by Jess Kolbe
HIM | Thirty
I lie in bed next to her nakedness, watching her and struggling to make sense of what is happening to me. The weekend has felt amazing and primal. We’ve connected and I don’t want to let her go, nor do I feel worthy of her, afraid that she will get to know me more and I won’t be able to fulfil her idea of a man. Arguments run wild in my head.
Yet she has accepted me and been herself. She is fierce in her connection, her will to love, to be open, while trembling in my arms, tears falling from her. That sheer beauty floors me. I really believe that we both have been wholly ourselves this weekend, I think. Is this what I want? Am I all in? How can I ask myself this now! I’ve got to get out, I need space, shut it off. I peel myself away from Evie, moving through the morning routine while hating myself for being distant.
Fuck, panic is starting to set in. I’ve spent the entire day in denial, avoiding feeling what happened this morning. Worried that I’m too invested, I’ve smashed out three day’s work in one, needing to burn my frustration. She’s in my head, full force, that smile, the way she lights up. I feel sensations of her throughout the day, as if she is here, beaming at me with that twinkle in her eye. It feels great and entirely bonkers. She’s so very fragile and strong at the same time, sort of like me now. Feeling so fucking great and then so fucking horrible to have found her, to feel happy, and like its wrong. I know I shouldn’t but sometimes the guilt is too much. How do I stop it? The knowledge that Dad died less than 2ks from the farm. It’s like my reason keeps failing me and I’m reminded of that day when my body shakes, sadness engulfing me. Dad wanted me to be happy, he’d wanted me to settle down for years.
Why am I tormenting myself? I fucking like her. It feels like Dad is here with me when I’m working on the land, our farm. Harold walks over to sit by my leg, clearly seeing my distress. I tell him about my thoughts and what’s happening with Evie. I know Evie is who I want and that I am ready to give this a go. I plan to ask Evie out, smiling at the thought that Dad would have done a formal request with Mum. I will not be so formal and yet I am still honouring the family tradition. It is funny that even after all we have shared, what I have experienced of her, the thought of asking her to commit to a relationship with me turns my stomach, petrified with sweaty hands, heart racing, the whole nine yards. I want to love this woman and feel like I am sure now, so let’s give this a go. I crack a beer for me and one for Dad, and let his beer sit next to me. Harold gets some water. I tell Dad now all about Evie. I tell him about his emotionally vacant son, one minute, and then how emotionally needy I am, and it feels like a conversation we would have had. I tell him what I am struggling with. I think, between over thinking about her and over thinking feelings. Feeling out of control with my emotions and yet after being emotional with someone, I feel more in control. It’s fucked up. I didn’t want to lose control and yet that is what gave me my control back. I am trying to figure out so much with my life and the feel of her in my life is overwhelmingly wonderful. I know for sure Dad’s head would be spinning too with this newfound epiphany, so we agree that it’s a good idea for me to have another beer. Dad’s sitting on his. Then we talk like he is truly here. We talk of the wave of guilt I have been feeling and I swear to God he asks me to let it go. That was a tough pill to swallow. I know it’s me talking, but it feels like him and definitely his style, so I take a deep breath. The words tumble out.
“Dad, did I kill you?”
They are closely followed by tears that I can’t hold back a volcano of emotion explodes from me. The true depth of my fear is what would have happened if I had waited for help instead? I logically understand it was the right thing to do, to relieve his pain, but my thoughts play tricks and it feels different staying it out loud. I am choosing to believe that my dad came and gave me some sound advice, that moving the tractor off him meant he was released from his pain. I rationally understand that, but it is still my dad, it happened, and I know I will go over it many times and that’s okay. I love my dad. I’m instantly reminded of what Ruby said the other day, thinking something and feeling it are two different things. Stop trying to think feelings and fucking feel them. Rubes has an astounding handle on the English language for a lawyer. I smile as I polish off my beer and feel like I have accomplished something. I can’t control things, but I did have the courage to ease my father’s suffering and I am proud I could do that for both of us. The thought actually brings a level of relief and I feel like I ease a little. I know I will grapple with this for the rest of my life, I loved my dad and would do anything to have him back, hence why I am fighting with myself and the reality of what happened. Pondering my thoughts, the landscape, the sense of freedom I feel here, along with the images of what I shared with Evie this weekend has me smiling at how life has changed for me. I’m standing with Harold and a refreshed beer, talking to the ghost of my father, watching the sunset, thinking of her. How she giggles, the way her smile moves across her face, how good it feels to be listened to, how she just is herself. At times she feels like she is being careful with me, and I guess I am too. The ‘getting to know you,’ and we are trying to ‘take it slow,’ even if that was thrown out the window this weekend. My god, she is kind. I desperately don’t want to hurt her. I’m in, with her, completely.
