Dear Diary,

First and foremost gals thanks for your notes and point of view...

Friday morning I was in quite a state. I hadn't slept well, was still packing and one paper was still unfinished. Gail had wanted me to get an early start but I felt overwhelmed and like I was disappointing her on top of being disorganized, upset, and not feeling ready to meet with M. I had wanted to get up at a decent hour, get my eyebrows done and get a two hour massage, but those things obviously had to go by the wayside.

M had called and left me a voicemail when I was sleeping, saying that he was fine with whatever I needed to do and to just keep him posted. He also said that it was difficult to determine what was going on by reading my email, but he hoped that everything was okay. I did like the fact that he read my email and the part that I wrote that I preferred phone contact to email or text. That was one thing that drove me crazy about my contact with Frank. I wanted Frank to stop writing me letters and emails and be a man and call me, but I guess I never made that clear. So I never responded to any of his overtures in the hopes he would get the hint, each time getting more and more annoyed. In this case I have nipped that problem in the bud by expressing my preference and I at least found some happiness in the fact that M seemed to be honoring my preference.

I am not sure why he wrote me an email anyway- maybe he was getting scared? But it's my opinion that email exchanges around heavy emotional topics or confrontations are the coward's way out, and cause more confusion and misunderstanding than help. As a last resort, such as with me and Alphie, sometimes they are necessary- I felt like if I had tried to speak with Alphie in person, he would have attempted to manipulate/charm/define me like he always does, and I would have hung up feeling violated and confused by him once again. Emails are best when you are cutting off from an abusive person. But I didn't want to start setting up some kind of precedent with M where all our conversations started being via computer. That would truly suck, and annoy the shit out of me. After all... I was in love with the guy... and emails just create more distance.

I did have a good conversation with Gail though. I told her about how I was feeling and she confirmed that I didn't have to know right then what to do about the meeting- that as the weekend progressed I would figure it out. She said, "Just get yourself here, now, and everything will be okay." That calmed me down quite a bit and I was able to stop crying and freaking out, get myself out of the house.

Gail and Sandra picked me up at the bus station, and remarked how skinny I look. I believe I was the same size last month (hard to tell as I don't have a scale or any way to really tell) but neither one of them noticed- I even remember remarking to myself, "Hmm, interesting that neither one of the girls said anything about my weight loss." But they noticed when they drove up to get me this time.

The training got underway and of course Craig was there again. I thought I detected a sense of coolness and detachment around me in regard to him- but I couldn't be sure. I thought maybe he was just being introverted.

I felt really limited at the training because there was not enough privacy for me to do any anger release work. I knew I was upset, and things just felt worse and worse. Saturday morning I was half-awake, half-asleep, but deeply aware of an incredible energy of fear in my body. I felt it come up in waves- terror- it was like a nightmare that I couldn't wake out of, and a sense of very real fear. I requested angels at my side, and could they please take the fear away- and then they did.

By Saturday night I was still very torn. More and more feelings of inadequacy were coming up for me. I was upset because in my manic, upset state I had forgotten the majority of my beauty products- the lotions, oils and hair stuff I had wanted to bring with me to make me smell good and look nice. Also everytime I looked in the mirror, I felt I looked haggard, tired, unattractive and older. I know this harsh attitude towards myself comes up whenever I feel threatened and really bad about myself, but it was hard not to see from that perspective.

I chose cards- three of them- with questions. The first was just a general sense of what I needed to do right then, and the card was "Change"- to prepare to be unsettled and just embrace the change. With the warning that fighting change just causes more intense changes to happen. Then I asked if I should meet with M the next day. The card was about honoring my own rhythms- which I took as a message to check in with my own timing and that maybe this meeting was not the right time for me... I needed to feel into my own timing. And the third question was, will M come back to me? The third card was, "You shall have love when you love yourself." Have heard that one before...

I felt deeply into myself, first thinking of all the things that make me happy- my trainings and certain people and stuff I know that is good for me- and I noticed how my body feels when I think of that stuff. And when I thought of the meeting with M, suddenly I felt much heavier and it was a very different kind of feeling.

So I determined that that was my deepest intuition saying "No".

And I called and left M a voice message canceling our meeting, just saying, "Thanks for your call and your flexibility. Tomorrow won't work for me." Afterward I did feel relief. I took a shower and when I looked in the mirror I no longer thought of myself as ugly. I was able to relax. I did cry, but at least I didn't have the stress of feeling like I had to do this big impossible thing the next day.

I have never really done that before. I am always gritting my teeth, being brave and doing the difficult thing. It's hard for me to walk away from something that feels like a challenge. But also, I get hurt a lot too. I don't know if I would have been able to put a brave face on this one, and attitude of "I don't care and I've moved on just like you have."

