See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff, One-Man Show, A Boy in Man's Clothing, The Doctors Visit, Giving Him the News and The Appointment for the background on this one.
Just one day after the door incident, I had an appointment at NYU for a more detailed ultrasound in the ongoing hunt for the missing embryo that could kill me. #111 had replied to my email the day before saying he'd still like to go to my next appointment with me, so I told him where and when. He was 15 minutes late--and he was never late, so, clearly, he was making a statement. He didn't apologize or anything when he walked in. I had gone to The Strand that morning and was reading an E.L. Doctorow novel in preparation for a New Yorker Festival panel discussion the next day--a discussion featuring Doctorow, Annie Proulx and Peter Carey that I had originally gotten the two of us tickets for. Clearly, I was making a statement, too.
We had nothing to say to each other. I started to put my book away and he said, "You can keep reading if you want to." So I did, and he got out his cell phone and was laughing as he texted or emailed someone, which bothered me to no end because, naturally, it made me wonder who was on the other end.
Finally, they called us into the examining room and I got undressed and up on the table. I learned from the day before to throw vanity out the window. The first technician came in and did one ultrasound. Again, it hurt--not only from pain but also from fear and #111, who was sitting in a chair next to me, put one arm over the top of my head and held my hand with the other. I squeezed his hand harder every time the technician hit a sensitive spot, digging my nails in just a little bit for my own gratification.
When the technician finished, she said it looked like it was in the cervix, which was a very bad place for it to be. "They did the right thing yesterday in giving you the pill and injection," she said. "They did a very good thing." When she left to get the doctor, I said to #111, "It's ironic that I don't even think I want a kid and this one could have killed me."
Then the doctor came in--an older doctor with a poor bedside manner who was not shy about jamming the ultrasound wand in. More hand squeezing, more nail digging. He had a more tempered diagnosis and told us that it may have miscarried on its own and been on its way out by the time they gave me the drug. "But we'll never know for sure," he said. "Either way, you're fine. This kind of thing happens all the time. With the next one, there will be no problem." That was the twenty-zillionth painful layer to this whole scenario: Everyone we came into contact with didn't know we weren't together.
On our way out, #111 said he was getting a bagel and asked if I wanted to get one, too. "Ess-a-Bagel?" I asked. That was the plan, he said. Sadly, we were always on the same page. It was raining a little and we walked together downtown. The conversation was light--this movie, that movie, Guy-Ritchie-is-a-one-trick-pony, oh-isn't-the-Ess-a-Bagel-decor interesting, teasing me about losing my keys... that sort of thing. Back outside, we were going in different directions, so we gave each other a sad little hug in the rain.
Diagnosis: Sad. Just sad.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Mr. Unavailable #111: The Appointment
See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff, One-Man Show, A Boy in Man's Clothing, The Doctors Visit and Giving Him the News for the background on this one.
I met him at my appointment and when he walked into the waiting room, "strong" #111 was back. He immediately launched into a story about a man who appeared happily married, but told him the week before: "If I could do it all over again, I wouldn't." #111 had obviously liked this story very much because he was now changing his own. On a date back in July, he had referred to "whoever he ends up with..." indicating he wanted to end up with someone. Now, however, didn't sound like he so much wanted to anymore.
I was filling out paperwork and having difficulty figuring out how to work the insurance. The one that was probably "right" to use was going to not cover much and going to make things really expensive and, seeing as I was now unemployed, the one that might be "wrong" to use would have made everything free. So I asked him what he thought I should do and he snapped, "Well, why don't you try being honest for once."
I got up and walked away toward the check-in counter and gave them the expensive insurance info. I was clearly upset when I sat back down and he was like, "What's wrong with you?" I said what he'd said wasn't very nice and he said...(and there should be no surprise here), "I was just joking." And there it was, the mean streak poorly disguised as a sense of humor.
Early on in the relationship when we had the discussion about "what if I got pregnant," he asked if I'd ever been pregnant before. I said I hadn't. I thought that if he had gotten someone pregnant before then he would have told me then, but he didn't, so I assumed he hadn't. So I said to him, "So, you've never done this before, right?" And then he said he actually had. An old girlfriend years ago got pregnant but he was positive it wasn't his because they used to cheat on each other all the time. But he went through the process with her anyway (even when he said it he had a bit of a martyr air about it). And then with the 4.5-year ex--yes, there she was again--they had tried to have a baby but it didn't work out. This was the first I was hearing of it.
They brought me into a check-in room and then weighed me and put us in an examining room. The doctors came in and had me change. #111 asked if I wanted him to wait outside and I said I did. I changed and got on the examining table and a minute later, he came back in and said they told him he couldn't wait in the corridor. The whole thing was awful. I wanted him to be with me but he wasn't with me so I wasn't sure how to treat him. He didn't know how to act either. They came in to do another ultrasound and it actually hurt. #111 was standing down by the door and when he saw I was in some pain, he came over and stood by me and held my hand, which was nice but painful in a different way. Again, they couldn't find the embryo and said it might be ectopic. There was a chance it could rupture. I got dressed and he asked me if I was OK.
Standing there looking at him, I was miserable. "Can I have a hug?" I said. I buried my face in his shoulder, sobbing, and said, "This is awful. And we're not even together." We sat down and moved our chairs closer and he told me what happened with the 4.5-year ex. She got pregnant with twins but one of them died and then they had to wait for the other one to die. It was a terrible scenario.