Fuck, life is different.
HER | Thirty-one
After dinner, we are washing up together when Sam looks at me and says, “I missed you.”
“Me too, it was hard to leave you. I’m not sure what we are, I feel you in my skin, I feel you in my body when you’re not here.” As he turns me to face him, my trembling voice continues, “I want your eyes on me all the time, I want to be with you all the time.”
He stands back, leaning against the bench, looks at me, and watches my body for a moment, enjoying the space he is creating between us, electrified again, heat and passion filling us both. I breathe it all in deeply. I allow him to take his time. He says he’s not sure what we are either and he ‘is in.’ He pauses, looking into my eyes. “With you. I’m in this.”
I’m a crumbling ball of emotion on the inside and can’t stop my smiling. With as much cheek as I can muster, I ask if he is asking me out.
He clears his throat and I can see this is important to him.
“Evie, exclusively?”
“Sam, yes. I would like that very much.”
Sam responds with good and declares he’s sleeping over, playfully whipping me on the arse with the tea towel. I put my arms around his shoulders, drawing him into me.
“I am grateful you asked me out and let me know that you are sure you want to try to see what we can build together.”
Our banter turns quickly into a shower, exploring each other in our new-found commitment. I feel more grounded, accepted, safe in the recognition of emotional vulnerability being held and nurtured. He didn’t run for the hills. In fact, he chose me, so I show him how grateful I am. The energy is swirling around us, his touch like a dancing fire tracing my skin, lightening me up.
My body feels tense, strained, yearning. I need to harness what is out of control. I feel this pent-up energy rising in me. He’s sleeping now and it’s been a remarkable night and yet I’m restless, somewhat like a speed freak, Evie… Plugged in. My thoughts are racing, lying next to him, when like that, suddenly, click, I understand why my body is reeling.
I need to learn to love, to learn what the practice of what loving for someone like me looks like, for all of me. Exploring the parts of my body, my heart and my traumas, as those fears show up and swarm around me. The focus is on me now, I can’t focus on Sam, he’s in. I’m holding back, scared to completely release me, to truly trust, hence why I am wired and full of this energy. Instantly, my body relaxes. The best source of confirmation is my glorious body and she was screaming at me. I now begin the next level of letting Sam into my skin and letting go of my demons, without running away or self-sabotaging, I beg myself quietly in the dark, please let me out of the cage.
; A few weeks have passed since my midnight realisation. Fear has become a continuous creeping shadow in the dark. I’m experiencing the torment of my monsters. I know I’m triggered, wondering what happens if he discovers how broken I am? I am attempting to roll with it and to try to see the punches coming.
I know unhooking myself has been hell. I’m seeing the depths of what healing looks like in a relationship, while also discovering our normal. In between learning about him, my monsters play games. They show up constantly when I’m vulnerable, attempting to play games with my mind, telling me how bad I am, damaged, the negative reruns, becoming louder and so full of hate. When I see Sam feeling down or struggling about his dad, I automatically focus on him and supporting him, and my fears lessen. Then when he is good and seems okay, I sink. Why can’t I support myself like that? The ordinary exists in the way he tries not to be in a bad mood after a tough day, when he chokes back emotions when he is reminded of his dad, when he reaches for me to feel his pain, when he laughs. I close my eyes and feel his smile, his joy, savouring those lucky moments, like music to my heart and body. When he tries to impress me with gifts, little things, small moments of acknowledgement. The way the man says hello, good morning, goodbye and good night all send tones of joy and appreciation throughout my life.
