My fingertips, almost every single one, are either bleeding or have scabs. I have been so anxious for the last week that I've had to repaint my nails 4 times, and try as I might to keep myself from biting my cuticles, it hasn't helped.


I should be happy, right? I should be excited. Instead I'm nervous, the other side of the fluttery-stomach coin. Nervous because, after a little over two months, the boy is coming to see me, and I have no idea how that's going to go. We'e fought probably every week, some worse than others. He asked me if I missed him and I hesitated. I miss how things were... but will they every be that way again? Maybe the new relationship energy has flickered out with all the distance.


Right now he's off at an adult baby nursery, my attempt at a concession and compromise. Their site says they don't do anything sexual, but in a way, that's not what scares me. What scares me is this intimacy, so quickly shared with me, can just as easily be quickly transferred. I'm not exactly jealous as I am hurt, but then, this was my idea and done with my permission so it's my own damn fault I feel sick now. And I didn't know what else to suggest. It kills me that I don't feel like I make him feel safe or happy. 


I was excited and awake when we spoke last night- I had gotten beautiful flowers from him, and art, and some toys from Good Vibrations to test that I was happy about. I was really feeling snuggly and safe and even ok, I thought, with this session he was going to. I don't really know what happened- he says I picked a fight, I think he got jealous about another guy in my life and his sarcasm got me on the defensive, but whatever- next thing I know we're fighting, I don't want a story from him anymore and in fact begin to wonder if we can make this relationship work. 


He went off to this session with me not sure if I wanted to talk to him again- and then becoming sick with worry because there's snow everywhere, he's a new driver and I didn't want him to crash and die without me telling him I loved him, but I also didn't want him to think things were ok. He was late, because he stayed an extra hour to read me this story (not that he told me til after). And I've had 5 hours of sleep because I don't know if I'd rather it went well or terribly, and I love him and hate him all at once.


It's niggled in my head before- maybe I should leave him for his own good, give him time to find himself and sort his head out. It hurts so much to think about, but is that ripping the bandaid off instead of just letting us die a slow, painful death? I don't know. I know he loves me, or strongly believes he does, but I also know that his self-awareness is terrible. It could be codependency. I don't know.


I know what this is about. This is about trust. He's broken my trust before and a lot of my fears have to do with worries, not that he has ulterior motives, but rather that he just won't think. I know that if he goes to this session and comes back to me calmer and happy I should feel better, like I can trust him more. Instead I feel like I want to withdraw, to hide myself in a fetal position and not come out. It's a childishness I hate in myself. Is this love, or madness? Can this ever be healthy? Is it already dead?


I love him. 


I must, because if I didn't it wouldn't hurt so much and I wouldn't hesitate to drop him and move on. 


Apparently my friends aren't terribly good at questioning if he's not just another E, or something similar. I don't think he's as cruel or careless, though he's controlling in his own way- letting me go play with others and then being jealous and angry when I do. But I question entangling myself in his life any further when his emotional instability keeps battering itself again my own. The boy's in therapy, something E refused to do, and that's something, but is it enough? None of these things on their own are that bad, they just accumulate. I want to wipe the slate clean but don't know how. 


I feel like what I really need is his arms around me to know what my heart needs, but that has to wait. Waiting, waiting, waiting, I feel like all I do is wait. Wait for divorce, wait for the visa, wait for the boy to get home, wait for him to wake up, wait for permission, wait for the explosion. 


Antoine de Saint-Exupery said "Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward in the same direction". Can we manage that? The boy, my little fox... he's tamed me as surely as I've tamed him, and it wrenches at my heart. Is this love, or just suffering? Am I capable of having a healthy relationship, ever? How broken am I?

He comes in 5 days. Am I ready?