Fear

Fear is only as deep as the mind allows.
Japanese Proverb

What do you do when you spend so much time with someone, so much time loving that someone, that you are blind to everything else? What do you do when you find out that the person you love may not be the person you thought they were? How would you react to the idea that maybe, just maybe, you fell in love with a stranger?

After 14 months of dedicating my heart and my soul to J, 14 months of talking about our future and working towards goals together, I've realized lately that there could be a possibility that he may not be the man I think he is. I'm not saying that that's the case, but it surely is possible.

Where is all this coming from, you may ask? What happened now that she is questioning her knowledge of the man of her dreams? To be honest, I'm not really sure. I guess my only answer is that fear has set in. Fear that I am talking about marriage, about family, about a future with someone and I don't really know him as well as I wish I did. Fear that after 14 months, if I don't know him by now, that there's a possibility I will never know him. It pains me to think that, but after all that has happened between us, I'm just not as sure anymore...

I'm scared to shit (excuse my French). I'm so so afraid that I'm going to marry this man, promise him my heart, my life, my future, and eventually find out he is a completely different person than I know him to be. I believe marriage is forever and I'm afraid of being hurt, not taken seriously, and of any skeletons that hang in his closet that he hasn't shared with me.

Maybe this is the sign that I need to pump my brakes when it comes to marriage and baby talk. Maybe, rather than talk about the future, we should talk about the past. Maybe I should get to know the real J, the one that I'm not sure I know yet. Maybe I should stop being afraid of the things I could possibly find out. Maybe I should just suck it up and start to ask the questions I've been too afraid to ask about the girls he was once with.

Maybe I'm talking out of pure broken heartedness (yes, that's a word I just made up, go ahead and copy me), but I know for a fact that I don't ever ever ever want to feel the way I felt last month when I found out about his little fling. I completely let my guard down for this man and he crushed my heart in a way no one ever has because they have never been as close to my heart as he has been. I want to believe in fairy tales and happy endings, but a part of me is so afraid of thinking those things will happen to me. Maybe I was destined for heart break and bad things because I made the wrong choices when I was younger, because I'm not the best mom ever, for God knows what reason.

I want to stop being sad, and mad, and angry, and upset and scared. That's the biggest thing, I want to stop being scared. I want to love without fear. I want to have the confidence to believe that if anything does happen, it's his loss. I want to believe that if things don't work out, I will be ok. Somehow, I have a hard time believing so. In my mind, he's been "The One" since the first day we met. I hope he sees me the same way. I also hope that this hurt in my heart goes away and stops eating away at my insides. I want to be completely happy again, with him or without him (preferably WITH him). I want to continue on with life, like this didn't happen, but I can't. I need to know that he loves and respects me as much as I love him and respect him, and from where I'm standing, it feels like it may be a lot to ask for, but I think I'm worth it. I hope he does too...

No one said relationships would be easy. Maybe this needed to happen to bring me back down from Cloud 9 and back to reality. I needed the slap across the face to remind me that NO ONE is perfect, no matter how much I think they may be perfect for me. But just because he's not perfect (and by no means am I) doesn't mean that this won't work. It just means that I'm now in this relationship with open eyes and an open mind.

Talk about a lot of insight regarding my love life. I guess that's what happens since I'm around the corner from turning 29 (Feb 22). I guess with age comes wisdom and I pray that this wisdom doesn't fail me, just as much as I pray that J doesn't fail me either