Being a lover girl sucks

Have you ever seen those memes late in the year that go something like "2025 is gonna be my year!!" and then right below that is a picture of a defeated person with explosions happening everywhere in the background and the caption "me in October". That is me right now.

I took a lot of hits this year. Solid hits that would have sent even the most mentally stable person into a spiral. Genuinely, I have no idea how I made it to October without fully breaking down. I will give myself a pat on the back for that one. I will say that vices like drinking and smoking ciggies on the regular have helped. I have some of the greatest friends on earth who have listened to me talk about situations backwards and forwards and sideways. I metaphorically f*cked every thought process, every situation, every conversation that could have gone differently had I said something other than what I actually said in the moment.

I am tired.

Not just tired, I am mentally and emotionally drained. I am done. I don't want to do this anymore.

I write this more so because I just need to beat a dead horse just once more before I let it go, so here goes nothing.

The last few years since my last long term relationship ended, have been a mumbo jumbo of crap I have put up with, in my search for a long lasting (maybe forever) type of connection. I have not found that as of yet. This year was probably the worst for that. I tried to distance myself from expectations and let connections flow as they will. I broke my own heart over and over and over again. The thing is, I didn't even look for any of these connections per se. Yeah, I had dating apps and I was somewhat active on them, but I genuinely did not actively pursue anyone. Everything that happened literally just fell into my lap. It's not like I was all like "I need to find a man, I hate being single" type shit. If anything, whenever I was on my own, I was much happier so you can only imagine I didn't really want to ruin my peace.

In reality, I know who I am. I am so much of a lover girl that any connection that feels less than a romantic comedy, is not for me. In my search for forever, I found a lot of right now. I found the forehead kisses without a promise of tomorrow, I found the hand-holding that is meant to mean more but just doesn't. I can't keep doing this to my heart anymore.

A couple of weeks ago I met someone that instantaneously felt like he could be forever. It was quite strange how comfortable I felt being myself from the absolute get-go. In two weeks, we covered six months worth of conversation. From silly, to heartbreakingly deep, we were talking every single day without so much as running out of a single thing to say. He felt like the male version of me. With the same sort of overthinking patterns, soft heart, and a slight darkness behind his eyes built over time with every disappointing thing that happened to him. All the while, he was trying his best to remain light and positive. It was easy opening up to him because I felt like he could just get it. I wanted to just keep this gorgeous man in my arms all the time and make sure no one could ever hurt him.

In reality, that doesn't happen often anymore. Dating has not been fun or fulfilling in any way. Funnily enough, I was talking to my friend about this last night. We were watching "How to lose a guy in 10 days" (how fitting of a foreshadowing). She, (a happily taken woman in a relationship for the last few years), mentioned how a long term relationship isn't as fun and exciting as the movies romanticize it to be. She talked about how sweet they looked in those 10 days, and how she misses that sort of lustful romance that in time, looks different when a relationship becomes the day-to-day. I wanted to understand what that's like but I couldn't be further away from the sentiment. I don't know any other type of relationship anymore other than those lustful 10 days. The excitement of someone new, the giggles and dates, and the eventual just as quick incineration of the connection. It goes up in flames, gets extinguished and when the dust settles, it's time to move on. I don't even have the time to get real feelings for anyone cause it falls apart quicker than my heart has the opportunity to really get comfortable with anyone. While I have had the opportunity to meet great guys along the way and had great laughs and fun, the impermanence of these lustful and temporary connections are starting to wear me down.

How do you explain that to someone? That your attempts at dating have been such a tragic dumpster fire? That you can walk into a connection thinking it has potential but in reality you are dealing with someone who is emotionally unavailable and they string you along for just enough until the connection eventually dies down to the point you have to walk away to put yourself out of further misery? How do you explain to someone that you might have the purest intentions and still be the person who has to end things because your heart deserves better? How? How? How?

I have a hard time accepting the end of this one because if he's anything like me, well, this probably meant something to him too. That said, I find myself at a crossroads. On one end, I have always been the kind of person to fight for what I want and try over and over again until it eventually works in my favour. On the other hand, he walked away and he could have meant it. I might not be the person he desires, and perhaps I need to come to terms with that.