"You tried to get pregnant even though you weren't married?" I asked.
"It was like a marriage," he said. "We had a very deep friendship."
That stung. "I knew on our first date you weren't over her," I said. "You talked about her even then."
The doctors came in and told us what the situation was. They said that if there was a chance we wanted it, they would wait to make sure, but because we didn't want to keep it, they didn't want to take any chances and would give me a shot that would end the pregnancy no matter where it was and then a pill to induce a miscarriage.
Afterward, #111 and I went outside. It had been exhausting. We'd been in there for three hours. He asked me if I was OK and hugged me. "Yes, but no," I said. "Thanks again for coming with me," I said.
"Yes, for like the 16th time," he said, because I'd thanked him a bunch of times for coming, partially because I was thankful and partially because I wanted to avoid one of his "annoyed" moods.
"Let's get you something to eat," he said, and we started walking toward the East Village. I felt awful. I had no idea what I was going to talk to him about. I was hurt because he'd brought up his ex--again. He held that damn relationship in such high regard--and, by his own admission, she had never even been emotionally available to him, so I don't know what this "deep friendship" bullshit was about. Maybe he was just trying to hurt me. It was all very baffling and painful at the same time because there I was completely ready, willing and able to go there and he didn't want to--because he wasn't able to. But he didn't know that.
I was quiet on our walk downtown, which, of course, meant he was nice to me, asking if I wanted to get ice cream or where I wanted to go to lunch. Finally I said, "How about Mogador?"
"No, I just don't see it. What are you passionate about?"
I started a list of things and realized, as he shot each of them down, it was futile. He needed to find a reason for why he didn't want to be with me and this was what he found. My apparent lack of passion. Somewhere in the 12 hours between when I'd seen him last night and now, he had decided that, no, it wasn't that he was emotionally unavailable, it was that I just wasn't that passionate. And, by the way, he didn't really want to get married anyway.
"Well, I don't see it in you, either," I said. "Sure, you like the arts but I don't see how you like it more than anyone else." He began to defend himself, lamely.
"I think you're a hypocrite," I said. And the thing was, I was right. And he knew it. It was like Therapy 101--he was projecting.
I sat there, despondent. I had made the mistake of thinking that he was open the night before, so he would still be open now. I was wrong.
"You were so open and vulnerable last night and now you're all walls," I said, moving my hands in front of me to indicate walls going up.
"Yeah, well, it's been a trying day," he said.
I was silent for the rest of lunch, and I'd lost my appetite. When the bill came, I tried to pay--because money had been such an issue with him--and I admit it was a little passive-aggressive, but I didn't care.
"Let me just walk you home," he said. It was more like he followed me home. At my downstairs door, which is heavy and made of steel, I opened it to walk in and he said, "Here, just take this [the leftovers]. Please just eat something."
"No, you paid for it," I said.
"Just take it," he said.
I grabbed the bag and walked through the door, letting it fall on him. Yes, I was being a bit of a child, but I think on some level I was allowed. I had taken enough.
When I got up to my apartment, I got to write this email, and chuckled as I typed:
"I'm sorry I got upset and let the door fall on you. I guess there are just certain things we can't talk about." Letting the door fall on him was one of my prouder moments.
"Now there's passion for him," Nora said after I told her and Heidi about the door later that night. Neither of them were surprised by his retreat from vulnerability. "This is who he is," Heidi said.
Diagnosis: When a man is angrily yelling at you, "I don't feel that strongly about you," clearly, he feels strongly about you.
But here's the really sad thing about this whole scenario: Even though I let the door fall on him, I fully knew that I would hear from him again and that he would go with me to my appointment the next day--maybe that's even why I knew I could let the door fall on him. He had a commitment to what was going on that I completely trusted and believed in--a commitment that, for a while, he sounded like he was making but was never truly able to make to our relationship. I now know what him being committed to me feels like, only he wasn't committed to me, he was committed to my abortion.
I met him at my appointment and when he walked into the waiting room, "strong" #111 was back. He immediately launched into a story about a man who appeared happily married, but told him the week before: "If I could do it all over again, I wouldn't." #111 had obviously liked this story very much because he was now changing his own. On a date back in July, he had referred to "whoever he ends up with..." indicating he wanted to end up with someone. Now, however, didn't sound like he so much wanted to anymore.
I was filling out paperwork and having difficulty figuring out how to work the insurance. The one that was probably "right" to use was going to not cover much and going to make things really expensive and, seeing as I was now unemployed, the one that might be "wrong" to use would have made everything free. So I asked him what he thought I should do and he snapped, "Well, why don't you try being honest for once."
I got up and walked away toward the check-in counter and gave them the expensive insurance info. I was clearly upset when I sat back down and he was like, "What's wrong with you?" I said what he'd said wasn't very nice and he said...(and there should be no surprise here), "I was just joking." And there it was, the mean streak poorly disguised as a sense of humor.
Early on in the relationship when we had the discussion about "what if I got pregnant," he asked if I'd ever been pregnant before. I said I hadn't. I thought that if he had gotten someone pregnant before then he would have told me then, but he didn't, so I assumed he hadn't. So I said to him, "So, you've never done this before, right?" And then he said he actually had. An old girlfriend years ago got pregnant but he was positive it wasn't his because they used to cheat on each other all the time. But he went through the process with her anyway (even when he said it he had a bit of a martyr air about it). And then with the 4.5-year ex--yes, there she was again--they had tried to have a baby but it didn't work out. This was the first I was hearing of it.
