I’m My Priority Now: This Is What Self-Love Looks Like.
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Sitting in the discomfort on the plastic blue chair. Panic palpitations pulsate in the pit of me. 10000 butterfly wings beat in my heart. Chest squeezes, throat wheezes shut.
Breathe. Shake it out, fingertips wiggle. I reach for my protection crystal. Clasp to hold tight. It will be all right. Pray. It’s not going away. I’m in the thick of it now. Asphyxiating.
And in my parallel periphery, I see the shimmer of his blue checkered shirt. He’s so little to my left, from once right beside me. I’m besides myself now. I leave.
Just play on your phone, get into the escape zone. Sit and exhale.
His hyena eyes reflecting the void stare. He’s unavoidable in this big empty room, looming in front of me now.
“Can we talk? But not here.” I lead myself off the plank into the dark night sky. I’m not going to cry.
The conversation is stilted and dry.
“I’m not understanding what it is that you’re trying to say. This is not an amends. I don’t understand why, and you carried on, so…” From the free flow for days in a row, these sentences linger suspended.
He’s sick. And I know there is nothing I can do about it.
And for the first time, I don’t want to fix anything. I want to self-protect.
I’m not angry or mad. I’m heartbroken and sad. I’d wanted it to be different. For him to be better.
Pity and love and disappointment and regret. That this wasn’t it.
“You won’t be seeing me anymore, so you’ll be happy about that.” Even his death-wish manipulation doesn’t do its trick. His fishy skin is repellent to me. Is it a sick puppy? No, wait, reptilian! My mamma-mammal blood wouldn’t warm him closer. I’ve unhooked the drip. Pumping my love through my heart now.
An awkward goodbye, and I’m relieved when it’s over.
Back home in my bed, replaying all that we said. And as I tuck up and turn, I turn it over. Let it go.
Maybe he will, maybe be won’t get better. But I am, and I’m my priority now. I’m here to love me now. My feelings matter more. I’ve closed the door on him, and if he’s out in the cold, sick, sad and old, it was his conscious choice, not mine. I’ll leave him be and focus on me.
Waking up with warmth in my skipping heart. Darkness before the dawn, and I sit in it, with candles lit. Meditate, pray, give thanks for the day, and appreciate the way that I feel now. Whole and complete. Because nothing real can be threatened. I can’t be given away. I didn’t lose him, I gained me. This is what it means to be free.
To feel all the feelings and not shame them away.
To forgive him as I forgive myself for choosing him.
To focus on myself as the priority now.
Progress, not perfection — it’s beautiful, getting comfortable in the discomfort of it all.
Head clear to channel heart. To receive inspiration and creative satiation. Make true a new reality with structured practicality. Self-expression versus emotional regression of I can’t do this anymore.
I can, and I am. It’s okay to feel not okay all the time. The spiral has ceased.
Released instead of wound up, bound up, caught up in another. No more co-dependency, I choose personal integrity. Not self-will, controlling the outcome, thinking I know best in circles of cycles playing out in repeat. Just trust in my heartbeat. The constant flow that life will go where she goes. And all I know is that as I am, right here, right now, is my ultimate destiny. I don’t need to know more.
Permission to feel whatever it is that I’m feeling. Affirmation to name and to claim all the contrasting complexities. The all-at-once-ness of the total experience. And the gift of acceptance, and so it is.
Released to the great goddess. Mother to me. Whatever is to be.
I get to love all of me as I am.
To return home to myself, following the golden path of self-love.
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