The View From My Knees

Original photo by Mac

In the past year or so I’ve been going through some changes. Usually when someone says something like this they are referring to puberty, menopause, or some other physical transformation. But, for me, it’s been more of an emotional – maybe even spiritual – change. I’m becoming someone else, and I’m not sure I like the new me.

When I divorced my first husband I set out to become the open, sexual girl I knew had been hiding inside of me my whole life. I embraced my sexuality. I flaunted it. I shared it freely. And I had a damn good time doing it. I loved the person I had become. She was fun. She was happy. She was vibrant. She loved her life, and it was obvious to everyone around her.

But then something started to shift. My priorities began to change. Deep down inside I didn’t feel like that girl anymore, and I became frustrated that everyone still expected me to be her. And why shouldn’t they? I’d created an image and flaunted it freely, and they had no way of knowing that anything had changed. I never told anyone. Not even the person if affected most.

When Mac and I first met we discovered a sexual chemistry like nothing we’d ever felt before. And out of that chemistry a loving, passionate relationship was nurtured. We had some amazing times together, both in bed and out. We were completely comfortable together. Kindred spirits, as Anne of Green Gables might say. Mac gave that sexual girl inside of me wings and encouraged her to fly as often as possible. The way he looked at me made me feel beautiful and incredibly sexy. The way he reacted to my sexuality – whether it was watching me pole dance at a party or seeing that I had no panties on under my short skirt – was both thrilling and rewarding.

So, when I started to struggle with my sexuality it was him I feared telling the most. What would happen if I was no longer the super-sexual girl he had fallen for? Would he still love me? Wouldd there be anything left of our relationship? I didn’t want to lose him, so instead of talking to him about it like I should have I bottled it up. I struggled to pretend that I was the same as before, hoping that it was just a passing phase and that I’d eventually start feeling like my old self again. But I didn’t. Instead, I just drifted further and further away from him, and he had no idea why.

I knew I had to do something. In the span of a few months I had pushed away all of my friends and become disconnected from one of the people I loved most in the world. I’d stopped dating almost entirely, and the handful of dates I did go on felt forced and lacked any real excitement. I don’t think I went on a second date with anyone at all during that time. It wasn’t that the men I was dating weren’t exciting. It was dating that wasn’t exciting for me anymore. So, eventually, I just stopped making (or, at least, keeping) dates altogether.

And that’s where I found myself several months ago. Distant. Lonely. Bored. Unhappy with the person I had become and wanting so badly to go back to being the girl I was before. And still, I didn’t talk to anyone about it. Instead, I decided that I needed a new fling to inject some kind of spark back into my life. It seems stupid, looking back on it, but I guess I thought that if I jumped back into the dating pool I’d find a little bit of sexuality floating around in it. Maybe a little bit of New Relationship Energy was what I needed to catch a glimpse of the girl I’d lost over the past months.

Vincent was supposed to be that spark. I’d had a crush on him for a while and one day I just decided to go for it. After a little Facebook flirting, an extra ticket to a show, and an obscene amount of alcohol, we ended up liplocked for an entire evening. I don’t know what was different this time, but there were definitely sparks with this one and I actually did want to see him again. Maybe this plan would work, after all.

Only, instead of a fun, sexual fling my relationship with Vincent took a vividly emotional turn. Fast. Within a few weeks we went from barely knowing each other to head over heels. I tried to chalk it up to New Relationship Energy – the very thing I’d hoped would kick my sex drive back into gear – but soon it became clear that it was more than that. And so, even though it hadn’t been the sexual reawakening I’d been hoping for, I threw myself into this new relationship head first, with no regard for how it affected the rest of my life. After all, at least I was feeling something.

I continued to drift away from Mac, only this time it looked more like I was running toward something else. My shiny new relationship took precedence and this person that I loved so dearly and had been so afraid to lose was neglected and made to feel like he no longer mattered. Eventually the situation exploded. Amidst my excitement over my new love I broke a promise to Mac – possibly the only thing he’d ever asked of me. Mac had asked me not to sleep with Vincent because he was positive for HSV-2, but one day I just couldn’t hold back any longer. I betrayed Mac’s trust in a way I never though I was capable of. I couldn’t believe how I’d hurt him. What was I doing? I hadn’t done something like this since my divorce. Was this the person I was becoming? Was I going back to the lying, cheating, selfish person I’d been in my early twenties? I was horrified. I’d been so proud to grow from that place, and now I was right back where I’d started.