They brought me into a check-in room and then weighed me and put us in an examining room. The doctors came in and had me change. #111 asked if I wanted him to wait outside and I said I did. I changed and got on the examining table and a minute later, he came back in and said they told him he couldn't wait in the corridor. The whole thing was awful. I wanted him to be with me but he wasn't with me so I wasn't sure how to treat him. He didn't know how to act either. They came in to do another ultrasound and it actually hurt. #111 was standing down by the door and when he saw I was in some pain, he came over and stood by me and held my hand, which was nice but painful in a different way. Again, they couldn't find the embryo and said it might be ectopic. There was a chance it could rupture. I got dressed and he asked me if I was OK.
Standing there looking at him, I was miserable. "Can I have a hug?" I said. I buried my face in his shoulder, sobbing, and said, "This is awful. And we're not even together." We sat down and moved our chairs closer and he told me what happened with the 4.5-year ex. She got pregnant with twins but one of them died and then they had to wait for the other one to die. It was a terrible scenario.
"You tried to get pregnant even though you weren't married?" I asked.
"It was like a marriage," he said. "We had a very deep friendship."
That stung. "I knew on our first date you weren't over her," I said. "You talked about her even then."
The doctors came in and told us what the situation was. They said that if there was a chance we wanted it, they would wait to make sure, but because we didn't want to keep it, they didn't want to take any chances and would give me a shot that would end the pregnancy no matter where it was and then a pill to induce a miscarriage.
Afterward, #111 and I went outside. It had been exhausting. We'd been in there for three hours. He asked me if I was OK and hugged me. "Yes, but no," I said. "Thanks again for coming with me," I said.
"Yes, for like the 16th time," he said, because I'd thanked him a bunch of times for coming, partially because I was thankful and partially because I wanted to avoid one of his "annoyed" moods.
"Let's get you something to eat," he said, and we started walking toward the East Village. I felt awful. I had no idea what I was going to talk to him about. I was hurt because he'd brought up his ex--again. He held that damn relationship in such high regard--and, by his own admission, she had never even been emotionally available to him, so I don't know what this "deep friendship" bullshit was about. Maybe he was just trying to hurt me. It was all very baffling and painful at the same time because there I was completely ready, willing and able to go there and he didn't want to--because he wasn't able to. But he didn't know that.
I was quiet on our walk downtown, which, of course, meant he was nice to me, asking if I wanted to get ice cream or where I wanted to go to lunch. Finally I said, "How about Mogador?"
"Yes, let's go to Mogador," he said.
At Cafe Mogador, we made small talk and then, even though I knew I shouldn't have, I went there. "So, how come your ex was able to move on and you haven't been?" I said.
"She wasn't as sensitive as I am," he said.
And then I told him about this blog--but not the name or any other trackable details--about how I write about my dates with emotionally unavailable men and, then, in a roundabout way, I suggested how he was exhibiting classic signs of emotional unavailability--everything's great until a sudden emotional shut down.
"Look, I don't think I'm all that emotionally unavailable." He was angry now. "You just aren't hearing what you want to hear. I just don't feel that strongly about you." He was angrily yelling at this point, in a hushed-restaurant type of yell. "It's the passion thing. I just don't see it."
"What, you want me to sit here and prove to you that I'm passionate about things?"
And then I told him about this blog--but not the name or any other trackable details--about how I write about my dates with emotionally unavailable men and, then, in a roundabout way, I suggested how he was exhibiting classic signs of emotional unavailability--everything's great until a sudden emotional shut down.
"Look, I don't think I'm all that emotionally unavailable." He was angry now. "You just aren't hearing what you want to hear. I just don't feel that strongly about you." He was angrily yelling at this point, in a hushed-restaurant type of yell. "It's the passion thing. I just don't see it."
"What, you want me to sit here and prove to you that I'm passionate about things?"
"No, I just don't see it. What are you passionate about?"
I started a list of things and realized, as he shot each of them down, it was futile. He needed to find a reason for why he didn't want to be with me and this was what he found. My apparent lack of passion. Somewhere in the 12 hours between when I'd seen him last night and now, he had decided that, no, it wasn't that he was emotionally unavailable, it was that I just wasn't that passionate. And, by the way, he didn't really want to get married anyway.
"Well, I don't see it in you, either," I said. "Sure, you like the arts but I don't see how you like it more than anyone else." He began to defend himself, lamely.
"I think you're a hypocrite," I said. And the thing was, I was right. And he knew it. It was like Therapy 101--he was projecting.
I sat there, despondent. I had made the mistake of thinking that he was open the night before, so he would still be open now. I was wrong.
"You were so open and vulnerable last night and now you're all walls," I said, moving my hands in front of me to indicate walls going up.
"Yeah, well, it's been a trying day," he said.
I was silent for the rest of lunch, and I'd lost my appetite. When the bill came, I tried to pay--because money had been such an issue with him--and I admit it was a little passive-aggressive, but I didn't care.
"Let me just walk you home," he said. It was more like he followed me home. At my downstairs door, which is heavy and made of steel, I opened it to walk in and he said, "Here, just take this [the leftovers]. Please just eat something."
"No, you paid for it," I said.
"Just take it," he said.
