I wrote a post on having hope for a year at the end of 2018. Bless my sweet heart. That lasted until around April 2019, but actually that's a decent run for me. My therapist asked me in my last session, "What do you hope for?". I replied, with much less emotion than you'd expect, "Nothing. I don't allow hope. Hope hurts me." She prodded deeper asking why I refuse to hope and could there be anything I could hold onto. I said, "I believe in my tenacity. I have full faith in my resiliency. But I can't hope. It's too painful to hope."
What do you hope for?
Hope for me is a planned letdown. Though I have to question how many of the things I won't allow hope for are society's expectations of what I should want? Would money make me happy? Would having a partner make me less afraid? Would fame take away the pain of being unwanted by a parent? Again back to what society says I should want, but I have felt like what are supposed to be life milestones were disappointing or non-existent for me. No special Sweet 16 - I spent that in a basement hearing some chick give a guy head while my friend and I hid from his mother who was drunk upstairs. No prom - I went to a different high school every year, I didn't know anyone, no boyfriend, no money for a dress anyway. My wedding sucked. No money, it was a rag tag picnic type situation. I bought the first dress off the rack because I didn't want to even look at dresses I couldn't have. I didn't feel like a princess. My groom didn't compliment how I looked. My father was late. I hated it. (No hope) C-section - Yes, I had a healthy baby and am thankful for modern medicine or both of us would have died. I had hoped for this perfect birth, because my mother had 3 nearly perfect vaginal births, and in my head I felt like the God I believed in was going to give me my moment. That beautiful moment where you do your last push, they say "It's a ___!" and they hand you your baby. I was 10 days overdue, induced, cord around the neck, emergency C-section. Again, because I feel like I need to not look whiny, I know it was the best choice for my son's birth. I just wanted that moment so much.
Though claiming no hope there is obviously some as I want these life moments. I want an awesome memory. I want to feel that I wasn't left out of life. And this desire, this need, this obsession with feeling like I've missed out and just want something, is where I get into trouble. I stayed in my last relationship much longer than I should have because I was longing for one more moment. He was toxic, a narcissist and a nightmare but he actually did give me a few memories that were special. Though I now know I shouldn't trust anything he said. He made my 50th birthday extra special, we had a wonderful new year's eve, and he came to my work gala where I may have for a split second felt pretty in my cute red dress, strappy heels and salon hair, and to top it all I won the grand prize. I put myself at risk by clinging to a potential moment and ignoring all the horrors around me.
My therapist asked me when I stopped hoping and that was around 15. My parents divorcing was so destructive, beyond your typical divorce issues, that it felt like I had nothing to cling to and no one to help me. I stopped hoping to hold down the pain of everything continually going wrong. I'm sure I've referenced this quote before as it spoke to me deeply, from the movie "Divine Secrets of the Ya Ya Sisterhood" (wonderful movie but the title is horrendous) there is a scene where a lady's fiancé is with her mother and he asks her, "We're happy and she's always acting like the other shoe is going to drop." The mother replies, "That's because it always did." It's why I nearly strangle anyone that tries to tell me, "Things can only get better!". Really? Well you've lived a charmed fucking life if you truly believe that. Things can get worse, much worse, and then when you have nothing left the bottom can drop out. My therapist asked me to rescue my 15 year old self. I said, "She's mad. She doesn't want to be rescued."
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