Keeping myself normal-ish with Sam and keeping my demons at bay has been difficult. I feel so exhausted all the time and sensitive, like everything is amplified, sensory overload. Which equals more triggers, sleepless nights, flashbacks, body tremors and my brain in survival mode. I understand I’m trying to make sense of the new, trying to unhook from old, working to create a new story written by us not by my past. I up the ante on those things that are good for me, including more touch with Sam. He loves it although has no idea how much he helps me. Skin to skin time reduces my anxiety, I know this, and even though it feels physically painful at times, I practice. I am rewriting my story of touch, of love, of feeling safe with a man. I have gotten myself to a point of being able to love. The doing of love and working with my fears is simultaneously revealing new layers of my trauma.
However, it’s a whole fucking other level to go through it and hard work because I am fighting my own demons while learning to trust and love. I’ve made attempts to avoid Sam a few times. Our connection is so strong and overpowering, I feel my body disobeying me or is it that I’m disobeying my body? My soul calls to him. How do I practice trust? Confusion fills me, I churn and churn, not about Sam, I’m sure of him. But of, my demons wanting to take me from him and the fear battle occurring in my brain. I know in a roundabout way they are attempting to protect me from feeling that kind of pain, again.
My stomach feels stretched tight like I’m going to vomit all the time, and it is like a lump has permanently set up in my throat.
I’m trying to think my feelings. Fuck, I don’t know. I’ve had panic attacks, my body’s way of screaming at me to listen after I try to ignore my emotions. My heart is the loudest, she aches and beats out of my chest cavity, all over shaking, out of control and covered completely in sweat. I’m so cold, so very cold, bone cold, hold me. Once, I vomited when I was in such a spin of fear, hiding in the bathroom, how it tried to control me. Some nights I repeatedly beg ‘let me love,’ in the dark. Wishing for release, to break free of these bonds. I feel like a dam wall is breaking and I’m doing my best to plug every fucking hole before Sam sees the crazy tumbling up and out of me. My all shakes constantly, battling my demons and working with them is taking a toll on me.
I’m stuck between the possibility of two different worlds, even now I’m shaking, my inside shivering. Knowing how one can be loved but not allowing myself to receive it, feel worthy of it and love beyond the demons in the darkness is my torment. To let light, grow from within, while a hurricane of connection, affection, laughter, tenderness, protection, looks down upon me, as our intimacy grows. I’m trying to accept my feelings. Knowing that I’m not even sure but he feels so safe. How does he even exist? Some days I feel like the luckiest human in the world and then I feel so deeply sorry for him. Having felt the darkness of pain, loss, hurt, betrayal, means as much as I want to love, I’m battling my own exposed monsters by experiencing a love that is safe, how someone should be loved, should give love, I’m losing my struggle. My own history of all the fuckedup shit that I knew was there and hoped I had worked hard enough to never let it own me again, then feeling like I’m under complete control… followed by the thought ‘sure, dickhead.’
How much personal development is enough? Fuck, I know myself too well sometimes. I am my own monster, not just what was done to me, but my coping strategies keeping me from living. How much convincing do I need? I’m damaged goods. How do you stop thinking?
Now, I do understand this is the next level of taking my life back, of no longer allowing anyone else to dictate my life, including my past hurts, but to live my authentic life, as a loving woman, giving the love I have to Sam, reclaiming my power in love, I need him more than ever, am I drowning in darkness? I want all levels of love in my life. I am attempting to break my brains habit of being a victim, of being too broken, too damaged for love. I am none of these things, believe me. I will no longer allow fear to trick me into believing I am, fear can’t convince me anymore. I will thrive, with or without Sam. Fear cannot live here, I have choice. No matter what I’ll be okay. I want to chase love even more now as I’m feeling all of me. My darkness and light, it all feels unstuck, like I’m learning and expressing and being dragged back into the thick mud of it, all at once. Then hope rises through and it feels like my darkness is allowing the light to grow, an internal tug of war. Love helps me to find more of my own trust and releases me from those pains, my two sides, fear-based, and love based. Both win as doing the very thing that scares the shit out of me is how I found self-love and being able to open to Sam. I love how it’s the feeling of love that pushes me, and the possibilities I have with Sam. I’m fighting an epic war on my own that I will fucking win. The more I talk aloud the more I gain perspective, the more it is out of my head. The more I am free to experience him, to experience us. Trying to stay in my body while she screams, she argues and I shake uncontrollably. The deeper we go, the harder I find it to shield him from those monsters; he never needs to know, no-one ever does. I am the monster now. I’m lying next to him, betraying him by not telling him, after all we have been through, after what, he has shared with me, after what, I have asked of him. Fuck, I’m a hypocrite. You see, the fear, these thoughts that I feel, I need to share with him, and I will.
