I battle thoughts that only
take me up, then push me down
I ultimately come full circle
A romantic merry-go-round
Emotions catapult me to new heights,
of tears and broken dreams
But plummet with another breath
A roller coaster of silent screams
I can't escape the tilt-a-whirl
this breakup has become
But oh, how I still love the girl...
A fantasy undone
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Day 32
Words are bitter on my tongue
Not unlike the gin I drink to
Wash the memories away
Dreams fade with each drop
Replaced by hazy memories
And echoes of distant laughter
Tears spill as the cup knocks over
And fades words of love
The colors blurring like a summer sunset
Not unlike the gin I drink to
Wash the memories away
Dreams fade with each drop
Replaced by hazy memories
And echoes of distant laughter
Tears spill as the cup knocks over
And fades words of love
The colors blurring like a summer sunset
Friday, November 27, 2009
Day 31
It began as a fantasy, in a dream world where boundaries are pushed and limits of expression are tested. It became a wild, passionate, heady frenzy. The crescendo grew, and new love was realized amongst the joy and certainty of love that had defied all odds and lasted many years. The cold chill of winter was barely felt as we were warmed by love so new, so unexpected and so magnificently beautiful.
The fantasy became a reality, in the cruel light of the real world. Her touch silken escape, her laughter light that lit the darkness. She became ours, and we became hers. Five glorious spring days... early April, so full of the promise of summer's glittering green.
We coexisted, the three of us, in the real world and in the dream one... where on bended knee, with him beside me, we asked her to be our bride. Our joy was overwhelming when she agreed. Vows were exchanged in this second life, but she was here beside us, part of our real lives. Rings shared by him and I were moved to our right hands, as the three of us pledged to love and cherish... and wore matching rings, with three diamonds, to symbolize what we shared. We dreamed of sharing the same magical moment in our real world... someday, when the time was right.
Spring became a glorious glow of rebirth, as it does year after year... but this was a sweeter spring, for we had dreams of making all the fantasies of our other world realities. We took the first step in this in May when being apart became unbearable, she came here to live.
We journeyed together, in so many ways... spring blossomed into summer, and summer faded into the gilded glow that is autumn. Like the change of seasons, our relationship changed. Like the beauty that can be seen in any season, there was beauty to be found. There was also sorrow, like the golden aspen leaves falling from the trees. There was fear, like that of driving on ice slicked roads.
Worse than fear, there was danger... danger that staying together would mean death to all we shared. Danger that would mean there could be no hope of spring's return, someday when the time was right.
With the heaviness of this burden upon us, we let her go. Glistening tears spilled down our faces... so much love still remains. Is it a mistake? To let someone go because you love them too much? When faced with the reality of risks so great... the reality of hurt and intentional pain where there had only been love and the desire to find happiness within each others' arms. I cannot believe we were wrong, but, oh how wrong it feels.
Empty canyons remain, cut by the rush of new love and joy, once so full of promise... but one cannot move backwards, and stagnant water can only become dark and dirty. When forward is no longer an option, the time has come to say the words that cut deeper than any river can.
Still, I think we all dream... of the possibilities of a new spring. Winter is never a permanent death. It is merely a cycle, part of a process. Spring will return, and so often it seems more magnificent than the one the preceeded. There is freedom in the blue of a crystal clear Colorado summer sky.
At night I see the stars... so many, that I could never count their shimmering lights. Beyond them, even more are hidden from my view. Dreams are not unlike the stars that dance in the night... that danced in her eyes during happier times. I long to see those stars again. I ache to recognize those dreams.
Time will pass, and the hurt will heal... but the love can never die completely, and this is why I know the horror of this ending is right. Love lives beneath the tears, beneath the frustrations and beneath the overwhelming sorrow. It does not hurt to lose that which we do not love.
So, perhaps someday, another spring will bloom for the three of us. For now, he is my anchor... for now he remains my constant partner. She remains the princess of my dreams and soul... and I will not give those dreams up easily, and will find comfort in the memories of her soft warmth, of her musical laughter.
The end of one novel does not mean a sequel won't be written... as the book closes on this fantasy made real, my heart remains open to more dreams. Make no mistake... she will be the only woman I dream of, for none could take her place, just as none could take his.
My heart is whole, and yet shattered. My love is all accounted for, and there is none to give to any other but the Two of Me.
The fantasy became a reality, in the cruel light of the real world. Her touch silken escape, her laughter light that lit the darkness. She became ours, and we became hers. Five glorious spring days... early April, so full of the promise of summer's glittering green.