I grabbed the bag and walked through the door, letting it fall on him. Yes, I was being a bit of a child, but I think on some level I was allowed. I had taken enough.
When I got up to my apartment, I got to write this email, and chuckled as I typed:
"I'm sorry I got upset and let the door fall on you. I guess there are just certain things we can't talk about." Letting the door fall on him was one of my prouder moments.
"Now there's passion for him," Nora said after I told her and Heidi about the door later that night. Neither of them were surprised by his retreat from vulnerability. "This is who he is," Heidi said.
Diagnosis: When a man is angrily yelling at you, "I don't feel that strongly about you," clearly, he feels strongly about you.
But here's the really sad thing about this whole scenario: Even though I let the door fall on him, I fully knew that I would hear from him again and that he would go with me to my appointment the next day--maybe that's even why I knew I could let the door fall on him. He had a commitment to what was going on that I completely trusted and believed in--a commitment that, for a while, he sounded like he was making but was never truly able to make to our relationship. I now know what him being committed to me feels like, only he wasn't committed to me, he was committed to my abortion.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Mr. Unavailable #111: Giving Him the News
See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff, One-Man Show, A Boy in Man's Clothing and The Doctors Visit for the background on this one.
I was petrified to tell him. After all the things he'd said about how his ex's friends used to talk about getting pregnant by the next guy they met--just to have a baby--I was afraid he'd have thought I'd done it on purpose somehow. And after how he behaved during the breakup, I wasn't even sure if I would hear back from him at all. I decided to wait until the classes he taught were over for the day and left him a message. "It's Tara. When you have a chance, if you could call me back tonight, that would be great. It's kind of important."
Then I waited. A few hours later, he called.
"I have bad news..." I said. "...I 'm pregnant."
"I thought that's what it might be," he said.
"I figured you'd figure it out."
"Maybe we should talk about this in person," he said, and then he started to ask how it could have happened. I said I didn't know and became flustered and he said, "It's OK, I know."
"What do you want to do?" he asked.
"Under the circumstances, I really don't think it would be a good idea to have it," I said.
"Listen, we should talk about this in person, I'm going to come down. I'll be there in about an hour."
I was stunned. I never thought he'd race downtown to talk about it. He always seemed so annoyed whenever anything remotely tricky came up (tennis taking a long time, me not immediately offering him gum, etc.) that I thought this would be too much for him to handle.
An hour later, he came up the stairs and when he saw me had a look on his face that I'd never seen before--sort of open and concerned--not the closed-off "intense" expression he always cultivated. We sat down and he asked if I knew how far along everything was. I told him maybe five weeks, but they couldn't tell because they couldn't find it and it might be ectopic and the doctor seemed more freaked out than I was, which only freaked me out more...again, I became overwhelmed.
"It's OK," he said. "Let me talk for a minute. I felt like such an asshole when I left here last week. I was such an asshole for all those things I said to you."
"Why did you say those means things?"
"Because you were right. Everything you said was true. I didn't realize I did those things until you said something."
I forget the exact order of the conversation, but at one point he was talking about me...
"I hope you don't take this a patronizing, but you carry yourself with such ease. Even with your friends I see it..." and then he went on "...and a lot of people are self-deprecating and it's because they really don't like themselves, but you're self-deprecating and not like that at all." It was a compliment delivered almost morosely. In retrospect, I realized he was telling me he didn't have those things.
"That's not patronizing, that's very nice," I said. I told him it came from working on myself for a number of years (therapy, etc.) and how when I started dating again in earnest, I met a guy (#100) and told Heidi how comfortable I was with him and she said, "It's probably because you're comfortable with yourself."
"You used that line on me," he said. "That you never felt as comfortable with anyone before."
"I felt more comfortable with you than I did with that other guy."
"Why did you not date much for five years?" he asked.
"Because I think I was shut down on some level," I said, and then told him how at the end of last year I decided I didn't want to be alone anymore and that's when I started dating more. "I'm learning what I want and who I want to be. I want to be in a relationship where I can reveal who I truly am and not get rejected--and for the other person to reveal who he truly is. I don't want to be in any other kind of relationship. I don't want to be a walking dead person. There are too many relationships like that."
He just nodded. As we talked, he was slumped a little on my sofa and was looking straight ahead. He was on the verge of tears.
"Do you want to be alone?" I asked him.
He shrugged. "I don't know. I'm fine alone. I'm fine with someone..."
"Well, I think it would be a shame if you were alone because you have so much to offer if you'd just let yourself."
He didn't say anything at that. I could see him welling up again.
At one point I said, "I don't think you were going to break up with me. I think you're emotionally unavailable and when I got laid off you felt some sort of weird pressure."
"No, I was going to end it," he said (and that stung), "but you're probably right, I probably am emotionally unavailable. If I were more self-aware, I'd probably know that."
"That's funny," I said. "You're always talking about how self-aware you are."
"You know what they say about people who talk a lot about being a certain way, they usually aren't."
"Methinks he doth protest too much," I said, totally stealing Heidi's line.
"You're probably right," he said, "You're very smart, you know. Very smart."
The conversation came to a sort of natural close and he said, "I'd like to go with you to your appointment tomorrow."
I told him I'd like that and said I'd see him there at 9 a.m. He used my bathroom for a second time and I said, "I thought I was the one who was supposed to be peeing all the time."
"It's sympathy peeing," he said.
