It’s the Connection, Stupid

I actually don’t care that much whether we eat Thai or Italian or Mexican or Japanese or California fresh.  Sure I might have a slight taste for this or that but I’m willing to adapt on a decent amount of daily living stuff to coexist with my partner and child.  And then there are some areas where I don’t want to adapt.  

I want to be adapted to, and I feel guilty about wanting what I want, needing what I need, even when - objectively - it’s kinda human, non-alarming stuff.  Quiet time to myself, playtime with friends, eating, sleeping, exercising on a schedule that works for my biorhythms - without feeling guilty or constrained by coexistence.  Just once in a while, not all the time.  Because I love the coexistence, I do, but there’s just been so much of it the last couple of years.  And there’s more to come.

And so, I also will stipulate that I do feel like the luckiest person in the world in the partner department, because when I lay out these desires my hubby is like, “great go for it.”  His bottom line is frequently: I want you to be happy, first and foremost (with the added desire that I be pleasant and loving, which is not too big an ask even though I don’t always meet that mark).  

There is this internal thing for me — a place where more growth is indicated — that says it’s not okay to be me doing me, together with him.  Like me-time takes away from us time, rather than adds to it.  

And that’s toxic.  It’s a set-up for dissatisfaction.  That’s not what either of us wants.  We each want to be ourselves, doing ourselves, together.  Connected, together, connected apart, it’s all good.

It’s not about when dinner time is, necessarily, but about feeling free to take care of myself the way I need to while staying connected.  If the connection is there all the other stuff falls into place.  If it’s not then it could be the itinerary of a lifetime and feel like crap.

So I’m gonna focus on the connection with my partner and with myself, so that I can let go of stories that don’t serve either.  And then we can live happily ever after one day at a time, even in back to school, back to work, Delta variant mode all together in this same ever-shrinking house with our ever-expanding hearts all day every day.  I’m gonna keep going.  

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