Lets be real…I’ve got no business being in a relationship right now.

Not now, when I feel broken on so many levels, more fragile and uncertain than ever before. I am struggling to rebuild my life, to create myself anew in a world where nothing looks the same. As the debris of my former life settle around me I must salvage some sense of myself from the fragments that remain of what once was, working up the courage to lift my eyes from the wreckage and move forward into the unknown of what will be.

I’ve got numerous holes to patch – love, friendship, and pure kick-ass determination being the mortar and putty of choice. I’m trying to shore up the weak sections of my spirit and heart so they can hold up to the inevitable struggles yet to come. I’m even choosing to leave some of the holes and cracks as they are, because I have learned along the way that sometimes remaining exposed and vulnerable is the only way I will ever encounter the truest and strongest parts of myself, and the only way to be sure I recognize and accept the gifts the universe sends my way.

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.
~Leonard Cohen

But I’m not doing any of this alone. Of course there are the beautiful spirits who swim in and out of my life; acting as friend, life-jacket, spiritual guide, babysitter, cookie-baker, muse, lighthouse, therapist and butt-kicking drill sergent as they are needed and as they are able. Without them, I don’t know where I’d be. But for the past five months there has also one constant presence in my days, in my thoughts, and deep in my heart. There is her.

The last time I built a love relationship I was 21, a young, optimistic and incredibly naive young woman just out of college. It was hard enough then; it always a challenge to connect yourself to another, to negotiate the complexities of together-life you hope to create. But eleven years ago I knew just a small part of myself and understood even less. Hindsight allows me to see that joining yourself to another is infinitely easier when you have barely begun to plumb the depths of the woman you will one day become.

There has been more than a decade of love and loss, of growth and change since S. decided to build a life together, and one year since we began the process of untangling and dismantling that life. I have faced myself, acknowledged my deepest needs and done my share of shadow-dwelling. And now I am building a new relationship, all this behind me, and so much yet to come. I have spent a year wading through the muck and mire of gain and loss and exhilaration and heartache, facing daily the impact of what I have done, living with the relentless onslaught of my guilt, his anger, their confusion, trying to not just survive but to ultimately thrive on this journey into fully formed woman…this all makes for an entirely different level of challenge.

Building a relationship in this space, where nothing is certain, where everything - the life I left behind and the life I am trying hard to envision and manifest – is raw and vulnerable and so damn shaky, when I struggle to maintain my faith in even the smallest things…it sometimes feels impossibly difficult. Back then I held, as so many of us do in the beginnings, a beautifully naive view of promises and commitment and forever. I had a simple, unwavering faith that love would always be enough. There was no way to predict that things would change to the extent no amount of love could have ever been sufficient.

Now I struggle to reach inside and find enough trust to carry me through the moment and into the future. I have to continually remind myself to release my worries and fears, to be true to myself and my needs, to honor my spirit and path and to do the same for her. I have to learn not just the beauty of compromise but also the necessity of not compromising my true self in the process, nor expecting that of her- so that we can create something real and lasting and true. I have to do all this when sometimes getting through the day without breaking down into tears and panic and gasping for breath while doubled over on the bathroom floor requires more strength than I can muster…hell yeah, it’s hard.

I know, with absolute conviction, that this whirlwind that has caught me and spun me into beautiful oblivion for the past five months has kept me from doing the vital self work that should have been my sole domain. This arching, spiraling, expansive force has distracted me from the focus that should have been placed on my children, from finding some sort of peaceful and respectful closure for my relationship with S., from doing the work, equally monotonous and terrifying to me, that is necessary to push forward. All these things would have, in so many ways, been easier, clearer, faster, smoother had she not entered my life.

But she came, and she’s here and there’s no way around that. She eased her way into my life, and my heart, so quickly that I know - on a level that transcends all logic - that we’ve known and loved one another before. It was immediate and unquestionable, so fast, so deep, so profound that from the first moment she touched me I was forever changed, and what you do with a love like that that but let it take you where it will?

Early on we both voiced nearly identical feelings that there was no choice, but instead a shared sense of a force beyond ourselves, of the inevitability of our togetherness, of an ability to feel one another regardless of time, space or distance. Our connection is soul-deep, infinite and fiercely real, I’d no more chance losing her than I would risk losing myself into half-existence again.

We are different, she and I, incredibly so. I wonder how we can make those differences mesh into the life we want to create together. And, with the cynicism of a girl who has watched her choices lead to the disintegration of a family, I wonder IF we can. I wonder why on earth she would want to stick with me right now, when I spend so much of the time an utter and complete emotional wreck*. I want to be independent and strong and accomplished for her, and right now I feel anything but. I question how to find necessary balance so that I can juggle all that needs to be juggled, without short-changing her and our future together.

But there are times when lose my grasp on the basic faith in what is and instead allow myself fall into the trap of doubt and worry about what might be. I forget to focus on that intangible and inexplicable connection that flows between us, and want to attach myself to some sort of non-existent guarantee. I give myself mental permission to sink into questioning and worrying and stressing about logistics and ‘what-if-might-not-how-can-i-possibly-trust-this? - pure crazy-making thoughts. I magnify our differences and distort them – fun house mirror style – until I create imaginary expanses between us. And then my self-protective mechanisms kick in (those developed over a lifetime of keeping myself safe by keeping others at a distance) and I begin to pull away, to shut her out. Self protective yes, but also self-defeating, because distance between us is the last thing I ever want.

Our love has been easy from the start, but our relationship has had challenges and roadblocks and stresses that ago far beyond what most people deal with in their first year as a couple. There have been fights, and tears, and hurt feelings, intense discussions into the wee hours of the morning as we attempt to navigate through this incredible complex situation. We have had to work, and work hard at times, to remain on solid ground, and it has required a level of commitment and faith that I don’t imagine normally exist at this phase of most relationships. In this way, our challenges also become our strength.

Yes, some things would have been easier had I not randomly connected with her that night back in February; if I had been sensible and stuck with my plan of staying away from relationships, if it has been possible to talk myself out of the feelings, deny the connection and kept myself separate from her. Yes indeed, some things would have been easier, but some things would have been infinitely harder and some of would have been damn near impossible.

Bottom line, we don’t get to choose when love finds us, our only responsibility to the universe is to open our hearts to receive it and to do our utmost to honor it for the gift that it is. Even when the timing is all off, even if the challenges of life would seem to suggest that the wisest choice would be to go it alone, even when the work of the relationship pulls focus from other things that need attention.

Without promises or guarantees or commitments, I know that what is between us is precious and needs to be nurtured and cherished and received with gratitude. Yes, from the outside it’s probably pretty clear that I don’t belong in a relationship, but from the inside it’s perfectly clear that, right now, in this moment, I do belong with her. I wouldn’t change a thing.

________________________________________________________

*(true story, dear readers, not a word of exaggeration, I’m a wee bit of a mess)