July 10, 2011
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My husband and I took a trip back to our meeting place for a friend’s wedding last weekend. The town was just as I had remembered it in the summer. The streets were empty and there was what I will term a “gentleness” in the air. Everything was quiet and relaxing. Everything just felt safer and more inviting than where we live now. I miss it terribly.
We planned the trip so that we could also catch up with old friends. We stopped by our old stomping grounds and got bubble teas at our favorite dessert shop. We had been gone for over a year, but I still remembered all the roads and scenery. It was like we never left. In a lot of ways I wish we never had…
When I finish this epic journey toward my PhD, maybe we can move back there, start a life there. Maybe I can become a professor at my Alma Mater. Maybe our children can grow up happy and safe in a quiet midwestern town that isn’t suffering from gang violence filtering in from Chicago and East St. Louis. I hate it here. I can’t wait until this is all over.
I think the visit back was a catalyst for a much greater problem: WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE? I’m always the one preaching that you should be happy, and if you aren’t you should eliminate what is making you unhappy from your life without a second thought. But I don’t practice what I preach. Graduate school makes me unhappy, mostly because of my adviser and the jaded attitude it’s giving me and the other students. Dating makes me unhappy, what with polyfidelity being one of the most FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE THINGS anyone can ever try to pull off in their lifetime. Even being at home makes me unhappy, because all I do at home is eat, waste time, work out, and then weigh myself and freak out because I weigh 122 lbs. instead of 120 lbs. I feel like I’m on the verge of a mental breakdown again and I don’t know what to do. What can I do? I’ve brought all this on myself. I chose this place. I chose graduate school. I chose my adviser. I chose to walk the path of polyfidelity. I chose everything that is in my life right now. There is no one to blame but myself.
Mike told me he would follow me anywhere and he tells me he is happy, but I know I cause him pain. Every time I find a girl to date she hurts us. One had a boyfriend when we started dating her, one was a prude and then cheated on us, one needed way too much alone time, and many others never got farther than us being interested in them because people can’t fathom being in a triad. I know it hurts him every time, and that hurts me the most. If it wasn’t for me, he wouldn’t have had to experience all that pain and suffering. He tells me that his life would be much worse without me and I know that is true. My life would be absolutely horrible without him. But both of us would be better off if I could just give up my bisexuality and my polyamorous feelings. He’s never said anything like this to me, but I always think it. “If only I were normal. If only I could settle for a normal job. If only we could leave this place RIGHT NOW and start our normal life.”
I hate myself. I hate myself. I hate myself.
If only she had said yes. If only we could find another partner here. If only there was some justification for all of this torment. Maybe then I could feel okay again. In the last few days I’ve stayed home from work several times because I knew I would cry if anyone talked to me. I feel like I’m falling apart. I’m definitely falling apart. I’M FALLING APART AND IT’S NO ONE’S FAULT BUT MY OWN.
