Thursday, October 10, 2013

It's Not Real Life Yet

Until March/April when the Professor and Ginger's lease is up and we can move into a bigger place with enough room to accommodate the Professor's allergies and my two extra cats, I'm splitting my time between my parents house where my cats live and the apartment where my significant others live. Now my certification class is over and I am hoping to be working more hours and/or a different job which will mean enough money to pay my own way. I also just found out that my cats could find a new temporary or permanent home with Moneypenny, so there is another roadblock taken care of on the road to living together full-time.

I should feel happy and lighter, but, judging by the tightness in my chest and the knot in my stomach, what I'm actually feeling is fear. We've touched on issues, had bad nights, been sick a little in front of each other, but I feel like I've seen the home side of them but they haven't seen the home side of me. They haven't seen me like I am now in mismatching sweat pants and t-shirt. I'm always wearing cute pajamas or pretty nightgowns. They haven't seen my huge piles of unfiled and/or undealt with mail, unread magazines, and unopened mail. They haven't seen my dvr full of unwatched tv shows that I feel weird about leaving behind or just erasing. They haven't seen me eat cottage cheese straight from the carton standing at the refrigerator. (Sorry Ginger, I know you think cottage cheese is gross.) While they're aware of it, they haven't seen me fall asleep on the couch in front of the tv and stay there all night because I'm too lazy to get up and walk to bed. I don't feel like we've really fought yet, like they've seen me be crazy at them about something they did. Hell, I don't think they've even heard me fart. How can I give up my cats and my little bubble of privacy when they've never even seen me with stubble on my legs? How can I be sure they'll really want to keep me when they see real life me, not just fun sexy-time me?

But even though I just spent over the last two days straight with them at our home and I'm sure that we all need our alone time, I can't think about anything but how much I want to be with them.

The Evil Bitch in My Head

Two faces have I
One that laughs one that cries 
One says hello one says goodbye 
One does things I don't understand 
Makes me feel like half a man 

At night I get down on my knees and pray 
Our love will make that other man go away 
But he'll never say goodbye 
Two faces have I 
-Bruce Springsteen

I haven't talked much about it yet on this blog but my relationship with The Professor is even more complicated than just being polyamorous, than just me also having a relationship with Ginger, who was his girlfriend when we met, than just all three of us having a relationship too. He's also a Dominant, while both Ginger and I are submissives. Actually, when he and I met, we were just supposed to be casual play partners. Things don't always happen according to plan, this time for the better. Obviously, it is still early, only four months in and we are all still working out our dynamics, as couples and as a whole, both in and out of the bedroom. Obviously, as a couple of almost four years, The Professor and Ginger have their own established dynamics and roles. He and I are still working out ours and, but we've touched on something that we both want to explore further, even one we want to let bleed out from the bedroom into our everyday life. We are trying to explore it more. We had definite plans to spend my first two full days off (yesterday and the day before) in intense exploration of the new roles. But it's never really that simple.

Because they both have ample experience with "the crazy," both as crazy people themselves and from dealing with crazy people in their lives, I am not quite as difficult for them to deal with as I have been for previous romantic partners who have never had to deal with the crazy. To my surprise, I regularly underestimate how much they will understand and how patient they can be, especially when I act out because I am feeling insecure or overwhelmed. Which I seem to always be right now. First I was overwhelmed simply by the new relationship. Then by the certification class that I've been doing for the past month. Last week, because of the end of class crunch as well as working over the weekend with a rather difficult client, I wasn't able to get back to 'our place' from Wednesday afternoon until after my final class on Monday afternoon. So I was feeling especially overwhelmed, which leads me to wanting to act out, and because I wasn't with them, I was feeling insecure, which leads me to want to act out.

Understanding and patience can only go so far. Especially within the bdsm dynamic that The Professor and I are exploring. When he is just my boyfriend in an open and honest poly relationship who knows that he's dealing with a stressed out crazy girlfriend, he's so far been more understanding that I could have asked for. (Same goes for Ginger.) But when he's Sir or Master, things are little bit different. Sirs and Masters expect obedience. Even when you disobey because of the crazy, there must still be consequences. Mostly, I'm a good girl. A large part of it aren't even things I'm trying to do but things that I just do naturally. But there's this other part of me, the part that wants to act out, to do reckless things, to say "fuck you, you're not the boss of me" when someone tells me to do something. The Professor likes to call it the evil bitch in my head, likes to say that the real me is the good girl but the evil bitch in my head gets in the way. "I don't want to break you but I do want to break her. You can be such a good girl or such a bitch. I prefer the good girl."

The problem is that you can't break her, or at least you can't break her without breaking me too. After some intense play, this was the conclusion we reached. I also realized that The Evil Bitch in my Head is there for a reason. She is supposed to keep me safe, or at least in control. Now, it might not be in the most life-effective positive-coping-mechanism ways, but she still has her role in my life. When I feel overwhelmed, she helps me blow off steam. When I'm feeling insecure in a romantic relationship, she reassures me, "Yep, everyone leaves, you might as well blow it up yourself by doing something or someone that will make you feel better right now," which at least gives me back some sense of control. When someone orders me around and I start to feel put upon, she is the one who refuses to move and says "Fuck you, that's why." Ok, ok, so none of this is making her, or me, look any better. The best thing I can say is that she isn't as in control as often as she used to be and that I am more likely just to let her take over my brain now than I am to let her take over my whole life.

Of course, I have no idea how to tame her enough to not get into trouble, so I can be a good girl all the time.