I think I need to move.

I love living alone sometimes.  But when you live in 600 square feet and go through the same spaces alone after being part of an us, there are ghosts everywhere. And the space is already cramped without having to feel the absence of a warm body so harshly. 

You are still everywhere. And when you were here I didn't think I even wanted you. That's the honest, naked truth. It's hard to sit with. I don't know if I ever loved you or now that you're gone, I just obsess over what isn't there.  It seems cruel that while I never particularly liked your hugs or spooning or being physically close, now it is all I crave.  I used to want to get off the phone and have silence when you texted, and now that my phone is silent it is squeezing out the pulp from this mascerared heart. 

The way you use me for sex cuts me deeply. Because I feel a closeness that quite literally does not exist.  I am castoff and discarded, I am gathering dust beneath your bed.  It is cold here.  And I wonder when I will want someone who isn't you.  Because every day there is you everywhere, and it's hard to imagine life without you.  This is the cruelest existence, to want to be seen and heard and adored by someone who probably wouldn't care if you were alive or dead.  I feel dirty and ashamed, I am a kid old all over again and wondering what I did wrong, punishing myself daily for crimes unknown. 

I am so tired.  I just want to love you and be loved by you.

 The movies always makes madness out to be so glamorous.  Heartbreak has a glint to it.

But it's all dull and ugly and utterly exhausting. 

I love you and it makes me sick.  I hate myself for it.  All through Covid I had no one because of this insane love, this punishing unhealthy lust.  I've been all alone for so long when I've had so many opportunities to be with people. Knowing that it's all entity my fault makes it so much worse. 

I truly hate myself. And I hate being this lonely.

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.

I know I'm 35 and all.

I am grateful to have a job during these times. But I don't know when I've been so tired. I really just want my momma, her food, and to crawl under that big wonderful gold duvet and listen to the rain outside or swim in her pool in Austin. To watch my little Sammie bean fly up the stairs and run outside. I miss it so much. I want to work on puzzles in the big main room. And watch Sammie fall asleep on my mom, happy and full. I'm so depleted. 

Hold me close and don't let go

 This is just a small thing. From my phone. Sammie wakes me and stands on my chest. I can hear his heart everywhere with my stethoscope and his murmur is awful. I don't want him to suffer. Not for what he's given me. I held him.and sang la vie en rose in English because it's pretty. Often I have to hold him for a half hour to an hour before he gets comfortable and goes back to sleep.

He may be a little dog. But his love is the biggest love I have ever known in my thirty-five years here. And a dog's love is the only truly unconditional one I have ever experienced. Without being dramatic, just entirely honest.

He brings me so much joy. My heart feels like a balloon even when I'm crying as I hold him, feeling the washing machine murmur thrum on my chest, heart against heart. Thank you, God, truly, for this little dog. I will always carry him with me.

 Please God take me before Sammie. Or at least give me his suffering and pain. He doesn't deserve this God. He doesn't. He is so good and pure. He is true love embodied. 

Yesterday was one of the hardest days of my life. I stood tall because I have to for him. He is my everything. 

I am so afraid of what I am without him. Each day I have so many moments of joy and they are thanks to him. He is such a blessing, he is such light. I am so truly blessed and thankful. And I have given thanks. And I will continue to. But he does not deserve pain and agony. I can bear it for him. Please God if you are listening, please please please let me. I love him so purely. He deserves this. He is so good. 

 In my chest there's a hole where a heart used to be.