I tried to figure out the "why" about hearing the "no" inside myself, but Keith said that sometimes it's just about trusting the original answer and the "why" will be revealed later. My theory is that right now, M is acting like a stupid, wild teenager... and I am in my "little girl" who so wants love and feeling all my longing and anger about not being loved. There's a way that deep inside I hope M will be able to give me that. But if I take my little girl to his stupid teenager, all that will happen is she will be crushed. Again. Beside the fact that it's never been M's job to take care of my inner child, it's not a good mix and it's not safe for "her".

Gail of course had to throw her two cents in and say that she would have cut him off after the first five weeks, blah blah blah. I just told her, "Well, this wasn't you, it was me. And this has been about me learning how to figure out stuff for myself. I was okay with being in the unknown and I don't regret the choices I've made." She said she recognized that but there was still an air of judgment around her- that I "did it to myself" and created lots of suffering.

Whatever. Yes, there was suffering there but there was suffering from years before M. This seemed to be the way to heal it. And my method was to go deep into the suffering and examine it for what it truly was... I had an awareness that 99% of it was not even about M! Gail can say whatever she wants, because she conveniently forgets about her own fucked up relationship whenever she is up on her soapbox. She forgets about three years of craziness with Craig and his divorce and his kids and all their arguing and insanity. All the times she said she was leaving Craig- an average of every other week- and she tells me she would have walked away after five weeks? LOL. Right! Talk about the pot calling the kettle black... that's BEYOND, my friend! Whatever!

I was in training all the next day but when I checked my messages at lunch there was one from M. He said, no problem, we'll reschedule for another time... and that he sensed something in my voice was not right, and he hoped everything was okay. He can think whatever he wants to think... I didn't give him any explanation and I know I don't owe him one. I need to really get myself together before I even talk to him again, that is my sense.

Shock. Denial. Anger. Grief. Acceptance.

That's what they say you go through when a loved one dies.

I've been through the shock and the denial and a lot of the grief. Now I've really come into this anger. When I think about the fact that M left me to possibly be with other, nameless, faceless women... women he doesn't even know... he left me for the UNKNOWN... well that just drives me nuts and fuels my anger. It brings up all my feelings of not being enough and the fury that is behind that. Whew! Good for me, I guess. It needs to come out. Only when this anger has truly dissapated will M not rattle me one iota. I can move on to acceptance of the fact that we are not together and perhaps never will be. I will be able to turn my face to receive someone else, a man who knows who he is and what he wants, and what he wants will be me... and he'll do what it takes to be in my life, he'll want me that bad.

How do I know this? In this moment of clarity, I just know it. Last night I was feeling pretty good. I came home from the training, and B met me for a walk and a sandwich. I told him about my week and all the crazy emotions I have been through. He was very supportive. Then I went home and settled in for one of my favorite indulgences... season 3 of DHW on DVD... it's a ridiculous show full of selfish, unrealistic characters but I can't help enjoying it so much... somewhere in the middle came this thought "I love M, he doesn't love me...."

This brought a huge insight for me. This very much felt like a THOUGHT. There was no FEELING to go with it. Actually, I was feeling pretty good and enjoying my show. But it's like the THOUGHT showed up and tried to pull me back into my sadness. It's kind of like what I read in the Susan Anderson book- that I have come to associate love with pain... I am all too familiar with feeling this sense of a vanished lover... who knows, I might even be "addicted" to making myself feel terrible with that.

This is a big deal because it means it's not REAL. It's my ego, trying to fuck me up again and again, and keep me in this miserable place. My sabotaging ego that wants to keep me in the story of the little abandoned girl who never get what she wants, nobody loves her, etc. etc.

So this is how I know. Because thoughts can't control me... despite everything, I know I am bigger than my fear. I know that anger is just a feeling, and energy, and feelings go away the more you express them. So if I have to punch pillows for the next 3 months around this M with other women thing, I will do it until I don't feel one iota of anything about it anymore. If I have to keep crying because the grief is really there, I will do it. If I have to wake up in terror and ask angels to heal me, so be it. But I will not let my thoughts keep me in this endless cycle of ridiculous pain and isolation. I will not let my ego collude with old stories. I will not let my mind give another person- M or Alphie or anyone else- power over ME.

I'm determined to have my own power for myself.

You might see me slip, Diary, but that part of me is getting stronger and stronger. And soon all the old fear that is holding onto M, onto anything, will be completely cleared away.... and I will have the me that I want. The confident me that is not afraid to love or be loved.

And I will have everything I want. Even if it's on my last day taking my very last breath, I will be moving forward in the direction of owning myself.

So be it.

Love,
Duck

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