When he left, I was ecstatic. I didn't know what any of this meant, but I wondered if there was hope.
Diagnosis: Ironically, our relationship just got the depth it needed in the breakup. Or maybe he could only tell me these things because we have broken up. He has finally let himself be open and vulnerable, and it's beautiful. This is what I've been waiting for, but has it come too late?
I was petrified to tell him. After all the things he'd said about how his ex's friends used to talk about getting pregnant by the next guy they met--just to have a baby--I was afraid he'd have thought I'd done it on purpose somehow. And after how he behaved during the breakup, I wasn't even sure if I would hear back from him at all. I decided to wait until the classes he taught were over for the day and left him a message. "It's Tara. When you have a chance, if you could call me back tonight, that would be great. It's kind of important."
Then I waited. A few hours later, he called.
"I have bad news..." I said. "...I 'm pregnant."
"I thought that's what it might be," he said.
"I figured you'd figure it out."
"Maybe we should talk about this in person," he said, and then he started to ask how it could have happened. I said I didn't know and became flustered and he said, "It's OK, I know."
"What do you want to do?" he asked.
"Under the circumstances, I really don't think it would be a good idea to have it," I said.
"Listen, we should talk about this in person, I'm going to come down. I'll be there in about an hour."
I was stunned. I never thought he'd race downtown to talk about it. He always seemed so annoyed whenever anything remotely tricky came up (tennis taking a long time, me not immediately offering him gum, etc.) that I thought this would be too much for him to handle.
An hour later, he came up the stairs and when he saw me had a look on his face that I'd never seen before--sort of open and concerned--not the closed-off "intense" expression he always cultivated. We sat down and he asked if I knew how far along everything was. I told him maybe five weeks, but they couldn't tell because they couldn't find it and it might be ectopic and the doctor seemed more freaked out than I was, which only freaked me out more...again, I became overwhelmed.
"It's OK," he said. "Let me talk for a minute. I felt like such an asshole when I left here last week. I was such an asshole for all those things I said to you."
"Why did you say those means things?"
"Because you were right. Everything you said was true. I didn't realize I did those things until you said something."
I forget the exact order of the conversation, but at one point he was talking about me...
"I hope you don't take this a patronizing, but you carry yourself with such ease. Even with your friends I see it..." and then he went on "...and a lot of people are self-deprecating and it's because they really don't like themselves, but you're self-deprecating and not like that at all." It was a compliment delivered almost morosely. In retrospect, I realized he was telling me he didn't have those things.
"That's not patronizing, that's very nice," I said. I told him it came from working on myself for a number of years (therapy, etc.) and how when I started dating again in earnest, I met a guy (#100) and told Heidi how comfortable I was with him and she said, "It's probably because you're comfortable with yourself."
"You used that line on me," he said. "That you never felt as comfortable with anyone before."
"I felt more comfortable with you than I did with that other guy."
"Why did you not date much for five years?" he asked.
"Because I think I was shut down on some level," I said, and then told him how at the end of last year I decided I didn't want to be alone anymore and that's when I started dating more. "I'm learning what I want and who I want to be. I want to be in a relationship where I can reveal who I truly am and not get rejected--and for the other person to reveal who he truly is. I don't want to be in any other kind of relationship. I don't want to be a walking dead person. There are too many relationships like that."
He just nodded. As we talked, he was slumped a little on my sofa and was looking straight ahead. He was on the verge of tears.
"Do you want to be alone?" I asked him.
He shrugged. "I don't know. I'm fine alone. I'm fine with someone..."
"Well, I think it would be a shame if you were alone because you have so much to offer if you'd just let yourself."
He didn't say anything at that. I could see him welling up again.
At one point I said, "I don't think you were going to break up with me. I think you're emotionally unavailable and when I got laid off you felt some sort of weird pressure."
"No, I was going to end it," he said (and that stung), "but you're probably right, I probably am emotionally unavailable. If I were more self-aware, I'd probably know that."
"That's funny," I said. "You're always talking about how self-aware you are."
"You know what they say about people who talk a lot about being a certain way, they usually aren't."
"Methinks he doth protest too much," I said, totally stealing Heidi's line.
"You're probably right," he said, "You're very smart, you know. Very smart."
The conversation came to a sort of natural close and he said, "I'd like to go with you to your appointment tomorrow."
I told him I'd like that and said I'd see him there at 9 a.m. He used my bathroom for a second time and I said, "I thought I was the one who was supposed to be peeing all the time."
"It's sympathy peeing," he said.
When he left, I was ecstatic. I didn't know what any of this meant, but I wondered if there was hope.
Diagnosis: Ironically, our relationship just got the depth it needed in the breakup. Or maybe he could only tell me these things because we have broken up. He has finally let himself be open and vulnerable, and it's beautiful. This is what I've been waiting for, but has it come too late?
Monday, September 27, 2010
Mr. Unavailable #111: The Doctors Visit
See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff, One-Man Show and A Boy in Man's Clothing for the background on this one.
I kept busy over the weekend, going on the Haunted Halloween hayride upstate that #111 was supposed to join in on. Instead, just Shelagh and Allison and I drove upstate. I'd already told Shelagh about the positive result and then told Allison in the car. She was alarmed. "Those things are usually right," she said. I momentarily panicked but truly felt I wasn't actually pregnant. I wasn't having any weird cravings or any bizarre reaction to things. Plus, I happened to have an OB-GYN appointment scheduled for Monday so I knew I would find out for sure soon enough. Besides, everything I was feeling felt like PMS and sometimes I had really bad PMS.