We coexisted, the three of us, in the real world and in the dream one... where on bended knee, with him beside me, we asked her to be our bride. Our joy was overwhelming when she agreed. Vows were exchanged in this second life, but she was here beside us, part of our real lives. Rings shared by him and I were moved to our right hands, as the three of us pledged to love and cherish... and wore matching rings, with three diamonds, to symbolize what we shared. We dreamed of sharing the same magical moment in our real world... someday, when the time was right.
Spring became a glorious glow of rebirth, as it does year after year... but this was a sweeter spring, for we had dreams of making all the fantasies of our other world realities. We took the first step in this in May when being apart became unbearable, she came here to live.
We journeyed together, in so many ways... spring blossomed into summer, and summer faded into the gilded glow that is autumn. Like the change of seasons, our relationship changed. Like the beauty that can be seen in any season, there was beauty to be found. There was also sorrow, like the golden aspen leaves falling from the trees. There was fear, like that of driving on ice slicked roads.
Worse than fear, there was danger... danger that staying together would mean death to all we shared. Danger that would mean there could be no hope of spring's return, someday when the time was right.
With the heaviness of this burden upon us, we let her go. Glistening tears spilled down our faces... so much love still remains. Is it a mistake? To let someone go because you love them too much? When faced with the reality of risks so great... the reality of hurt and intentional pain where there had only been love and the desire to find happiness within each others' arms. I cannot believe we were wrong, but, oh how wrong it feels.
Empty canyons remain, cut by the rush of new love and joy, once so full of promise... but one cannot move backwards, and stagnant water can only become dark and dirty. When forward is no longer an option, the time has come to say the words that cut deeper than any river can.
Still, I think we all dream... of the possibilities of a new spring. Winter is never a permanent death. It is merely a cycle, part of a process. Spring will return, and so often it seems more magnificent than the one the preceeded. There is freedom in the blue of a crystal clear Colorado summer sky.
At night I see the stars... so many, that I could never count their shimmering lights. Beyond them, even more are hidden from my view. Dreams are not unlike the stars that dance in the night... that danced in her eyes during happier times. I long to see those stars again. I ache to recognize those dreams.
Time will pass, and the hurt will heal... but the love can never die completely, and this is why I know the horror of this ending is right. Love lives beneath the tears, beneath the frustrations and beneath the overwhelming sorrow. It does not hurt to lose that which we do not love.
So, perhaps someday, another spring will bloom for the three of us. For now, he is my anchor... for now he remains my constant partner. She remains the princess of my dreams and soul... and I will not give those dreams up easily, and will find comfort in the memories of her soft warmth, of her musical laughter.
The end of one novel does not mean a sequel won't be written... as the book closes on this fantasy made real, my heart remains open to more dreams. Make no mistake... she will be the only woman I dream of, for none could take her place, just as none could take his.
My heart is whole, and yet shattered. My love is all accounted for, and there is none to give to any other but the Two of Me.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Day 30 (many days late)
I cannot lie
Not to them
I cannot pretend,
for it's cruel
I have to let go
Surrender myself
to the pain that comes
with moving forward
There is no going back
No return to gilded days of promise
Stagnation ruins all that there is
Falsehoods destroy all that there was
It is what is right
Yet feels so wrong
My eyes sore and puffy
from hours of shed tears
Is there a monster looking back
when I see myself in the mirror?
Have I made the wrong call?
To protect those I love...
Is letting go wrong?
Even though holding on would taint
all that has been shared
all the beauty that once was
Why do I feel a demon?
Their tears shatter my heart
I am mourning, too... it is all our pain to bear
Why do I feel so alone?
Not to them
I cannot pretend,
for it's cruel
I have to let go
Surrender myself
to the pain that comes
with moving forward
There is no going back
No return to gilded days of promise
Stagnation ruins all that there is
Falsehoods destroy all that there was
It is what is right
Yet feels so wrong
My eyes sore and puffy
from hours of shed tears
Is there a monster looking back
when I see myself in the mirror?
Have I made the wrong call?
To protect those I love...
Is letting go wrong?
Even though holding on would taint
all that has been shared
all the beauty that once was
Why do I feel a demon?
Their tears shatter my heart
I am mourning, too... it is all our pain to bear
Why do I feel so alone?
