the worst woman in the world
on not loving those who love me
I wince, reading Luke 6:32: “But if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them.” So that’s what that is? It’s supposed to be easy for me to love those who love me, but why do I stand in front of someone who does and feel like I don’t know how to love at all? What could be so broken that being unloved is often more appealing?
Loving Jesus has made me kinder in many ways, but on this Monday, I feel like the worst woman in the world. It’s a culmination of realizations coming to a head. I’m living in a stark reality that I believe I romanticized for some time.
When I walk into bookstores, I look for the broodiest of titles, examine the covers for ambiguity, jadedness, and any hints of a disillusioned and flawed protagonist. I think I called my issues on myself. I wasn’t always this way. I used to look at bullet points on the attachment styles and felt like an optimistic, hopeful romantic, so much so that it gave me an anxious attachment style; I needed to be needed — and now I need to be wanted.
The more I engrossed myself in novels with these protagonists who never found themselves in truly healthy or committed relationships, I realized my obsession didn’t come out of the ether. It was like a familiar, alternate version of me that I fought for years to avoid, but in the comfort of my literary companions, I realized I didn’t mind being.
So unknowingly, I succumbed. And I’ve cried a couple of times this morning from the overwhelm of realizing this character was not something I could admire from afar, but my evolution manifested. I no longer toy around with the idea of being the girl afraid of commitment, who ultimately prefers situationships because of their non-binding agreements; banter until I no longer feel like it, validation ‘til I feel like I no longer need it, both parties satiated.
When finally approached and pursued by someone who fully enjoys me and expressed his desire to commit to me, I froze. I called myself a “flight risk” in his presence and promised to try. I didn’t make it very long, and emptied my vat of tension and frustration with myself and inability to settle down, telling him I truly feel as though I cannot commit to anything right now.
And I’m not too sure what’s going on with me. I cannot discern if that’s my true disposition or if it’s that I’ve simply never met anyone I was actually ready to settle down with. Surely, I’m a romantic for a reason, and something in me desires love. Therefore, I find these things perturbing. Because, if you’ve been here long enough, you know I’m always pining for marriage, and for someone to want me. Well, I’ve officially been wanted. I chose to do nothing with it all, and I feel like the worst woman in the world for it.
It feels bare and harsh to be at the age where people are now getting into true committed covenants, and my desire for it wanes daily. I think about going to therapy, but the work feels too deeply rooted, and I’m always weighing whether the deep work for a relationship is worth it, as I struggle with how I view men in general.
It feels unnatural to find more safety in the idea of being unattainable, weightless, a nemesis of gravity. To be beautiful, and single, and educated, and not be apprehended. But how do you reconcile the confusing tension of being a romantic who wants to be kept theoretically, but has never seized the opportunity in reality?
Writing this also feels bare and a little harsh because it’s probably the most vulnerable I’ve been on here, but if something clicks with you, I find it worth it. Most things I write that I find vulnerable here, I’ve processed over and over, and it doesn’t feel as scary, but I already feel the temptation to hit “delete post” before even posting it.
It’s a raw, fresh realization I’m having about myself, and I don’t have very many answers. For me, understanding helps me become vulnerable because I won’t be shamed for what I know about myself, but it feels like a true soft underbelly to not understand something about myself and share it, probably because I’m afraid you’ll figure it out before me.
I don’t know what I’ll do about these things. Today, I just know they’re here. May God help me figure out what to do with them tomorrow.
With love,
Rebecca
SO MUCH of this clicked with me! I applaud you for throwing out some really vulnerable stuff here. That takes guts. There's so much I could say, but that would require me to bare my soul on here, and I'm not as brave as you! Instead, I'm going to be obnoxious and share a way-too-long passage that kept coming to mind when I read this. I clung to it the first years of my marriage...perhaps it'll resonate with you, too.
"Our experience is coloured through and through by books and plays and the cinema, and it takes patience and skill to disentangle the things we have really learned from life for ourselves. People get from books the idea that if you have married the right person you may expect to go on 'being in love' for ever [...] In this department of life, as in every other, thrills come at the beginning and do not last. [...] If you go through with it, the dying away of the first thrill will be compensated for by a quieter and more lasting kind of interest. [...] This is, I think, one little part of what Christ meant by saying that a thing will not really live unless it first dies. It is simply no good trying to keep any thrill: that is the very worst thing you can do. Let the thrill go--let it die away--go through that period of death into the quieter interest and happiness that follow--and you will find you are living in a world of new thrills all the time." --C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
I had to do a lot of dying to myself in the romance department right before and after I got married. I had to die to the stupid idea of wanting to be "the one who got away," wanting Mr. Darcy, wanting my love life to be the novels I'd read for years instead of the real life God had for me. The death was slow and painful. The rebirth though? Marvelous. I'm in love in a way that I didn't know existed; a deep, unshakeable love that makes those flirtatious, edgy flings I chased for so long look like what they are: child's play.
You are on the right path, Rebecca. Keep exposing things to the light (Eph. 5:13). You are His, and He won't let you down.
I relate. For me it’s a natural phenomenon that I’ve owned for some time. I know its roots and origins, yet I’m trying to navigate how to “fix” it. I guess we’ll see what therapy and God’s grace will do.
Grace unto you🌸