Shame is such a complex animal.  It really feels like this dynamic being, like you can't think about it or write about it or sometimes even breathe about it because it is coming for you.  And it is just beneath the surface, waiting to get out.

 I do not understand how I exist in a space with this human nor do I think I ever will.  I know it to be unhealthy and dysfunctional.  And full of shame.  It's taken years for me to loosen my feelings of shame around sex, and now I think I have a healthier relationship with it.  But never would I have fathomed taking the things from this person that I have.  I know that he does not respect me.  

And he's not the first.  There exists so much shame.  Around sex and relationships.  I consider myself to be a strong independent woman, but why does my will bend when it comes to love?  I must feel as if love equals this, like I deserve to be loved in a smaller, uglier way than people around me.  In a way that is for dimly lit alleyways and narrow sidewalks with flickering street lamps.  

That I do not think I deserve a real, solid redwood forest type love in the foggy sunset of Muir Woods is shameful.  And it's all I can do to whisper it here as I wait for a text back.  The shame.