Time, I need time.
I want to take my power back. The power out of my fears, out of the ability for me to self-sabotage us and that I choose to tell him, and am not forced to, not out of fear. Oh, Sam, please be patient with me, please hear my silent pleading in the dark. I need to jump off the edge of the cliff into the abyss of me, to unhook myself from these fear patterns and to feel alive, practice new, chase my happy and fight for us. I need to not think, stop worrying. Let me just make this clear, I have a beautiful, strong man and our forever is amazing. I feel him in my skin like I have never before experienced. I continue to nurture my own story and our love story so that my heart opens. The more we become us, the more I’m feeling the possibility of loss, of hurt, so I’m chasing my natural instincts to love and connect while equally wanting to run like the wind in the other direction, in fear, which leads to a life of more of the same. The fear of being broken, unwanted, never seen. My brain wants to protect me, attempting to convince me to protect myself from him. I’d be happy alone, but would it be an extraordinary life: NO. I want, and can have, extraordinary. I know my past hurts are trying to save me from future hurts. I’ve felt loss, the horrors of fear, it is the part of me that survived that cuddles me in the middle of the night while I am frozen in terror. It’s my brain that protected me and took me away. It’s my heart and brain that knows the sadness of loss, I felt, but it’s my survival mode that protected me. You see, I’m in
a battle with the very thing that I need to survive, that has both consciously and unconsciously protected me. My brain and heart are my own internal knight and shinning fucking warrior, because no one came! I showed up for myself! I fought! I still need those parts of me to live as I might need my survival warrior woman again.
I know I will hurt again. I know that I will feel loss. I will have hard times. I’m equipped to deal with whatever comes my way, to process the feelings and stay in my body, not my head. Knowing this and the practice of living it are two very different things. This is the first big challenge to that resilience in me, because it’s not that I want it to stop, because I need it to protect me and to trust myself that if I fall, I can catch myself. I’m truly not sure I could survive hitting rock bottom again. I’m trying to expand myself to allow love in, both self-love and to receive Sam’s love, while loving Sam, to unlock that magic within me and allow light into my dark parts. To overcome is to make friends with my survival self to bring forth the abilities I have within: my self-trust, allowing me to have a different relationship with my past, and my fears, so I can be adaptable and have the life of my choosing.
Even if it is not forever, I am willing to lose and love. I choose to feel the protected strength of a man, not for Sam to do life for me or fix me but, for me to feel the safety of a man and turn down my survival mode. I first and foremost can protect the hell out of myself. I would love to feel protected and feel into my softer feminine self so as I don’t have to fight as much, for someone to show up for me in that way. This does not change the fact I am strong, and fully capable of protecting myself. I know Sam loves that about me, however I want to choose to feel the protection and safety of a man, as that is my desire. There is freedom in my femininity, in my want for protection from a man who also is seeking meaningful true connection. I wonder the woman I can be not shaped by the terrors of my nights. My need to feel safe and allow another to provide for me, in that way, reflects the human being standing before me. I want desperately to feel the strength of this man to feel my basic human need of protection met for that cup being filled by a man. I’ve spent so long fulfilling that for myself that I just want to feel safe. Just as a strong woman allows space for another strength to evolve, equally for a man to show both power and vulnerability, there is nothing sexier and more of a turn on when those traits exist side by side within a man and are freely shared. It is a sign of a good man with depth and integrity. No one is ever comfortable sharing emotions but a willingness to do it anyway, to face the unknown, to hesitate and do it anyway, that’s strength.