I always imagined my wedding day would be a whirlwind of emotions – tears, laughter, maybe a little champagne buzz… What I didn’t expect was to break a sweat before the ceremony even started. One minute I was gazing at the altar, the next I was wanting to sprint towards the exit, veil flying behind me like I was running another marathon. So much for ‘something borrowed’ – the only thing I was borrowing at this point was extra time before anyone realized the bride was bolting…
I used to look into my tear stained eyes in the bathroom mirror at night and ask myself why I was still alone. I would mistakenly believe my desperate need for a man would make my life better. I waited for years for the universe to provide me with True Love so I could “start my life”. As I continued searching for someone to love me, it started to confirm that my sadness was an empty pit, and would never be filled. My endless nights of tears on the floor of my apartment rained down into a wishing well and drowned my sorrows, dimmed the pain of being alone, continuing my belief that I would never find anyone to comfort me, to hold me close, and tell me everything would be alright.
I went through all of the dating apps. Multiple times. Going on dates, getting burned, going on more dates, becoming frustrated, deleting them and swearing them off, saying “I’ll just meet someone organically” or “the Universe will provide”.
After each date, I’d come home with one of the following scenarios: defeated, endlessly swiping until my fingers went numb or I cried myself to sleep; going on a mediocre date, having told the man I had a great time, but dreading having to ghost him or make an excuse once he tried to make the next plan, because I couldn’t face telling him I really wasn’t interested; or being over the moon about some guy, immediately making future plans in my head, imagining all sorts of things about him, and putting him on a pedestal that would ultimately sprout a broken leg and it would cause the idea of the man to come crashing down, and I’d be back at square one. Again. For the millionth time.
I believe that everyone produces “energy”; basically it’s what you are sending out into the world - the person you are, how you’re feeling, how you show up, and what you create - and that ultimately sends out energy into the Universe, and it gets matched and sent back to you in different ways. When you smile and outwardly engage with the world, you’re sending out good energy and it’s matched with a smile from those around you at the Grocery Store, but when you are sad and depressed, the world continues to show you what you’re putting out into it. Basically, crap.
And I was attracting crap. I was broken, defeated, unsure, deflated, and mentally unavailable. Who do you think I found myself going on dates with? Equally matched dog poo, stuck to the bottom of your shoe, that you can’t really ever shake the smell of until you do some deeeeep down cleaning.
I went on dates with Narcissists, men with severe substance abuse issues, someone who was recently “separated” and still married, even someone with DID (multiple personality disorder) who ultimately told me “the bad one likes you…”.
Oooooof - I should have run away. Screaming. What did I do? I stuck to them. Like GLUE. Hoping that I would be the one that “could change them” and that I would make a difference, and they would stay with me because I “fixed them”.
What. The. Actual. Fuck.
I would get invited to brunch with friends, just so they could hear my new hilarious-yet-terrifying dating stories, and I would always leave bemused and alone, wondering if there was something wrong with me.
It was literally the only thing I could talk about. Dating…. Men. When I was out and about, I’d always immediately look to check a guy’s hand to see if they were wearing a ring, and if not, he was fair game. I was always asking for advice from those who had love, and everyone always would say, “when you stop looking for love, it will find you”, or “you just have to be in the right place at the right time”… but in the moment, that advice was never detailed enough to make me to stop worrying and just allow myself to let it be and know it would some day happen.
Finally, I decided to delete the apps altogether. And lo-and-behold! I met a man. That night, in fact! A fellow crazy triathlete, spending their Friday evening swimming laps at the pool. I didn’t even question if I was ready for a real relationship, after going through all the insanity of dating crazy men, and I let myself just continue grasping for this one man to love me and make me whole.
Things went FAST. I pretty much immediately “fell for him”, and moved in shortly thereafter. I even (GASP) got rid of my cat for him. I threw away parts of my life that were important to me, all for a DAMN MAN. Yeah, you heard me… I’m ashamed. But back then, I was looking at losing the “most important thing (read: MAN) in my life”. UGH.
Fast forward THREE years. I still hadn’t healed. Obviously.
In fact, I had been hiding myself from the world. I didn’t have any friends who had any idea of who I actually was… or how I felt. I didn’t even know how I felt. That’s the scary thing about the world we live in today. You can post pictures of your smiling faces, beautiful sunsets on a beach, and get away with “faking happiness”, and then you tuck away in your house and cry yourself to sleep. Or drink. Or dissociate by binge watching a TV series. Anything to make you not feel what you desperately need to feel in order to shake yourself awake from the nightmare that is your life.
And that’s what it was. A nightmare. I can STILL feel the cold water of the shower at rock bottom. I had been sitting in it for over an hour, naked, ashamed, and in a desperate fit of panic that I had started a path I could never return from. Mascara ruined the painted face that had presented itself hours before in front of all of my loved ones at the altar, now no longer wanting to be photographed in happiness and joy.
I never understood what it was that I was missing in those moments. There were no instructions telling me that the smiling mask I wore should have been turned inside out. The answer was staring directly at me on the other side of that fateful mirror that I would always find myself staring into. How did I miss her - her beauty, her awe, intelligence and curiosity? How did I not see her crying out for my own attention and love?
There are times that I look back at those days and wonder what more it would have taken for me to say “I never want to live like this again”. How did it take another SEVEN years from those days back in my lonely apartment for me to get to a place to break into that mirror, reach inside, give myself a hug and tell that poor crying girl that I loved her? I have to remind myself that at that point in time, I hadn’t gone deep enough - gotten to rock bottom - found the self that was strong enough to dig my way out the other side of my empty pit of sadness.
I know I can’t change the past. I can’t forget the bad dates, soak up the tears that were shed, or erase the hateful things I said to my former self from my position in that mirror… But I can forgive myself.
I can look upon myself with love, knowing that I was doing all I could do for myself in those moments, even if my thinking was skewed. I would never have gotten to the place I am today - The person I am now - without having those experiences shape my journey in those ways. Without all of that pain, I would never have hit rock bottom, and learned to grow strong enough to climb out.
I would still be stuck.
Not knowing who I was.
Not able to blossom into who I was always meant to be.
So Apologies, Miss - For the day you started to forget and lose who you were. For the tears you had to cry. For the nights you spent on the floor wondering if you were good enough. For the ways that you didn’t see how to love who you are.
I say these things as a reminder that your inner peace and purpose should become part of your daily check-ins. I really look forward to now being able to put into practice my own self love and care within a caring and loving relationship. One where I may need to make sacrifices for love, but knowing where my boundaries lie, and what it is I have that I can offer someone else. And, from now on, my own self-love will not be left in the shadows.
I hope that stories like these that we all share with each other begin to shimmer and shine a light in each one of you that it touches, and continues on throughout your own journey, never dimming.
If I was your muse today, then my healing is your healing.
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