"Sickly, I kind of hope I am pregnant," I said.
"Well, that makes sense, so you still have a connection to him," Shelagh said.
"No, I said, so I can say to him, 'I'm pregnant with your child and I'm going to get rid of it.'"
We made a zillion off-color jokes about my unlikely pregnancy, from "and people said I looked radiant on my birthday...and they thought it was because I was in love" to "maybe we can find you a flight of stairs upstate...or tip a cow on you." I was reveling in my dark humor, and, knowing it would end once I found out I wasn't pregnant, said, "I'm going to miss my imaginary baby."
Even I have to admit that this PMS was different. Usually I want to wear baggy clothes to hide myself when I'm PMSing, but with this, for some reason, I was still wearing dresses and tighter clothes and not afraid to hang out of them a little--or, actually, proud of hanging out of them a little.
On Monday, I went to the doctor. When the nurse took my urine sample, I said, "So, I took a pregnancy test on Friday and it looked like it came back positive, but I'm sure I'm not." Suddenly, her tone changed, "Well, we'll find out..." and then about five seconds later, "Yup."
"Yup? Yup what? Yup, I'm pregnant?"
"You're pregnant."
"Holy fucking shit..."
I never thought I was the kind of girl who could get pregnant. I was always so damned responsible. Obviously, I am an idiot because I was that girl. I couldn't figure out how it could have happened because we were careful, except for that one episode of crime-scene sex. At the risk of TMI, the doctor said it was possible it could have been a very bloody ovulation.
In the span of one week, I got laid off, dumped and found out I was pregnant. By the time I got the third layer of bad news, I was calm. Even Heidi (who met with me at every stage of the disaster, bringing me cupcakes, buying me dinner, taking me home with her) said so when she met me out that night.
"Obviously, I don't have control over anything," I said. "I give up. There's nothing I can do. I know what I need to do next and that's it."
One of the things I had to do next? Tell #111. And I wasn't even sure if I would ever hear back from him.
Diagnosis: Too much badness in too small a time span.
I kept busy over the weekend, going on the Haunted Halloween hayride upstate that #111 was supposed to join in on. Instead, just Shelagh and Allison and I drove upstate. I'd already told Shelagh about the positive result and then told Allison in the car. She was alarmed. "Those things are usually right," she said. I momentarily panicked but truly felt I wasn't actually pregnant. I wasn't having any weird cravings or any bizarre reaction to things. Plus, I happened to have an OB-GYN appointment scheduled for Monday so I knew I would find out for sure soon enough. Besides, everything I was feeling felt like PMS and sometimes I had really bad PMS.
"Sickly, I kind of hope I am pregnant," I said.
"Well, that makes sense, so you still have a connection to him," Shelagh said.
"No, I said, so I can say to him, 'I'm pregnant with your child and I'm going to get rid of it.'"
We made a zillion off-color jokes about my unlikely pregnancy, from "and people said I looked radiant on my birthday...and they thought it was because I was in love" to "maybe we can find you a flight of stairs upstate...or tip a cow on you." I was reveling in my dark humor, and, knowing it would end once I found out I wasn't pregnant, said, "I'm going to miss my imaginary baby."
Even I have to admit that this PMS was different. Usually I want to wear baggy clothes to hide myself when I'm PMSing, but with this, for some reason, I was still wearing dresses and tighter clothes and not afraid to hang out of them a little--or, actually, proud of hanging out of them a little.
On Monday, I went to the doctor. When the nurse took my urine sample, I said, "So, I took a pregnancy test on Friday and it looked like it came back positive, but I'm sure I'm not." Suddenly, her tone changed, "Well, we'll find out..." and then about five seconds later, "Yup."
"Yup? Yup what? Yup, I'm pregnant?"
"You're pregnant."
"Holy fucking shit..."
I never thought I was the kind of girl who could get pregnant. I was always so damned responsible. Obviously, I am an idiot because I was that girl. I couldn't figure out how it could have happened because we were careful, except for that one episode of crime-scene sex. At the risk of TMI, the doctor said it was possible it could have been a very bloody ovulation.
In the span of one week, I got laid off, dumped and found out I was pregnant. By the time I got the third layer of bad news, I was calm. Even Heidi (who met with me at every stage of the disaster, bringing me cupcakes, buying me dinner, taking me home with her) said so when she met me out that night.
"Obviously, I don't have control over anything," I said. "I give up. There's nothing I can do. I know what I need to do next and that's it."
One of the things I had to do next? Tell #111. And I wasn't even sure if I would ever hear back from him.
Diagnosis: Too much badness in too small a time span.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Mr. Unavailable #111: A Boy in Man's Clothing
See Could it Be?, It's Not Him, It's Me, The Recovery, We're Just Not That Into Each Other, The Continuation, The Curse is Broken, Unfortunately, The Make-Up Date, The Phone Call, The Negotiation, Dates 9 Through 12, Dates 13 Through 15, The Public Sex Talk, Bridging the Chasm, The Shut Down, All Kinds of Good, Meeting the Friends, Part 2, Hamptons Getaway, Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Happy Birthday to Me, The Drunken Text, Jeckyl and Hyde, The Layoff and One-Man Show for the background on this one.
