It’s Saturday, June 15, 2024: perfect 74 degrees, no humidity… I’ve opened all the windows in my place and expect the breeze and this writing to clear the air. Clear my head and cleanse my heart.

I have a lot of heavy feelings seeing you. I crossed lines I didn’t want to cross. I come out of it thinking, why did I allow myself to do things I didn’t want to do? Or did I want to and also know how bad it would be to do it? Perhaps I’m overthinking the intimacy part of it all. But, I cannot divorce the depth of the feelings it all brings out with the abrupt pain of once again saying goodbye after the feelings are so clear and present. I have trouble reconciling it all and at this point, the best I can do is give myself grace and submit to the idea that maybe I’ll never understand it all.

One week ago, some abnormal injury occurred that took the wind out of my sails. I was… happy. Beautiful day, visit with my sister and Finny, shopping… all of it was quite wonderful. I’m on the brink of a new life, with no heavy feelings or attachment to any man, gaining body confidence, and a new job pledging to rocket me into a sense of financial well-being. Happy.

Then suddenly I can’t walk and I can’t care for myself well nor can I take care of my Lu. This feeling of vulnerability is terrifying for me. I collapse internally. I reach out and before I can even ask you are already agreeing to come be with me and help me, and when you show up for me… You REALLY show up. It feels like the only time I can truly shut off and lean into someone who I know at the moment will not let me fall. I can exhale, lean in, cuddle up, sigh, and relax. That is incredibly meaningful to a person like me who has not been fortunate to have many people in my life who allow me to have this kind of reaction. It’s not only intoxicating, it is healing to my nervous system if… if it stayed. Who wouldn’t want that feeling or the person who brings it to ever leave?

I wondered how it would feel to see you again. I hated it had to be when I was such a mess but I am also very aware that I had to feel this vulnerable to reach out to begin with. When you first walked in I thought… oh okay… I got this. I can interact and exist with you around and not feel the weight and depth of what was. Well, that was wrong. I mean the first time I caught your eye my stomach twisted and I had an internal reaction. It was all still there. This needed to be handled delicately and with care or I will be in trouble again. I don’t want you to leave, you stay and so begins somewhat of a bender.

The highest of our highs and the lowest of our lows all in 48 hours. Quite incredible really. 
This whole week has been exhilarating, eye-opening, and draining. Amazing loving soft moments mixed with hard, mean, hurtful moments, and a sprinkling of the same ‘ole Freeman behaviors, and a loving future dreaming hopeful Cheryl cherry on top.

I’m proud and respect us for being able to bounce back and both recognize that we deserved to have an experience better than the way it ended Tuesday night. We did well to pull it back into a more loving moment.

But.

I regret what happened. And not why you think. Regarding the sex, I’m mature enough to say we are two consenting adults that wanted to enjoy each other and we did and I can let it be that and not have the worst reaction to it. The regret is more about the intimacy between us and where I go in my heart and mind when I’m with you. I want to be hopeful and new but you continue to show me the old behavior.

I understand there is no talk of reconciliation. That’s the problem. We talk like there is nothing between us, “just friends” when our bodies, hearts, and actions all prove the opposite. You want to show me things are better and different with you but they aren’t.

You minimize the weight of experiencing the same scenario that I have experienced with you, countless times before. It’s disappointing. We agree to meet to purposely redo the last time we hung out WITHOUT any negativity or dramas from before and you decide to pick a place you just went with another woman. You did that.

You will say it’s some conspiracy or mistaken identity. Two separate people placed you in the same place, with a woman, drinking the exact drink, a non-standard or common drink special ordered, you got with me… too many things point to the likelihood that you were there. Being in this same scenario with you before and learning after it was untrue (that you were lying), and having this current experience with you, logic dictates I cannot trust that you had not been there before. Sad, but true. I am sure there is a percentage of chance that you are telling the truth but will all of the information at hand I give it a 20% chance you’re telling the truth, 80% you aren’t. I chose not to believe you and with good reason. All we needed to do was go somewhere new. I blame you for the discomfort that night.

Then you come back the next day. We both have this draw towards each other. I do not understand it. You come and again we are lying in bed and another woman is looking for you. And we both know, they were calling often and probably stressed and worried about where you are and what you’re doing and mostly, with who.

You will either understand my point of view or not but these things I listed show me you haven’t changed in the ways I was hoping and it confirms that I have no desire or space in my heart and mind to spend intimate or much time with you.

But I’m okay and I’m happy that you were able to rest yesterday in the way you did. My hope is it can be a beautiful endcap to our little respite from reality this week. When I needed you, you showed up. And if you needed me, I feel blessed and happy to know that I was there for you, even if it just meant, letting you sleep. I don’t know what I could have done to help with that honestly aside from a comfy bed and my hip to rest your arm on so it didn’t hurt. haha I didn’t do anything but judging by your text you needed something and got it from me in some way. And this is very special to me. I was quite uncomfortable yesterday, for many reasons. This woman continued to call. You sleep until you wake, then run. Some things were painful and brought up a lot of bad experiences.

But what I’m choosing to cling to is that You were there for me, and I was there for you

Let’s leave it with peace and a lot of love.

I don’t have to understand it and I won’t but I don’t want to think about all this as a negative experience.

I give you my love and grace and peace and joy all I have positive to give, I will give it to you. And I will do my best to always lead with that when I think about you and when I speak of you and if I have any engagement with you, I want you to receive that. Love, Grace, Peace, and Joy.

In closing, a future with you and me is never so far out of my mind that I don’t allow it to consume some of my thoughts. Or maybe my hope.

But after this week I recognize that there would need to be very hard-line absolutes to even explore a relationship again. (by the way, I fully understand no one, especially you, is asking for this. Just processing through it)
If I ever entertained being with you again, I would need to see that you have resolved all of your relationships with women and have ended them, and have gone into a respectful no contact (or incredibly limited) zone with them. I’ll never trust that a woman continuously calling and texting and active on your social media is ‘just a friend’ or that there is no lingering emotion and attachment. You would have to fully end all relationships and be single without them for months before I entertained anything meaningful or serious with you. This, by the way, is how normal people date. No one clings to old lovers, ‘friends’, or girlfriends if they are healthy and ready for a healthy relationship. So I would also show up that way, like I will now with someone new. It is what is fair and loving to your new partner. I deserve that. At minimum.

It would be just the start, then letting trust grow could begin. It would be a fresh start.

I know it won’t happen though. Or I don’t believe it would given all of the information I have and experiences I’ve lived through. I think I just needed to get out my line in the sand, for me, somewhere. And if you’ve read this far, then you’ll know too. But, once again, not like you are asking me. I see that. And simply, if someone wants something, they do what the need to, to get it. It’s just that simple.
I have a lot of work to do on my own. Repairing myself so that when I need help, I’m comfortable asking a friend or someone who isn’t my ex who I have complicated feelings about, and who does not want to be with me. I most certainly need to find a new way.

My only goal and plan in life right now is to make myself the best person I can be. Healthy, safe, secure, happy, and loved.

So, cheers to another 6 months haha. This isn’t a concrete plan or me saying I dont want to any interaction with you but I’m going to try not to see you. I think it’s best for us. That excludes all emergency or if you were going through something serious, like I was, exceptions could be made.

I wish I knew you’d do the same as me, focus, and heal yourself. But you will do what you want to do and I respect that.

I do love you and I do feel love from you. I’m going to hold that close to my heart, from a distance.