Petulance personified

There's a new man in my life. A good one even, and I'm clearly threatened because after I spoke to my sister about it the other night, she looked at me, rolled her eyes, and said, "Denise, don't sabotage it."

Most people would be happy about all this, which I am. Most people, however, might stop there. Not me. I worry, relentlessly, fretfully. It's who I am. I used to hate this about me, but now I've accepted it. It actually turns out to be a useful trait in many contexts - work for instance.

While I've accepted my worrying, I still feel reluctant to share it with others. No one can possibly be expected to deal with all my neuroses, and so, instead, I do what any mature adult would do. I act like a child. A petulant, annoying child. I sabotage, I knitpick, I behave passive aggressively, a trait I'm sorry to say I inherited from my mother.

The best I can say is that I'm working on it. At least I recognize it now for what it is. Sometimes I feel like my entire life is an emotional twelve step program. I'll let you know how it goes.

Comments

Laura said…

hang in there and let him see the best side of you (which is who you really are). that paranoid side, fretting and worrying, is just pathology, a reaction. it's not the real you. it doesn't define you. you are worth being around.

February 3, 2010 at 9:07 PM

Briana said…

The only really useful thing (hopefully it's useful) that I have to say, is: "remember to breathe" - I don't mean just in the "take a deep breathe once in a while" but really, as a daily (hourly) thing - stop and remember to breathe. When you're riding (and nervous) its usually the first thing to go, and it screws everything else up - and don't even realize that you're holding your breathe. So, frequently, stop, breathe, breathe in a way at a level that you could sustain for hours, focus on the rhythm - if nothing else, it will distract you for a few minutes every hour. But I find it helps to center me in a way that few things do. or at the least, it keeps you from fainting. : )

February 3, 2010 at 10:21 PM

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