Mac and I had deep discussions about what had happened, how I’d been treating him, and how we could move forward and repair our tattered relationship. If ever there was a time for me to finally talk to him about all of the things I’d been feeling over the past year, it was then. But I didn’t. Instead, we focused on the way I’d been neglecting him since I’d started seeing Vincent and how I could balance everything better moving forward. God, how I wish I’d told him everything then.

After that, things began to improve between Mac and I. I made an effort to spend more time with him and show him what an important part of my life he was. Unfortunately, things with Vincent became strained as we both adjusted to my having less time for him just as the stress of his upcoming surgery was reaching its peak. I had also, once again, agreed not to have sex with Vincent, which put a strain on that relationship. My life became a constant balancing act. I struggled to remain loyal and affectionate to someone I’d loved dearly for almost three years while at the same time trying to give everything I could to this new, wonderful person I’d fallen in love with. I’d all but forgotten about my little identity crisis. Unfortunately, that continued to get worse.

Because sex had been such a major part of the struggles I’d been having with both relationships, I eventually developed a distaste for the entire subject. Sex had become emotionally toxic for me, and I just wished I could eliminate it from my life entirely. My sex drive had hit an all time low and the people I loved most were left feeling rejected with no explanation.

While both relationships suffered, it was my relationship with Mac that was affected the most. Even though we were spending more time together, I felt guilty for not giving him the deeply sexual relationship we’d once had. And then, last week at a week-long camping event we attend every year, the situation exploded for the second and final time.

At first everything was great. I spend the first few days running around and having a great time with Vincent. Because no one else was coming up until Wednesday and Thursday, I didn’t have to worry about splitting my time and affection between multiple people. I could just live in the moment and have fun for a change. It wasn’t just about being with Vincent, although our time together was amazing. For a few days I felt like I had a real break from the balancing act that my life had become. But when Mac arrived it all came back. Instead of showing him how happy I was to see him and how much I’d missed him, I treated him like a burden. He tried to get me to spend time with him and all I felt was guilt because I knew he would want to have sex. And why shouldn’t he? Events like this were charged with sexual energy and in the past we had relished in it. But sex was the last thing on my mind. I wanted to be with him, I really did. I even wanted to have sex with him. Well, I guess more accurately, I wanted to want to have sex with him. So I kept putting it off. “Maybe later,” I’d say, truly hoping that later I’d feel differently. But I never did. I am disgusted with myself for the way I treated someone I loved so much over those few days. And so was he.

On Sunday morning, just one month shy of our three year anniversary, Mac broke up with me.

I was devastated and filled with self-loathing, but I barely had time to shed more than a few tears because I had to help my camp pack up and prepare for the end of the event. That night and the next day I kept myself busy by volunteering to stay to help with event teardown and cleanup. While I never got a quiet moment alone to really sit down and let the tears flow, I did spend a lot of time thinking about what had gone wrong and how I could have handled it better. I knew nothing I could do could change what had happened, but I hoped that if I figured out what had gone wrong I could learn something from the experience and avoid hurting the people I loved again.

Since we’ve been home, Mac and I have talked a lot about what happened. With a little time and space, we may even be able to be friends. He has been more understanding than I deserve through all of this, and I am truly grateful for that. I don’t want to imagine my life without him in it.

Even though I know ending the relationship was the right thing for both of us, I can’t help but mourn the loss of something that has brought me so much joy for so long. Every once in a while, as I’m doing the dishes or typing an email, the reality that it’s over will just hit me like a wave and I’ll have to stop what I’m doing and cry until it passes. As a matter of fact, I’ve done it several times while writing this post. And at those times I wonder if I should have fought harder to make it work. If I should still fight. But I know I shouldn’t. It’s just not fair to either of us after all that’s happened.

So what now? A lot has happened over the past few months, but the underlying problem is still there. Who am I becoming and why do I dislike her so much? Can I just go back to the way I was before, or is that part of me lost forever? I would do anything to become that happy, sexual girl that Mac fell in love with three years ago, but I don’t think it’s going to happen. And if I can’t get her back, what will happen to the rest of my relationships or my career as a sex writer? I have to use all of this as a wake up call to figure out who I really want to be and how to be that person, and how the rest of my life will fit into that image. I’m just not really sure where to start.