Dear Diary,

Well good morning to you. Still up bright and early every day, but granted, I did go to bed at 10:30pm.

I couldn't wait for the day to be over. I didn't leave the house all day, although in yesterday's entry I did threaten to leave the house for a walk (didn't happen).

Instead, I had a lot of anxiety and the realization that I don't really know how to calm myself down, which is why I usually end up calling everyone I can think of, because I want them to make me feel better. I see that this is what I did when Frank left, only I called a lot of psychics, because I wanted them to tell me what was going to happen, and that it would be okay. It doesn't matter how many people I talk to though, or what they say, whether they are psychic or not, because the anxiety just comes back and says well what if they are WRONG, and I'm in the exact same place I was before.

So. That part of me has obviously not been fixed. That's what I want to work on when I go to this practitioner today- I'm going to tell her about what's going on, that I have a lot of abandonment fears and neediness, and that I don't know how to soothe myself. That yes, I do want M back, but whether that happens or not, I still have to live with myself, and I don't want to be this needy mess for the rest of my life.

And last night I read through my diary, from the beginning- not quite till the end but many many entries, probably over 200- it helped me to see the journey I have traveled- from the scared little girl working her ass off for everyone else, to the woman I am now with my own business. I am so much better with my boundaries and where I put my energy.

Through the trials and tribulations with Frank- well, I survived that, and I guess I can survive this. I didn't think there was anything better after Frank, and then Alphie came. I didn't think there was anything better after Alphie, and then I met Don. I was really depressed about losing Don, but M came in at the right time. Get the picture? I do. Life is not limited like I sometimes think it is. It seems the Universe always has something up its sleeve for me... Hooray!

So I am very excited about my appointments today - both with the practitioner and my therapist. I just want to MOVE this fear, I am done with the suffering. Poor Duck, poor Duck, NO! I want to have a happy life! Also my friend LilyB just called and I told her what's up with me and M. She said great, a conscious man who's working on himself, and you sound great! I said I go up and down, and told her my struggles. She is a massage therapist and said, "I want to give you some bodywork tomorrow," so that is another thing to look forward to. I will take any help I can get in the journey of healing myself.

I have to leave for the training on Thursday, and I haven't heard a peep from Alphie regarding the request I made that he give me some physical space. Either he hasn't checked his emails or he is confused about what space means and thinks he can't write me back, I don't know.

I have put off calling Petra and Michael as I don't want to explain what's going on with me and M. Not everyone has the same enthusiastic reaction as LilyB. I don't want people to say they are sorry for me, because this somehow creates the perspective and the vibration that things are very wrong, and I don't want things to be wrong. I want to view this as an opportunity for both of us, and not sink into sadness and despair and the old script that has always been.

Rather than blame M, and make him the bad guy, and make myself the victim, who always gets the shit end of the stick-- this is the time for me to look at myself and see what I have created in my life. How I have given myself the shit end of the stick over and over again. How I have avoided taking responsibility for this great fear that washes through my life like a wave, destroying everything. Well, no more. I don't want it anymore!

As I mentioned I spoke to X on the phone on Saturday. I was feeling a little bad because I know she works very hard, and has a couple of kids, and I could tell she didn't know what to say- it was obvious that she didn't really "get" what I was talking about when I was explaining the M thing to her.

For one thing she kept interrupting to say things like, "Well I don't get it, I know he is struggling but why can't you work on this together, like go to therapy together-" and even at one point I had to tell her, "Let me finish," because it was obvious her mind was jumping in before she even heard the whole thing.

Then on Sunday I wrote her a short email thanking her for listening. On Monday she wrote back a long tirade of an email in which she vented her frustrations about M, that I am such a good person and she doesn't get it and why does he get to make all the decisions while I wait and she is angry and why can't he blah blah blah.

Well I read that and it felt like poison. I have to admit it affected my brain a little bit, as I was walking to go to my presentation, I felt angry too. I felt like what was I doing, was I making myself a victim again by waiting for another guy, maybe I should just cut him off, or give him an ultimatum, 'listen I want a lover and you need to decide NOW if you want to be that guy'.

But on the bus I took out a gratitude list that I started to make, just about M. All the things he ever did for me or that we shared that I am grateful for. I continued to think of things I was grateful for and write them down, I haven't even counted how many things are on the list but I think by now probably 40 or 50. My attitude completely changed. I didn't feel angry anymore. I had a lot more compassion than I did when I was angry and feeling taken advantage of.

When I told Red about this particular phenomenon, he said, "Anger won't help M get better," and I realized this is very, very true. No one really gets any better by someone being angry at them. Think about it. Has the president turned into a better person because half the country is pissed about the war and various other things? No. Do thieves and murderers change because we shut them up in prisons and condemn them with our thoughts? Doesn't seem to be so. Does anyone you know thrive and grow from anger being directed at them, or do you see them closing down, becoming defensive, or going deeper into fear?

Sometimes anger can wake people up, when they have truly been selfish and uncaring, but in this case, I don't think that applies. This is probably the first time in his life M has done anything this self-caring. What's the use of being angry at him for taking care of himself? Because it's hurting me? Does that mean I am more important than him? No. Neither one of us is more important than the other. We are both important.

I have long believed that people only change when they are ready, and the impetus to change comes from within - not from outside sources. Sure, people change for many reasons- fear of loss, or someone being angry at them- but those changes are not authentic. Rather it is a change to be "good" or to keep something, but the fear is still there-- and it's more like the person is trying to live a lie, rather than having sincerely changed from the inside.

If M's gonna change, I want him to change from his inside. Because he wants to. I don't want him to fake it, and pretend to be somebody else with me. I think that was already going on a bit, with him trying and trying to be "boyfriend material" when he didn't feel he could. And it didn't work, did it? He was constantly having these "breakdowns" and I was constantly in fear that he wasn't really going to stay.

I haven't replied to X's email and actually I am afraid to read it again. I just don't have the energy to deal with all I'm dealing with AND defend our decisions or try to explain the nuances of a situation she may never understand.

And for myself, I am only a victim if I choose to be. It's perspective, as I have said time and time again. For me, this is the opportunity for me to heal old wounds from my mother, and my father. It's the opportunity for me to shed layers and layers of old fear that has prevented me from EVER being in a serious loving deep relationship for my ENTIRE LIFE. What an opportunity!!

If somebody came up to you, and said, "I'd like to help you, right in this moment, release and take away all the fear in your life that's ever prevented you from doing anything you wanted to in your whole entire life," would you take it? Of course you would!! I'm TAKING IT. What have I got to lose? Only fear! Because there's NO WAY that holding on to it serves me at all. It's not going to bring M back.

And maybe, in the end, I will lose M. I don't want to, but, there are no guarantees. He has his opportunities and I have mine. I'm choosing to take mine. And experience has shown me (and you, Diary, have reminded me) that there is always some new person, some new adventure, some new experience coming down the pike. That my life is full of the unexpected. That the clearer I become, the more fear I release, the more I become the LOVE that I am, the more richness comes to me.

I am such a different person from when I first started writing here. I admit that when I first began, I was very conscious of my few readers and very often trying to please them. Now I know I have maybe 1 or 2 readers but it doesn't matter anymore- I am writing my truth and I am writing for myself. As obsessive-compulsive as that can be sometimes.

So, blasting off into the Universe, ready to plumb the depths today-chances are I'm going to visit some shitty places but that's okay- they can't transform unless I go there.

Onward.

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