What’s holding me back?

I have been reflecting a lot recently.

People often do that at the start of a new year, they look back at the year gone by and think of the things they want to change and then a New Years resolution is born. A resolution that in a week or so, will be no more and they usually revert back to doing the same things they wanted to change.

I am no different except I don’t consciously make any form of New Years resolution, unless, I guess, you count the countless amounts of times I’ve kick started a diet after Christmas and failed miserably!

I look back on the year and I wonder what I would have changed. What was missing? What could I have done differently

Last year was a strange year in ways. I went on dates I NEVER thought I would be able to do again and what was more surprising and I suppose more of an achievement is I met those people on an online dating forum which, given my previous experience of being raped by a man I met online, I didn’t think I would ever have the courage to do again. Unfortunately, none of those dates worked out. Not because of anything remotely traumatic thank God, just not the guys for me. But also, there is something that holds me back from opening up to the idea of meeting someone, trusting someone new or being remotely intimate with another man.

I am still in the unconventional “relationship” I have been in for coming up to 6 years. This is a relationship (we’ll call it that for lack of a better word and to save an explanation) that I both crave for its familiarity but also have no idea how to leave behind.

It’s a relationship that has changed so much since it started. Not least because in 6 years I have gone through a journey of growth and I no longer rely solely on this person for my own happiness. There isn’t the toxicity of conversation that used to appear frequently, because instead now, I am able to delete the message I so desperately want to send. I bite my tongue to keep the peace. But because of this I have ignored so much niggling doubt.

We barely speak anymore and we see each other maybe once a month and sometimes more time goes between us seeing each other. We went from talking every day and seeing each other every week to barely a text. When we see each other, it’s now more about sex than it is about intimacy. I miss hearing about their day or them asking about mine. I miss the friendship. I miss the connection there was and, I feel more used than I do loved sometimes.

Don’t get me wrong, I know he loves me in his own way but I don’t feel that love like I used to and it makes me feel sad. It makes me questions if our time together has run it’s course. If this (non) relationship should end. Whilst he is in my life, albeit sporadically, it will always hold me back in meeting someone new. Someone who can love me and spend time with me and a relationship that isn’t built on lies and secrets.

I sometimes wonder why I’m holding on and what it is exactly I am holding on to? Is it the fear that if this ended then I would absolutely be on my own and not only do I lose someone I loved but I lose my friend. But if it doesn’t end then I will never allow myself to be free to meet someone else.

I am in such a mess and I don’t know how to get my self out of it. It just feels like there’s only heartbreak to come and that doesn’t feel much like a New Years resolution to me.