The day after our last date, I couldn't think. I was miserable. I started making lists of things I was unhappy about and decided I needed to talk to him. I never wanted to be "that girl" in a relationship--who always needed to talk--but enough was enough. I knew he was downtown for his volunteer job, so I texted him around 4 p.m. asking him if he could come see me when he was done. I felt oddly empowered after sending the text, which meant it was the right thing to do.
I met Heidi at Pinkberry and waited. As the hours ticked on, I got more and more angry: "What a fucking coward," I said. Finally, around 7, there was a voicemail message from him that I'd somehow just missed. He gave some excuse about why he didn't respond up until now and said he'd hang around downtown for a little while. I felt a tiny spring of hope. He was appearing to be accommodating. I called him and he said he'd meet me at my place in twenty minutes. When he came upstairs, I didn't even bother looking for a kiss. He came in and sat down and I said, "I really like you and I want to work on this relationship but I am not sure where you are at."
"I don't want to take this relationship any further," he said.
I was stunned. Then he said, "I was going to break up with you but then you got fired, so..."
Asshole. I got laid off, not fired. And he had made a unilateral decision with no discussion, no nothing. I asked him why. He started saying it was the little things, like how I didn't immediately offer him gum the day before. He also said that I wasn't a good listener and when he would tell me things I would say, "Poor you" or not listen. He said he didn't feel very deeply about the relationship. The weird thing was, the whole time he was saying all that, he was incredibly angry. I asked him why he didn't tell me he thought those things. "I apologize for that," he said. Never say anything about the things that aren't making you happy and instead just end it? It wasn't making any sense.
"Intimacy is being able to ask for what you need and being able to communicate and being able to tell someone how you feel," I said. He insisted intimacy was the little things--like immediately offering someone gum. I was angry. Many things began to click into place. I could never figure out how he could stay in a relationship for four years where the woman wasn't capable of intimacy and now I knew--he wasn't capable of it either. "I feel really sorry for you," I said. "Now I know how you could be in a relationship for four and half years where there was no intimacy."
That made him angrier. "If you want to discuss things like that, we can talk about that another time." Clearly, he didn't know how to handle what I'd said.
And then suddenly he said, "I was a complete fucking gentleman for three months!"
Again, stunned, I said, "I never said you weren't."
He said again how he needed to be be with someone who understood that the little things he mentioned were important. And I said, "Well, I need to be with someone who can communicate and tell me what they need and not expect me to read their mind or one minute tell me I can doze in bed and then the very next ask me why I didn't make coffee."
"Well, I apologize for that," he said. And then he left.
I was floored. I had no idea who I was just dating. Did the real #111 just walk out the door?
I met Heidi out and told her what happened. She told me that, clearly, he had no intention of breaking up with me before I got laid off--he would have been happy coasting along doing less and less--but when I got laid off, he realized he was going to have to show up for me and there was no way that was going to happen. I was angry.
"He wants to be alone, just look at how he lives," she said. "He's 44 years old and he chooses to live with a roommate in Harlem. There's no space in his life for anyone else. He's an isolationist."
She was right. I didn't want to be alone and Heidi offered me her sofa. In the cab on the way to DUMBO, I repeated some of the idiotic things he said. Like how we could talk about his lame four and a half year relationship some other time. "When exactly does he think we're going to talk about it? In Break-Up, Part 2?" And "When exactly was he going to break up with me? He said yes to everything I invited him to."
I felt relieved on some level--I no longer had to worry about where I stood or guess what his intentions were. But I knew the anger and relief wouldn't last. It never does.
Diagnosis: For him: When he said he was a "complete fucking gentleman for three months," he was basically telling me that he came with an expiration date, that his acting like a gentleman was indeed an act that he could only keep up for a little while.
This whole thing shined new light on things he told me about his past relationships. He always said how he and his workaholic ex from his 4.5-year thing never fought. Most likely, it was because he was chasing her for four and half years, which kept him interested. Maybe he didn't want anyone he could actually have. He probably didn't have to do too much, either. He'd moved into her apartment, she probably had plenty of money, he probably had very little to worry about. I bet it was an easy, intimacy-free existence.
"It's like playing house," Nora said. "He was no different in that relationship. His ex just probably didn't care enough to notice or do anything about it, especially if she was working all the time."
He sometimes talked about another four-month relationship where he claimed she said she started wanting him to change. Maybe what really happened was that he started to pull away, to do less and less (the "gentleman" went away) and expect more from her, just like he did with me, and she probably didn't like it either. She probably didn't want him to change, she probably wanted him to be the guy he initially presented himself as--a guy he never truly was.
For me: I really need to disregard everything he said about me. The things he said about me bothered me. I have never, ever in my entire life been called a bad listener or selfish, like he was claiming, so I knew on some level it was all bullshit. I knew from what he'd told me in the past that those were old issues of his--that he felt like people weren't listening to him, so it was probably one of the first--and easiest--cards to play. Most likely, he didn't even know why he was breaking up with me. Most likely, it was because we were getting closer--too close. But, like I said, I need to disregard it because it was all bullshit. Maybe I was threatening his isolationism and, instead of looking at it, he attacked the threat to it: me. That's why he was so angry.
The plot thickens: For more than two weeks, I've been experiencing what I thought was massive PMS. So, on the day of the break-up, I took a pregnancy test. Oddly, it came back positive. But those things can be wrong. Right?
