he loves me, he loves me not
21 Jul 2009 2 Comments
in depression, personal, relationship Tags: boyfriend, girlfriend, hope, hopelessness, hospitalization, suicidal ideation
i find it curiously strange that even after my bf told me that he loves me that i still wonder from time to time: does he love me or does he not love me? in those moments, i’m not even sure how i would know if he loved me or not or what it would mean if he loved me or didn’t love me. of course there are moments when i feel like i’m putting in more effort than he is. then times when it seems like he’s on turbo drive and i’m just coasting.
about six months ago, around the time my bf and i met and started dating, i was way way more depressed. i was in and out of hospitals and on and off on suicidal ideation. miraculously, coincidentally or even mysteriously, since my bf and i have been dating, i just stopped cold turkey on suicidal ideation or attempts. i didn’t get better all in one day. there was still another hospitalization after we started dating. but in the past six months, i have never, not really anyway, wanted to end my life forever and for good.
i think people just get greedy. i’m no exception to that observation. i was happy enough to be recovering from depression with the support of my new bf. i was excited to be feeling happy and having things to look forward to. i had to get used to not being depressed. i had to re-think how to live my life instead of trying to end my life. and along the way, plenty of times i thought to myself, i can’t believe have a boyfriend? i can’t believe he cares about me enough to listen to me and try to make me feel better when i’m crying…etc.
i can’t say i am moving to nyc for my boyfriend. but it’s true, if he wasn’t in nyc i’m not sure my sister and i would be moving there. we might have moved to somewhere in california or seattle where my sister keeps telling me that she has a guaranteed position. what ever the facts or reasons are for moving to ny, it feels like a huge step in the relationship between me and my bf. we’ll be able to date like many others when they live in close proximity.
but then what? i know how to deal with break-ups. i know how to package break-ups so skillfully that the guy feels like he wanted to break up with me. but i have no idea what happens when day in and day out, two people care and love each other and are better in the relationship than not. honestly i can say that i am a better me with my bf in my life. it’s something about how he conveys that he believes in me that i can recover from depression, that i can get out of bed, that i can clean my room or even do dishes or laundry instead of others stepping into help me out. and it’s something about the way he tells me that i am good at what i do and that i should pursue it more. how can you not love someone who loves you and believes in you? how can you not be a better “you” with someone in your life who is supportive and loving?
all this is new territory, making relationships work and staying in a relationship through good and bad days. all my life i have tried to stay out of relationships and to end it before it got too serious for me. and now that i’m in a relationship that i want to be in with someone i want to be with, i don’t want to break up. i don’t want to make him think that he wants to break up with me. i’m not afraid of things getting serious. i want things to get serious, whatever that entails. i’m in for the long-haul, for better or worse for however long it lasts, i just want to be here and in love with the person who helped me to get out of the most horrifying depths of depression.
finally finally – some big questions
21 Jul 2009 2 Comments
in new york, personal, relationship Tags: boston, friends, moving, new york city, therapy, turning 40
sometime in august my sister and i are relocating to ny. it’s happening so fast neither of us are able to catch up with all the changes. yesterday, my therapist asked me how i feel about the move and i started crying. i had kept myself busy with trying to figure out the move and logistics of it all. i wasn’t really paying attention to how i felt about leaving a place i feel at home. i have lived in boston for the past ten years, in the same apartment no less. i have never lived in one town for that long. i lived in seoul for the first 13 years of my life. but we moved around practically every year until i was about 10 yrs old?
so the big question of course is why are we moving? my sister hates boston. she’s been having a difficult time finding a job. as for myself, i don’t want to and am not capable at this point of living by myself. and my bf of about 6 months (give or take a few weeks) is also in ny. it makes it easier to leave boston at this point in my life because i just finished a degree program. and just in the past year my close friends have moved away from boston or gotten married and seem like they moved away. so as for leaving friends in boston, i don’t feel desperate separation anxiety or anything.
most people when they move to new york do so for a personal reason, like for a job, for a significant other, school, etc. most of the time, people want to live in ny. i used to want to live in manhattan. but now, i think manhattan is way to crowded and way too busy. we’ll be living in one of the boroughs and i may not even go into the city thqt often. i don’t think i would have a reason to go into the city unless i went to a church in the city or started taking classes at one of the schools or something.
i started saying that i’m practically 40 years old. and with that awareness, that in a few years that i really will turn forty, i wonder about where i’ve been, where i’m going and where i’ll be. i know i like my life now. i am happy with what i am doing or will be doing. as for what i will be in the next couple years, i have no clue.
