The One I Let Go !

Spring is in the air, or at least it is on and off! It often starts sunny and then there are showers, but the temperature is on the rise, the days are starting to get longer, and little yellow and violet flowers dot the landscape, creating a vivid tapestry of green, yellow and purple, a feast for the eyes as I walk my dog, Spot. As the sap rises, so does our energy. We like the earth come back to life.

For some unknown reason not long ago I had a vivid flashback to about six years ago when I met a man whom I am going to call Mr G.for Mr Good. We connected through a dating site. He lived near Limoges, which is a four-five hour journey from my home town.

We didn’t let this put us off, and our first date was in Rodez, a half-way meeting place, home to a famous, now deceased contemporary artist, Pierre Soulages. Soulages is known as “the painter of black”, owing to his interest in the colour “both as a colour and a non-colour. When light is reflected on black, it transforms and transmutes it.” That is at least what Google says when you Google Soulages.

Mr. G and I had an amazing weekend. We went to the museum to see Pierre Soulages’ work, and we dined out. Mr. B was fun, interesting, good looking, and also extremely kind. Also he was the sort of man I go for: practical, a handy man, but also thoughtful and intelligent. He had rented a small flat, and we stayed there. But I was at that time in no hurry to get closer. In fact, I was wary and defensive. Yet he was a perfect gentleman. He didn’t rush me.

I found him attractive enough that I went again to see him. I stayed at his house, where he took me round his farm. We visited the ceramic museum at Limoges, walked in the countryside, and all in all had a great time except for one thing: I rebuffed any attempt for him to get closer to me. I must give him credit for trying, because he then came and stayed in a guest house near where I lived, and we spent some more time together.

That was the last time. He had had enough. For him it was, I guess, like being with a fiercely devout church goer from the Victorian era who fled from anything physical. Mr. B knew what he wanted: a meaningful relationship with someone around his age, long term and committed. Exactly what I believed I wanted.

I learnt later that he had met someone in England. He was Irish, and went back there to live with this person.

Me, I got involved with a series of men who drank a lot, that honestly had so many problems you may ask yourself why I would do this and miss out on the good guys. A latter one to whom I finally said goodbye was because his drinking was phenomenal and also his idea of having a good time was us drinking together: the slippery path to nowhere if it’s only towards bad health.

Interestingly enough I met up with this guy a year after stopping the relationship, and he persuaded me to have dinner with him. The next thing I knew, I was coming back from a late-night tango milonga, it must have been about two in the morning, and he was lying on my doorstep in a drunken stupor so intense he didn’t even wake up when I stepped over him to get into the house. I threw a blanket over him and locked the door and went to bed. There was absolutely no way I was dragging him into the house in that state. At four in the morning when the doorbell rang I ignored it until it stopped and then went back to sleep. In the morning when I got up and went outside he was gone. Gone for good from my life.

There was another one, the last man with drinking problems. When he left to go home back to Scotland and I emptied the recycling bin, I found several empty bottles of wine and one of whisky that he had drunk by himself. I realised I had come to the end of that cycle of choosing doomed relationships. This last man was never obscenely drunk, he “held” his liquor, but the last time I saw him the smell of alcohol by the end of his stay with me was coming out of his pores. For me it was like breathing alcohol instead of air. When he left I had already made the decision to let the relationship go.

Men that instead of taking a good look at their issues preferred to drown out their problems with alcohol: I was finally over them.

Now looking back I can see clearly why I was choosing men like that. I had come out of a ten-year relationship with a psychologically abusive partner. I had blinded myself to his abuse, making excuses for him. Slightly in my defense, I compare myself to a lobster being boiled alive: the misery builds up gradually, then more and more, but by that time you’re hooked trying to make things better. But you are just like the lobster who little by little is slowly boiled to death.

Finally, it built up to such a pitch and became so blatantly obvious that even I couldn’t ignore it, so I walked out. But not before my self respect and sense of self worth had hit rock bottom.

Yes, the guys Ì was choosing afterwards were mirroring me, my feeling of lack of self worth, and I was mirroring guys who didn’t love themselves enough not to abuse themselves through their destructive drinking and also wouldn’t treat me well. Why should they? I had to learn to value, trust and love myself again. As soon as I could do that there would be no place in my life for them.

It took me a long time to rebuild and reconstruct myself to understand and to learn about boundaries and to recognise red flags.

Now, six years later, if the opportunity arises again to meet another Mr. B my sense of self worth and clarity will mean that I will rise to the occasion. And if it’s not a Mr. G but a Mr. T (for “Trouble”) I will set the boundaries straight away. The next time round I will not let Mr G get away.

It’s so easy to get lost in a relationship that is not good for you. We are hard wired to want and desire a relationship with the special “other,” but sometimes the price we are willing to pay is too high. That is why I am proposing my Elite Membership Forum course for kind, empathic women who have lost their way in their relationship and need to know that as soon as you realise you deserve better everything will change for you.

I can help you navigate this turn around. Come and do my course, and I promise you everything will change in your life

.

All power to us Women.


Take a look at my website and what I am proposing:

https://wowfactorunleashed.com/

. Or phone me on WhatsApp: +33695282234
Cherryl