But maybe, I just need to leave it up to fate. He might miss me too and read these very words (I have my fingers crossed on this being the case). And if he does, well... hey!

I will say this though - I can't do this to myself anymore. So if it's not him, well, I am taking a hiatus from men and taking a break. I don't intend on redownloading any apps, I don't intend on entertaining anyone anymore and I quite frankly cannot even fathom doing so for a long while. So if you're reading this and still need time, rest assured, I do too and I will not be "moving on to the next".

This ending was a hard hit for me because for once, I wasn't mistreated or not appreciated. I was baking cookies with a guy who suggested that we do that. I never had that before. And no, this isn't me romanticizing the idea of baking cookies with a man. I simply felt seen.

The new iphone update sends your deleted text threads to a recently deleted folder. I always delete the thread when something ends cause I am tempted to re-read everything, think about where it all went wrong and send myself into a deeper spiral than I was already in. I deleted that thread but I can't bring myself to delete it from the recently deleted folder just yet. 3,860 messages. Ouch.

And so, I will sit my ass down and work on me in the meantime. I will look inward and not let the lover girl in me die on account of all that has happened to me this year. I will simply build her back up and maybe, just maybe, one day someone will love her in the same way she wants to pour love into someone.

As always, thanks for coming to my Cez talk xo.

Re-write the present

I am miserable somewhere deep on the inside. My outer core bleeds rainbows and butterflies though. A couple of weeks ago my boss sent me a LinkedIn screenshot. He has a knack for finding those influential, self-development quotes or advice posts. I really don't know how he finds so many of those. He shares them with me and often, this usually leads to some bigger discussion about what I intend to do with my life and where I am heading. Half the time, those discussions make me cry. As much as I am not much of a crier, lately, the prospect of the future has been nothing but a daunting topic to me.

I wrote that first paragraph just over a month ago and it's been sitting in my drafts ever since, with the title "Misery loves company". I guess that a lot can change in a month. The last month has been weird at best. I am beginning to learn that I am far from nonchalant. In fact, I am stupidly chalant. I used to think that this was actually a manifestation of my general demeanour of self-proclaimed "hopeless romanticism", but, I seem to manifest that more so in a - skip through everything really fast until I feel comfortable and secure with a person or in a particular place in my life.

Let me break that down a little. For whatever reason, once I fixate on a goal, I just want to reach it. I don't want to stop and smell the roses, I don't want to try to walk the less traveled path, I don't want to entertain the idea of an alternative. I just want the fastest possible way to reach that goal. Be it a relationship, a professional goal, you name it. The concept of slow burn only sounds appealing in the books I read but not in my own life.

That said, this isn't a conscious thing I do when I'm in the moment. In reality, I think that the concept of letting something run its course and seeing where the path takes me, sounds quite beautiful. So why do I try so hard to control the narrative?

My boss would probably say that it has something to do with my childhood and some sort of anxious attachment style. We've been having a lot of talks of that nature in relation to leadership lately. Apparently letting people be exactly who they are and not trying to control the way they act and react is a learned skill. Taking a step back requires discipline and a different type of control. A control that allows you to blindly believe that things will just fall into place as they are supposed to - even if the outcome is not what you'd actually want. To me, that screams failure, even if I do understand that you really can't always control everything.

I'm used to fire, urgency, hunger. I'm used to deadlines, staying up all night talking because we just can't get enough of each other. I am not used to slow. I am not used to controlled. I am not used to letting someone take lead when I know how to do it myself. Perhaps this is my flaw and I need someone to ground me - I mean this both professionally and romantically.

I've always been a black cat. I have very few of the golden retriever qualities - perhaps just the loyalty. It's not a bad thing to be either - at least I don't think so. I'd like to think that I am surrounded by a lot of golden retrievers and that helps me stay grounded, not run away or get scared or anxious as much as I perhaps would if I were to be on my own. Patience does not run long with me. I don't like uncertainty and I distance myself from anything that even has the potential to hurt me in the near future.