The day after our last date, I couldn't think. I was miserable. I started making lists of things I was unhappy about and decided I needed to talk to him. I never wanted to be "that girl" in a relationship--who always needed to talk--but enough was enough. I knew he was downtown for his volunteer job, so I texted him around 4 p.m. asking him if he could come see me when he was done. I felt oddly empowered after sending the text, which meant it was the right thing to do.
I met Heidi at Pinkberry and waited. As the hours ticked on, I got more and more angry: "What a fucking coward," I said. Finally, around 7, there was a voicemail message from him that I'd somehow just missed. He gave some excuse about why he didn't respond up until now and said he'd hang around downtown for a little while. I felt a tiny spring of hope. He was appearing to be accommodating. I called him and he said he'd meet me at my place in twenty minutes. When he came upstairs, I didn't even bother looking for a kiss. He came in and sat down and I said, "I really like you and I want to work on this relationship but I am not sure where you are at."
"I don't want to take this relationship any further," he said.
I was stunned. Then he said, "I was going to break up with you but then you got fired, so..."
Asshole. I got laid off, not fired. And he had made a unilateral decision with no discussion, no nothing. I asked him why. He started saying it was the little things, like how I didn't immediately offer him gum the day before. He also said that I wasn't a good listener and when he would tell me things I would say, "Poor you" or not listen. He said he didn't feel very deeply about the relationship. The weird thing was, the whole time he was saying all that, he was incredibly angry. I asked him why he didn't tell me he thought those things. "I apologize for that," he said. Never say anything about the things that aren't making you happy and instead just end it? It wasn't making any sense.
"Intimacy is being able to ask for what you need and being able to communicate and being able to tell someone how you feel," I said. He insisted intimacy was the little things--like immediately offering someone gum. I was angry. Many things began to click into place. I could never figure out how he could stay in a relationship for four years where the woman wasn't capable of intimacy and now I knew--he wasn't capable of it either. "I feel really sorry for you," I said. "Now I know how you could be in a relationship for four and half years where there was no intimacy."
That made him angrier. "If you want to discuss things like that, we can talk about that another time." Clearly, he didn't know how to handle what I'd said.
And then suddenly he said, "I was a complete fucking gentleman for three months!"
Again, stunned, I said, "I never said you weren't."
He said again how he needed to be be with someone who understood that the little things he mentioned were important. And I said, "Well, I need to be with someone who can communicate and tell me what they need and not expect me to read their mind or one minute tell me I can doze in bed and then the very next ask me why I didn't make coffee."
"Well, I apologize for that," he said. And then he left.
I was floored. I had no idea who I was just dating. Did the real #111 just walk out the door?
I met Heidi out and told her what happened. She told me that, clearly, he had no intention of breaking up with me before I got laid off--he would have been happy coasting along doing less and less--but when I got laid off, he realized he was going to have to show up for me and there was no way that was going to happen. I was angry.
"He wants to be alone, just look at how he lives," she said. "He's 44 years old and he chooses to live with a roommate in Harlem. There's no space in his life for anyone else. He's an isolationist."
She was right. I didn't want to be alone and Heidi offered me her sofa. In the cab on the way to DUMBO, I repeated some of the idiotic things he said. Like how we could talk about his lame four and a half year relationship some other time. "When exactly does he think we're going to talk about it? In Break-Up, Part 2?" And "When exactly was he going to break up with me? He said yes to everything I invited him to."
I felt relieved on some level--I no longer had to worry about where I stood or guess what his intentions were. But I knew the anger and relief wouldn't last. It never does.
Diagnosis: For him: When he said he was a "complete fucking gentleman for three months," he was basically telling me that he came with an expiration date, that his acting like a gentleman was indeed an act that he could only keep up for a little while.
This whole thing shined new light on things he told me about his past relationships. He always said how he and his workaholic ex from his 4.5-year thing never fought. Most likely, it was because he was chasing her for four and half years, which kept him interested. Maybe he didn't want anyone he could actually have. He probably didn't have to do too much, either. He'd moved into her apartment, she probably had plenty of money, he probably had very little to worry about. I bet it was an easy, intimacy-free existence.
"It's like playing house," Nora said. "He was no different in that relationship. His ex just probably didn't care enough to notice or do anything about it, especially if she was working all the time."
He sometimes talked about another four-month relationship where he claimed she said she started wanting him to change. Maybe what really happened was that he started to pull away, to do less and less (the "gentleman" went away) and expect more from her, just like he did with me, and she probably didn't like it either. She probably didn't want him to change, she probably wanted him to be the guy he initially presented himself as--a guy he never truly was.
For me: I really need to disregard everything he said about me. The things he said about me bothered me. I have never, ever in my entire life been called a bad listener or selfish, like he was claiming, so I knew on some level it was all bullshit. I knew from what he'd told me in the past that those were old issues of his--that he felt like people weren't listening to him, so it was probably one of the first--and easiest--cards to play. Most likely, he didn't even know why he was breaking up with me. Most likely, it was because we were getting closer--too close. But, like I said, I need to disregard it because it was all bullshit. Maybe I was threatening his isolationism and, instead of looking at it, he attacked the threat to it: me. That's why he was so angry.
The plot thickens: For more than two weeks, I've been experiencing what I thought was massive PMS. So, on the day of the break-up, I took a pregnancy test. Oddly, it came back positive. But those things can be wrong. Right?
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