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My very best friend and I speak on the phone nearly every day, often for several hours. I have only known her for a few years but I’ve spent thousands of hours talking with her, analyzing texts, harsh words, other friendships, relationships. It has been the best therapy of my life and I love her beyond words.
Recently, she said something to me that I have not been able to move past, if she were a real therapist and I were a real patient, it would be a breakthrough.
“I was thinking about all of my friends whose relationships I envy, who have good marriages and are happy with their husbands and in their lives and every one of them does the same thing, they chose each other and don’t let other people get in the way, even in the very worst moments.” I am sure that most of you, my girls, are more emotionally evolved than I am and that picking someone always, over friends and distractions and work and parties is obvious and easy, but I realize I have never been able to do that. When I am hurt and sad and things aren’t going well, I retreat into myself or my friendships or a book or my phone, I look for distractions and I do not speak about my feelings. I tell myself that I am choosing myself, that I am picking the only person I can trust and rely on, the only person who really understands me and who loves me unconditionally the only person I can trust to be on my side, unilaterally.
I retreat into myself and let silent resentment build, I justify my hurtful or negligent actions with my feelings. “If anyone else was pushed to this point, they would behave in the same way I do.” And you know, perhaps they would. But I allow myself to be pushed to that point, I chose myself to the point of selfishness and then I deeply hurt the people I love.
Other people are a threat to relationships, of course, but I think I have been the person, in all of my romantic relationships, who has gotten in the way. I cannot forgive quickly, I cannot explain my thoughts, I take on the massive emotional burden-silently, at first- of all of the things my partner does that bother me and tell myself that it is because I am shouldering the load for both of us. I think it is an act of love but also an act of fear. I am afraid to be left, afraid to be alone, I am the little girl, crying in the backseat of my mom’s car because I was the only child not cast in the school play, being berated for thinking she was good enough to be cast in a play in the first place.
I am afraid of conflict in my intimate relationships and so I avoid it until my sadness and rage and anger bubble up and I cannot contain them any more, and then I act out. My dad did the same thing and it isn’t a good thing. My anger and hurt were justified but how can someone know, how can someone who loves me help and change if I do not tell them, if I do not give them the chance?
So I understand my issues and my problems and the reasons I have not been the girlfriend or wife I want so badly to be. But my psychology is only an excuse while I am ignorant of it. Now, I cannot dwell on my pain or fear and make excuses. I need to learn to speak even when it’s scary, I need to decide what I want and not allow anyone or anything to get in the way. And I need to accept that sometimes finding the courage to speak up and to ask for the things I need might mean I still do not get them. I might be better and I might still be alone. I haven’t been single, really single, for more than a few months since I was 20 years old. More than a decade of codependence. Growth has cost me a lot over the past year and it may cost me even more. I am scared to learn how to change but I will do it anyway because I cannot have a healthy relationship until I do.
The best, the only way to pick myself is to also pick someone else. And to give them the option, the real honest and difficult option, to pick me too.
I love you so much, I mean it.
Hannah Stella
This is the post that made me subscribe. I'm not sure I've identified with every single word in a missive until this one.
Maybe there is a part of you that feels they won’t change (because change is hard for everyone) and that is why you save yourself the trouble and hurt of finding that out for sure.