I don't know how to be different and unlearning these (somewhat toxic) tendencies has proven itself to be quite the task. I am trying though. I am trying to "chill out". I am trying to stop putting too much thought or heart into anything too soon. I am trying to accept that not everything always works out and the road to coming to that conclusion does not have to be grim. I can enjoy the process without thinking about what's next. In reality, all of this sounds painful to the formulation of my brain, but, I am trying.

If you've ever found yourself in this place, I hope you didn't feel alone. If you are now in this place, I want you to know that you are not alone. It's true that our minds can be the most beautiful and devastating thing to happen to us and although nothing is wrong per se on the surface, the things that are wrong in our minds have just as much power over our bodies as the ones we can physically see and touch.

As always, thanks for coming to my Cez talk xo.

Clam chowder and salty ocean air

I started reading this book the other day by one of my comfort authors Emily Henry - it's her newest book that came out this summer - Great Big Beautiful Life. I'm only a few chapters in but the writing style soothes me in a way that makes my mind travel to places that once also brought me comfort in real life. Her books are usually set in a small town, most times it's somewhere in Michigan nearby a lake. This time, it's a small island in Georgia.

I don't think about this often but this morning, the thought crept in like both a happy memory and simultaneously, one I like to forget. Four years ago, sometime right around this time, I spent a month worth of summer on the east coast, bouncing between a small town in Rhode Island and Cape Cod. While the company edged on a feeling that I knew wasn't right at my core, I look back at that time with a lens of fondness for what it was. I like to think that everything happens for a reason and a person's presence and the space they take up means something - or that maybe one day, it will mean something.

It's kind of odd, I will say, that when I think of that summer, I don't necessarily think about the company I had, but rather, what being there felt like. I think about strolling the streets of Newport and feeling like that nautical, picturesque city, it could heal so much of me if I gave it enough time. I think about the iced lattes at those small coffee shops, the locals that entered and knew the barista by name, the smell of the ocean with every breeze that picked up a strand of hair, blowing it away from my shoulder and leaving my skin uncovered for the sun to give it a kiss. I loved being there and while at the time I felt like it was all because of the man that I was with and loved, I know now that he played an insignificant role in just how the east coast touched me.

I think that in some sense, these books, they do the same thing to me. They reawaken a past that I have put in the work to heal from and to forget, when really, I just need to go back to it (to the place - not the person - definitely not the person). I would love to go back to Newport and see it again but this time, on my own terms, with my own people, doing my own thing. I hate that the memory of someone could take away from me just how special that place was. It's both endearing and all the same, quite sad - that I have learned to build a life for myself in which I've revelled in the beauty of places, not people, because places can't disappoint you in those same ways that people can. A place can call you back and whisper those sweet nothings in your ear, kiss your forehead, promise to keep you safe, and really really mean it.

When I think back at the fact that it really has been four years since the summer I spent there, I feel a weight sink into my stomach. It feels like no more than a year could have passed. Simultaneously, as someone who craves connection, it's strange to think that this was the last long-term sort of relationship I was in. Everything else has been a couple months, here and there, with people I often forget ever even mattered. To be fair, that relationship probably should have never happened either. I was lonely and bored and put up with way more than I'm willing to admit. That might sting if he ever were to read it, though, I can't say I care. It's been a long time.

I've been doing better this week. I think that one of the coolest parts of my life in the last four years (on my own - mostly single although always talking to someone) has been the community I've built around me and the people I've been able to build a life with that is not at all disappointing romantically. Just today I was thinking that I might soon have to start using the calendar on my phone to set reminders of the social events, hangouts, and fun things I have going on just in my personal life. I've been so incredibly fortunate in that sense. While in some aspects I lack a romantic kind of love, my friends have filled those gaps and poured so much love into me and our friendships that I only very rarely feel alone. I love that about my life. It feels full. It's also kind of fun to have a boyfriend in every country (but alas that's besides the point LOL).

I've been thinking a lot about hopping on a plane to Boston one of these days and making the drive out to Newport. I think I need that. I think I need to be there and see it with a fresh new outlook on what it means to be there. Not at all for anyone else but myself.

I think I need to wake up in a little cottage by the ocean, have clam chowder for lunch and go for a swim at sunset after a day's worth of sun, laughs and fried calamari. I think my soul would enjoy that.

As always, thanks for coming to my Cez talk xo.