Getting Back on Track

So I had a wee bit of crazy sneak in this weekend.  Friday night I went to bed and everything felt fine with Peabody.  Saturday morning I woke up paralyzed with the idea that he didn’t like me as much as I like him. Where did this devilish little thought come from?  I have no freaking clue. It certainly wasn’t because of anything he did or didn’t do.

That day I had to work a large part of it so I didn’t see him until the night.  That period of absence seemed to make my crazy grow exponentially. It resulted in me being stilted and awkward that whole night and a good portion of Sunday.  Peabody asked me several times if I was having fun(we were at a concert) and if everything was ok and I valiantly tried to paint a “I’m not freaking out” smile on my face and act normal but judging from the number of times he asked I’m pretty sure I failed.

Sunday evening I was at home and got determined to squash this weird insecurity I was feeling by just addressing it with him.  I’d thought about doing that for the previous 24 hours but every time I even thought of forming those kinds of words I swear my throat closed up.  I put my big girl panties on and went over to his house rehearsing my speech the whole way.  I marched up to the door with determination, knocked on it, and immediately lost all my words when he opened the door.  We just messed around his house for a bit and then settled down to watch a new show I’m obsessed with – Sons of Anarchy.  I’m only to season three so no spoilers you freaks!

I was half watching and half arguing with myself to just talk to him.   In the episode we were watching the girlfriend of one of the main characters had a mini-meltdown because she was feeling insecure about their future.  Given my state of mind it made me laugh. Peabody looked at me, paused the show and pretty much demanded to know what was wrong with me.

After a few false starts and stops I managed to string together a garbled string of phrases that probably sounded like, “Umm, errr, well I’m a freak. And umm, well I know I’ve been acting weird.  Errr, ugh, and see ummm, I feel insecure for some reason but it’s not because of anything you’ve done. I’m just ummm, a freak.  Meep meep booble booble I don’t like feeling vulnerable and that’s how I feel.  I’m a freak!”

We had a semi-civilized short conversation after that about how we both have been through a lot in the last few years and have our guards up and we need to start talking more about that stuff so we can head off things like this in the future.  I felt immensely relieved that he neither left a Peabody size hole in the door as he ran down the street away from my craziness nor did he shoot down my feelings and try to trivialize them.

I immediately felt relieved. Immensely.  I’ve been trying to think where this insecurity came from because as I said before it’s not because of anything he’s said or done.  Peabody treats me better than anyone ever has and though neither of us are ready to talk “emotions” every single thing he does shows me he cares about me and thinks about me all the time. 

Most of Monday my dad was very present in my mind and it got to me towards the evening.  I was really missing him and a little upset.  Despite my inner demons saying to keep it to myself I told my sister, Jules, Gwyn, and even Peabody how I was feeling.  I had a nice little pity party for a while as I lay buried under my down comforter when I had an epiphany.

My feelings of insecurity have very little if anything to actually do with Peabody. They are because we’re approaching the three year anniversary of my dad’s suicide.  He was my rock.  My shelter from the storm. He was the person I went to for advice, when I needed a shoulder to lean on, or when I just needed to feel safe and secure.  When he died, all that went away (which explains a lot about why I ran so fast and hard from my sham of a marriage).  And since then, I really haven’t felt very secure in anyone.  Dealing with Coach’s lying BS for so long just compounded the problem. 

So it’s like here I sit with a guy and situation that seems almost too good to be true, with everything moving along at an appropriate normal (and very different) pace for myself and it scares the ever living shit out of me to think that it could all be pulled out from under me in a heartbeat.  You would think by now I’d have a little more grasp on all the crazy things that grief and the emotional trauma of my dad’s death do to me but I guess maybe I’d just gotten comfortable and forgot about those lurking demons. 

I know with time I’ll find a way to feel more secure. And I think actually I have made strides since my whole grounding incident earlier this year.  Peabody knows the bare outline of what happened but I probably need to find it within myself to talk to him in more detail about how much it affected me and still affects me to this day. I still have a long way to go but I do think I’m on the right path now.

Miranda