I don’t get it. I just don’t understand how two people who share such an electrifying attraction can be so different in so many ways. A lot of people tell me that relationships need to be ‘worked at’, but I say, 'if it feels like work, you shouldn’t be in a relationship’. Others say ‘great minds think alike’, but there’s also the old adage that ‘opposites attract’. So am I making work for myself by choosing the latter?
I probably should, but I don’t feel pressured to make the 6th try at my relationship work; I just really want it to. I’m doing my best to view it as a new relationship, rather than a patched-up one, and trying to avoid the mistakes of the previous rounds. It’s incredibly frustrating when, at times, the other person doesn’t appear to have learned very much at all, though.
The difficulty arises when the pettiest of reasons causes an almighty argument. Try as I might, I cannot back down every single time, and I don’t think I should, either. ‘They’re just dishes’, ‘it’s just a tiny spill’, ‘I was listening to you and I responded with a groan’ – it’s never ending! When things are good, they’re great, but when they’re not, it’s a total nightmare. He would say the same thing – one of the rare things we agree on.
My friends are not my friends because I agree with everything they say; quite the opposite. I value an educated opinion different to my own and I love a good debate, but I hate arguing because it brings out the worst in me. I have a few rock-solid friendships with people of different age groups, different upbringings, varied backgrounds and different religious beliefs, although they may not practice them. Still I’m wondering why it is that I don’t argue like this with anybody else but him.
No, relationships aren’t easy, but I don’t think they should be hard work after just one year. Like in a weird first date where you pick up all the signs of ‘things to come’ if it goes further, I’m trying to figure out if this is just a hurdle we’ve got to get over or if it’ll only get worse. The trouble is, looking to the future I can’t see anything, and I’ve never felt this way before.
The sense I get is that this is just another ‘practice’ round; that I’m in a waiting room for the ‘real’ thing; the unconditional, inspirational, safe and easy relationship. That’s what I’m used to, and I wouldn’t waste my time if I didn’t feel this was achievable.
‘Go for it, stop often and re-evaluate’ – that’s the best advice I was given before we got back together. I don’t want to end it again, not by just getting up and walking out in the heat of the moment – that’s one of the mistakes from the earlier rounds, but it’s bloody difficult to bite your tongue and let it wash over you when you’re forced to think, ‘Why did we get back together?’
It seems that two people wanting the same thing, just like great sex, is not enough to hold a relationship together (earlier blog, December 4th 2010). I’m genuinely happy we are back together but I just can’t figure out why. What I do know is that I’m worried this ‘practice run’ could be for a relationship with somebody else – I’ve seen it happen to others, it wouldn't be right, and it would really break my heart.
People also say ‘be careful what you wish for’, and that ‘when you finally get something you crave, suddenly you don’t want it anynore’. I don’t think what I'm after is unreasonable, I just don’t know if it’s realistic these days.
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