I used to be neurotic about my glasses. I had to know where they were at all times. They were the very last thing I would remove at night – usually after I was already in bed – and the very first thing I’d put on in the mornings, and usually before I even got out of bed. Even if I lingered in bed to read or cuddle, I’d put them on.
But I realized a few days ago – I’m not neurotic about them anymore. I’ve started taking them off in the bathroom when I ablute and not bothering to put them back on. I’ve even spent hours in the mornings without them, while Pace and I sit around and cuddle before we exercise.
It boils down to comfort.
I used to be in a manipulative relationship with a controlling abuser. In that situation, I felt uncomfortable. I felt out of control, helpless, a victim. My glasses gave me security and comfort that I couldn’t find elsewhere – and she couldn’t touch them without me flipping out, so she never tried.
But my neurosis over my glasses was a red flag; a warning sign of things not right in our relationship. Much like my obsession over ansty goth rock (that also went away with that relationship) – I was using my glasses as an anchor, as something I could control in a situation in which I felt helpless.
(The goth rock was considerably more emo: I felt I had a hole in my soul, and goth rock sings about hole-filled souls a lot, so it gave me something to which I could relate. I got better.)
Now that I’m in a healthy relationship, I no longer need to desperately cling to control over little things because I no longer feel helpless – and I can look back and see things as red flags. The things I see when I look back will fill a book, but this is one of them.
Call it an early warning sign. So I give it to you as something to mull over and consider. If you find yourself clinging to the little things, desperate for comfort… what are you really feeling?
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Signs, signs everywhere are signs! In fact, I just had a really cool message from Mother nature just yesterday! Your post reminds me why I’m so excited to start your writers world-changing workshop!! You ROCK!
.-= Pam´s last blog ..Message from Mother Nature =-.
hmm…
I have noticed that when I was going through the same type of emotionally abusive relationship I always had a book and pens with me. I still carry them everywhere, but I don’t feel the need to be quite as obsessive anymore. I write in my daytimers, but not every little thing and every detail, I journal, but not every day. I don’t freak out every time my computer or my notebooks are out of sight anymore…
I am still letting go of the need to ask for permission in my own home, and the need to hide what and who I am from everyone, even myself.
.-= Moon’slark´s last blog ..Wishcasting Wednesday: What do you wish for your Space? =-.
That is totally interesting.
It’s weird, I can look back on the manipulative relationship I was in (was it abusive? I still don’t have a clue) but not with that kind of clarity. I’m sure I did have ticks and weirdnesses that might have flagged up there was something wrong, but I have no idea now what they were.
Part of my chronic Crappy Memory Syndrome (I just made that up) or stuff I’ve intentionally got rid of? Not a clue.
.-= Lucy Viret´s last blog ..A butterfly with a one track mind. =-.
With us, it was towels. It was the one thing Mom insisted on controlling in her crazy, out of control world. They had to be so precisely folded so that no edges could be seen, and it was nothing for her to tell one of us we’d messed one up towards the bottom of the stack, only to have the whole stack suddenly flying around us everywhere when she pulled the offending towel out so we could fold them all again.
It was such an issue that it became multi-generational. When one of my sisters-in-law was explaining why it was difficult to explain her marriage failing (“it’s all the little things”), the one example she was able to grasp onto was my brother’s obsession with… towels!
We do what we learn until we kick the shit out of our past so we can do otherwise.
Annie