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Day 29
Beneath my back, the bed sinks down
Her breath is warm upon my neck
His hands are soft on heated flesh
Her arms intertwined with mine
His kiss upon my mouth
Together
United
Completed
We rise and fall upon the bed
Until the end
When we fall into one another
And sleep
Her breath is warm upon my neck
His hands are soft on heated flesh
Her arms intertwined with mine
His kiss upon my mouth
Together
United
Completed
We rise and fall upon the bed
Until the end
When we fall into one another
And sleep
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Day 28
Intuitive Eating: two years later
In October of 2007, I confessed to my husband that I was really struggling with emotional baggage mainly related to my lifelong struggle with food. While I showed early signs of disordered eating, I didn't truly develop an eating disorder until I spent several years under the watchful and often vindictive and malicious eye of my aunt. I lost weight... I also lost all control over what I ate. I began to sneak eat. I'd eat out with friends. I'd steal food from the pantry when no one was looking. The aunt ridiculed me when I was caught, and did things that, in retrospect, often seem cruel.
Now, if you asked her, she'd tell you that she went out of her way to make sure I had special "treats," often that she herself made. Things like sugar free pudding or fruit salads. The problem is that it was always presented to me in such a way that I was made to feel inferior and left out. I wasn't "normal" like everyone else. I couldn't be trusted with anything. I was shamed into eating alone, and by the time I was a teenager, I was what was then called a non-purging bulimic (though only because my attempts to make myself throw up repeatedly failed).
A month before this fateful conversation with my husband, I had begun seeing a nutritionist. She gave me another thinly disguuised diet to try. I was disgusted. I felt broken. I'd dieted for years, and the roller coaster of ups and downs was getting to be a major problem. I was trapped in a never-ending cycle of failure/success/failure. I'd gain, lose, gain. I wound up heavier each time I dieted, and I was frustrated beyond expression.
When I found Bonnie, a therapist who specialized in eating disorders, I was skeptical at best. I was waiting for her to hand me the next not-a-diet diet and start asking me how much I weighed each week. Imagine my surprise when she instead handed me a book called Intuitive Eating. Not only would she not ask my weight, she discouraged me from finding it out.
The Principles of IE can be read here. The bare bones basic gist of it, however, is simple. Don't obsess over food. It's fuel. It's fun. It is meant to be enjoyed. It should not equate torturous rituals of weighing or counting Points (ala Weight Watchers). It is far more simple than you can possibly imagine, and yet, because of our twisted culutral obsession with thinness and fat phobia, it is almost impossible for most to follow.
I was ready for it, though. I had learned that dieting was emotionally and physically damaging for me. I wound up heavier and more sure I had 'failed' with each passing attempt.
Well, it's been two years. In that time, I have struggled with and embraced the concept of IE. I am no longer worried about a number on the scale. I have chosen to accept the body I have, to love the body I have and to let go of insane fantasies regarding bikini bathing suits at high school reunions. I've come to accept that with my disordered thought processes, I would undoubtedly struggle with body image regardless of what the scale said. I have addressed my disordered eating behaviors and thoughts as opposed to worrying about how many stars I've got on my Weight Watchers bookmark.
The result? I have never been happier with my body. I have never been less obssessed or concerned with food. In the two years since I gave up dieting, I have essentially maintained my weight. Early on, there was (and often is) some weight gain. I know this not because of a scale, but because my wedding rings didn't fit for a few months, or because the seatbelt fit a bit more snugly. After about six months, though, the rings fit again. The seatbelt felt less snug.
I still wear the same clothes I wore two years ago. I have probably maintained this weight within ten or fifteen pounds in either direction the entire two years. I don't know what that weight is. I am lucky enough to have a primary care doctor who supports what I am doing, who recognizes that not every pain in the human body can be attributed to being fat (love the doctor who told my girlfriend she had carpal tunnel syndrome because she was fat!!!). My doctor also recognizes that the mental health benefits of not obsessing over dieting are enormous to me, and that the chronic yo-yo dieting I did was unhealthy.
I still have bad days. I still, sometimes, struggle with my weight... with not feeling pretty enough because of it. But these thoughts are fleeting where once they were constant. I am able to remind myself that being pretty doesn't make one happy or emotionally healthy... and that being thin doesn't necessarily lead to health, either. Especially if unhealthy means are used to achieve the so-called-ideal results on the BMI charts.
Where food is concerned, I eat what I want when I want it. I do not check food labels. I don't obsess over whether or not I should eat a cream puff. If something tastes bad, I don't eat it... if something tastes good, I usually eat until I am comfortably full. I almost never cross the line from full into stuffed, and the rare times that I do, I am usually aware that it is happening, and it's a choice I have made for any number of reasons (something at a fancy dinner tastes really good and I decide I want a bite more, or I am actually giving in and emotionally eating - which is rare, but still happens once in a while).
