Mess by Molly

Morning affirmation: I seek guides in my life and realize they may be different than I anticipate.

Step 2:  Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity

“Here. Take my phone. Type in your number. Then call yourself,” directs the no-nonsense eclectic fashionista.   She is younger than me, roughly ten years my junior and her long thick Filipina hair is swept up into a stylish bandana.  Three miniature star tattoos dot the left side of her upper cheek, peeking out from behind her Gucci frames.  The stars remind me of the ones I strove for on my kindergarten papers, but hers are lemon in color, instead of shiny gold.

I feel constriction in my chest and tears welling up behind my eyelids.  I’m not used to asking for and receiving help from others.  “Thank you.”  I muster, bowing my head as I enter my digits.  

“Next time, instead of responding to him, text me instead,” she says forcefully.  “I mean it.  It sounds painful what you’re going through and believe me, I’ve been there.”  Then she smiles empathetically and my heart aches from being heard and feeling safe, something alien to me growing up in a household where fear and self-doubt were my closest sidekicks.   

I wonder how I avoided these fellowship rooms for so long, blindly believing my mother’s perspective that they are religious cults ascribing to a non-existent god.  In doing so, I ignored one of the basic tenets of recovery, ‘healing in community’.  Instead, I isolated myself and muscled through my pain, in solitude, just as I did on all those years on the tennis court, believing I alone had to win.   Self-judgment cripples my inner world.  I was raised to believe that everything, and everyone is a competition, an ethic utterly reinforced in our society.   Now that I have started to open myself up to the power of the group, I see what I have been missing: a way to feel my emotions by listening to others express theirs.  In these rooms, comparison is suspended when you hear heartfelt authentic stories.   Through others, I learn compassion towards myself.    

Yesterday, I deleted Pepe from my phone immediately after he texted so I wouldn’t feel the usual compulsion to reply.  Ever since we started sleeping together two years ago, I obsess about him and our “relationship”.    What started out as a confidence builder from my last breakup has devolved into me wanting something serious and him sadly, not reciprocating.  I accept breadcrumbs from him rather than leave.  As such, I feel insecure.  I am often scared to text him first because waiting for him to reply debilitates me.  That period in limbo, which could be anywhere from 15 minutes to 24 hours, has become the definition of insanity for me, also known as step 1, where I admit I am powerless and that my life has become unmanageable. I’ve always suffered from catastrophic thinking but I spiral between, “he’s busy, to he finds me annoying”.  My negative thoughts are self-harming.   

When my friends confronted me about being dishonest to myself about Pepe, namely me describing our situation as a relationship, I worked up the courage to ask him to spend the night a few times a week.  The terror on his face was real. He couldn’t leave fast enough.   Until joining these groups, I had never heard of love addiction or anxious/avoidant relationship patterns.  So busy focusing on staying sober, I never examined my intimate relationships. 

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The next morning at 11:11am, a 954 number texts me. 

In Spanish the message says, “Hello pretty, how are you?” code for:  Let’s hang out tonight?   

My adrenaline spikes, I’m excited. He does like me, he’s in my phone again.  

Then, I remember the meeting yesterday.  Today I can do something different.  I text the fashionista, “He’s in my phone again”.  

She responds within minutes, “Do you have a draft for a no more contact text? A simple text is best. Something along the lines of, ‘Hi.  Hope you’re well.  I need some time and space.  I won’t be available for calls or text.  Please do not contact me during this time.  I will reach out when I’m ready’.   Then you need to block him on every platform.”

A gut-wrenching reaction overcomes my body, but I know it’s now or never.  If I wait, I’ll lose momentum and my longing for him will overtake me.  I translate the draft message into Spanish customizing it to address the emotions I’ve been working on in recovery to convey. “I am sad,” I write, “because my feelings for you are strong, and we aren’t together as a couple.  I kept hoping you’d decide you wanted something serious with me when you told me you’re not looking for that. I need to start living in reality.”

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A week after sending the message, I’m depressed and lonely.  I call my mom to invite her to go for a walk since I hadn’t heard from her after telling her about Pepe.  She said she hasn’t been in touch because she was worried about my mental state and thought it was best to stay as far away as possible.

I notice I’m already trying to block this out and ignore that it hurts to hear her rejection of my pain. 

Then I look down at my phone and there are several messages from my fashionista friend who is traveling in Hawaii.  Along with her messages she sends me a picture of her handwritten gratitude journal with bubbly devotions praising God.   She writes in all caps:    

SO PROUD OF YOU HONEY.  

PRAYING FOR YOU. 

HOPE TODAY IS FLOWING WITH MORE EASE. 

GOD IS ALWAYS HERE.