Life's easier

"You know", M said yesterday, "it's a lot easier when I rememember I love you...."

Yes, classic hoovering.Gotta be careful. It's tough to be both emotionally available, and not visibly emotionally wary. But, I am the latter. That's for certain.

She's packed for her extended time away today without any incident or difficulty. I can tell she's relishing spending some time away with me,, etc, etc. She's being loving and caring and all that she can be when sbe's swung to white instead of the black.

Still and all, it is just one more iteration of an old pattern.

Here's a bit from a somewhat positive sharing exercise we recently had (email exchange, where I finally gave her a little feedback on some writings she'd given to me (related to the Dr Phil stuff....)

She'd written: Lastly, I think what struck me the very most was in your
introductory paragraph: "I know that for a long time I
have been putting up walls between us and then hiding
behind them to avoid being emotionally true to you and
our relationship. I thought I would feel safe behind those
walls, but I didn't feel safe at all, I just felt lonely. Now is
the time for me to finish knocking down the walls and be
vulnerable to you. It scares me, but it is also a rish that
I am willinly taking because I know this is the only way
for us to be close again. And I want that very much.
I need that very much. I also trust myself to be able to
survive anything negative that might come from this. "


and I wrote the following perspective for my part:

As I read that, I once again thought back over the years
(and this is a thought / memory that occurs to me
quite regularly).

Emotional walls and withdrawal behind them was a challenge
in the beginning and has been a continuing challenge throughout
our relationship. I know I say that I used to be much better at
recognizing that you were behind walls and drawing you out.
But, I have to tell you that one of my strongest memories of
our first days living together is you being upset, withdrawn,
and my just not understanding why and what to do about it.
I can picture it in my mind as I type this. I would sit down
at your old piano, take out some music from Camelot,
and sing, with all my heart, the song, "How to Handle a Woman".
which advises, "The way to handle a woman is to love her, love her,
love her."

To the best of my ability, fundamentally, I've tried simply to
do that. And I'm so sorry I've ultimately failed so miserably
for you.