Food is not a friend or an enemy now. It is something I enjoy very much when I need and/or want it, and something I walk away from if I am full or don't like it. I rarely choose to eat emotionally because food is not the panacea it once was. I now face my problems head on and try to find other means with which to solve them. Food never solved a problem in my life. It may have allowed me to avoid it... and as Bonnie used to tell me, after years of using food in that manner, there are times when it's okay to give in and do so. There are times when you need to allow yourself to shut off... but in allowing that, the "reward" of distraction is so insignificant that it is rarely worth that awful, overstuffed, my-stomach-hurts-from-eating-so much-feeling.
After two years of IE, I am happier than I have ever been with how I handle what I eat. I am more comfortable in my own skin than I've ever been, including that brief moment in time when my aunt managed to diet me down to my so-called healthy weight (and I thought I was fat). I am far more emotionally stable because I've developed skills to cope with my issues, whereas before I used food to avoid facing them.
Am I perfect? Hell, no. Do I falter some days? Sure. But overall I have a relationship with food that is far, far healthier than I ever dared dream it could become. Food is not my foe, nor my ally. It's what fuels my body. It is social and sensual and enjoyable, but it is not something I need to be happy, social or sensual. It is simply food. It tastes good or bad. I eat it or I don't... and no one tsk-tsks because I'm up a pound one week, and no one cheers and gives me an inflated ego because I happened to lose a pound another week. My weight is just a number on the scale that I refuse to consider or worry about, and I can't even begin to describe the freedom I feel because of this.
xoxo,
Juliet
In October of 2007, I confessed to my husband that I was really struggling with emotional baggage mainly related to my lifelong struggle with food. While I showed early signs of disordered eating, I didn't truly develop an eating disorder until I spent several years under the watchful and often vindictive and malicious eye of my aunt. I lost weight... I also lost all control over what I ate. I began to sneak eat. I'd eat out with friends. I'd steal food from the pantry when no one was looking. The aunt ridiculed me when I was caught, and did things that, in retrospect, often seem cruel.
Now, if you asked her, she'd tell you that she went out of her way to make sure I had special "treats," often that she herself made. Things like sugar free pudding or fruit salads. The problem is that it was always presented to me in such a way that I was made to feel inferior and left out. I wasn't "normal" like everyone else. I couldn't be trusted with anything. I was shamed into eating alone, and by the time I was a teenager, I was what was then called a non-purging bulimic (though only because my attempts to make myself throw up repeatedly failed).
A month before this fateful conversation with my husband, I had begun seeing a nutritionist. She gave me another thinly disguuised diet to try. I was disgusted. I felt broken. I'd dieted for years, and the roller coaster of ups and downs was getting to be a major problem. I was trapped in a never-ending cycle of failure/success/failure. I'd gain, lose, gain. I wound up heavier each time I dieted, and I was frustrated beyond expression.
When I found Bonnie, a therapist who specialized in eating disorders, I was skeptical at best. I was waiting for her to hand me the next not-a-diet diet and start asking me how much I weighed each week. Imagine my surprise when she instead handed me a book called Intuitive Eating. Not only would she not ask my weight, she discouraged me from finding it out.
The Principles of IE can be read here. The bare bones basic gist of it, however, is simple. Don't obsess over food. It's fuel. It's fun. It is meant to be enjoyed. It should not equate torturous rituals of weighing or counting Points (ala Weight Watchers). It is far more simple than you can possibly imagine, and yet, because of our twisted culutral obsession with thinness and fat phobia, it is almost impossible for most to follow.
I was ready for it, though. I had learned that dieting was emotionally and physically damaging for me. I wound up heavier and more sure I had 'failed' with each passing attempt.
Well, it's been two years. In that time, I have struggled with and embraced the concept of IE. I am no longer worried about a number on the scale. I have chosen to accept the body I have, to love the body I have and to let go of insane fantasies regarding bikini bathing suits at high school reunions. I've come to accept that with my disordered thought processes, I would undoubtedly struggle with body image regardless of what the scale said. I have addressed my disordered eating behaviors and thoughts as opposed to worrying about how many stars I've got on my Weight Watchers bookmark.
The result? I have never been happier with my body. I have never been less obssessed or concerned with food. In the two years since I gave up dieting, I have essentially maintained my weight. Early on, there was (and often is) some weight gain. I know this not because of a scale, but because my wedding rings didn't fit for a few months, or because the seatbelt fit a bit more snugly. After about six months, though, the rings fit again. The seatbelt felt less snug.
I still wear the same clothes I wore two years ago. I have probably maintained this weight within ten or fifteen pounds in either direction the entire two years. I don't know what that weight is. I am lucky enough to have a primary care doctor who supports what I am doing, who recognizes that not every pain in the human body can be attributed to being fat (love the doctor who told my girlfriend she had carpal tunnel syndrome because she was fat!!!). My doctor also recognizes that the mental health benefits of not obsessing over dieting are enormous to me, and that the chronic yo-yo dieting I did was unhealthy.
