably not real or authentic. Nice is impersonal.
I’m afraid that we spend all our time together because it’s easier than being alone, not necessarily because it’s the best thing for either of us. Being around me and M has helped derail his diet and his plans to not drink. Spending time with him leads me to put off adulting tasks like bills, calling my parents, applying for jobs, cleaning the apartment, and just generally having downtime. With him around, I feel loved and cared for, but also rushed and like I’m scraping by in a lot of ways. I think being productive around each other is something we’re both still working on and talking about, and I do still… want to spend time with him a lot of the time. I just hope it’s not a reflex or some kind of unhealthy… thing. I don’t know. Fuck. Having a good therapist would be nice right about now.
Also, I’m starting to worry I might either be pregnant, or have something wrong with my uterus. Like, the last 4 weeks of ptest have been negative, but my period is spotty and late, even after more than a week of sore tits and intermittent cramping. My period’s been weird this year anyway, but not quite on this level of weird. 😛 stupid of me to get to this point. it’s been a stupid compromise that I should’ve done something about sooner, but since I was able to get away with it, I did.
Thinking about going back on the same stupid pill I used to be on. Why do there have to be so many fucking health risks and awful side effects associated with women’s bc and yet we’re the ones expected to do this? If I could do something longer-term without fear of huge medical costs and actually harming my body in ways that require medical intervention to fix, I would take a longer-term bc option, like the implant. There should be better tools for this. like a roomba for your uterus.
I applied for a job that I feel very unqualified for in a way that won’t come out until later.
I never talked about all the listy shit that I could be doing right now instead of blogging. like… all kinds of cleaning around the apartment, of course. glow in the dark stars in my room. I would love to organize my makeup/perfume corner so it’s less of a pile and more nice to see on a bathroom counter. doing physical therapy, of course I’m putting that off by doing all kinds of internet research on bc and shopping and stuff. taking a shower. waxing my junk. clearing out unnecessary photos from my phone. purchasing music that I found on spotify and want to own. putting together my 2017 playlist. making lunch and snacks for tomorrow. folding the laundry i didn’t get around to folding. i’d like to not eat any more food tonight and only drink water/tea from here on out. pick out outfit for tomorrow. trim hair. idfk, do a face mask. if we’re getting wishful, i could try to work on the computer. or the router/repeater situation.
word count: twenty-eighteen.