I still have bad days. I still, sometimes, struggle with my weight... with not feeling pretty enough because of it. But these thoughts are fleeting where once they were constant. I am able to remind myself that being pretty doesn't make one happy or emotionally healthy... and that being thin doesn't necessarily lead to health, either. Especially if unhealthy means are used to achieve the so-called-ideal results on the BMI charts.
Where food is concerned, I eat what I want when I want it. I do not check food labels. I don't obsess over whether or not I should eat a cream puff. If something tastes bad, I don't eat it... if something tastes good, I usually eat until I am comfortably full. I almost never cross the line from full into stuffed, and the rare times that I do, I am usually aware that it is happening, and it's a choice I have made for any number of reasons (something at a fancy dinner tastes really good and I decide I want a bite more, or I am actually giving in and emotionally eating - which is rare, but still happens once in a while).
Food is not a friend or an enemy now. It is something I enjoy very much when I need and/or want it, and something I walk away from if I am full or don't like it. I rarely choose to eat emotionally because food is not the panacea it once was. I now face my problems head on and try to find other means with which to solve them. Food never solved a problem in my life. It may have allowed me to avoid it... and as Bonnie used to tell me, after years of using food in that manner, there are times when it's okay to give in and do so. There are times when you need to allow yourself to shut off... but in allowing that, the "reward" of distraction is so insignificant that it is rarely worth that awful, overstuffed, my-stomach-hurts-from-eating-so much-feeling.
After two years of IE, I am happier than I have ever been with how I handle what I eat. I am more comfortable in my own skin than I've ever been, including that brief moment in time when my aunt managed to diet me down to my so-called healthy weight (and I thought I was fat). I am far more emotionally stable because I've developed skills to cope with my issues, whereas before I used food to avoid facing them.
Am I perfect? Hell, no. Do I falter some days? Sure. But overall I have a relationship with food that is far, far healthier than I ever dared dream it could become. Food is not my foe, nor my ally. It's what fuels my body. It is social and sensual and enjoyable, but it is not something I need to be happy, social or sensual. It is simply food. It tastes good or bad. I eat it or I don't... and no one tsk-tsks because I'm up a pound one week, and no one cheers and gives me an inflated ego because I happened to lose a pound another week. My weight is just a number on the scale that I refuse to consider or worry about, and I can't even begin to describe the freedom I feel because of this.
xoxo,
Juliet
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Day 27
A hand outstretched
so hard to hold
feels like I'm letting go
Pain not shared roils in my stomach
twists thoughts into ugliness
my burden my pride and fear
First steps taken
stumbles and falls preceeded success
wandering alone before I dare
to trust another again
Day 26
emotional tug of war
I'm pulled two directions
answers in the middle
where I cannot seem to stand
I'm pulled two directions
answers in the middle
where I cannot seem to stand
Monday, November 2, 2009
Day 25
She stands beyond the door I've closed,
a wistful, longing look upon her face
It touches me and toughens me
It frightens me and reassures me
She cannot open the door,
though she tries in vain
I hold the key, clenched tightly in my fist
Which I press against my chest
She waits with patience I do not possess
I cannot answer the questions in her eyes
I want her warmth, I want her love
I miss her sweetness, I long for her touch
The knowledge awakens fear
Too terrified to trust even myself,
let alone the poetry that slides easily off her tongue
The poetry that dances past lips I ache to kiss
I know I must decide
Do I take the risk of being hurt?
Dare I throw my heart at her feet
with nothing but the hope that she will not crush it?
She stands beyond the door I've closed
I wrestle with my wounded pride
I battle demons caused by words
And hope she will not walk away down the empty road
a wistful, longing look upon her face
It touches me and toughens me
It frightens me and reassures me
She cannot open the door,
though she tries in vain
I hold the key, clenched tightly in my fist
Which I press against my chest
She waits with patience I do not possess
I cannot answer the questions in her eyes
I want her warmth, I want her love
I miss her sweetness, I long for her touch
The knowledge awakens fear
Too terrified to trust even myself,
let alone the poetry that slides easily off her tongue
The poetry that dances past lips I ache to kiss
I know I must decide
Do I take the risk of being hurt?
Dare I throw my heart at her feet
with nothing but the hope that she will not crush it?
She stands beyond the door I've closed
I wrestle with my wounded pride
I battle demons caused by words
And hope she will not walk away down the empty road
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