Man Ban 2010

  

  

 “Maybe some women aren’t meant to be tamed.  Maybe they need to just run free until  they find someone just as wild, to run with them” 

Sex and The City 

  

 I don’t know what it is with me and relationships, either I’m not very good at them or I just keep picking the wrong men.  My therapist says it’s the latter, but then he’s never been in a relationship with me. 

Except the one where I pay him $120 an hour to talk about me and ultimately pay for his latest holiday or piece of art.  No, all jokes aside, I love and adore him – I don’t know what I would have done without him.  

Aaanyway – I’ve been in 5 ‘significant’ relationships (2 short & 3 long), which pretty much sum up about 21 of the past 24 years of my life.  The spaces in between?  I spent them crying, depressed, wondering what went wrong - thinking I would never recover  - but always putting on a pretty brave face.  The fact was I didn’t feel right without a man in my life,  I’d had a man by my side since I was 16 years old.  And there was a really crazy, wild, soul searching 18 months after the last long term one ended, but before the last short term one began. 

The last short term one ended about 5 months ago – I actually believe that he may have been the love of my life.  Why did it end ? different life stages I think is probably the best way to describe it.   

Since then I have been on 4 dates, and dabbled in a casual relationship with one of them (M3).  M3 didn’t really flick my switch – but it was an experiement of sorts – I ended it a couple of days after NY. 

Upon some serious soul searching & discussions with Therapist, I realised had convinced myself that I always ended up with the same kind of man, and that I needed to go for the complete opposite - well as it turned out, the complete opposite bored me to tears.  I also realised that I have created this  whole set of beliefs about relationships, like serial monogomy is the only way to go, two people aren’t meant to be together for their whole lives, living together ruins relationships, marriage is totally bogus, all men cheat … and my favourite …. ”for me the best relationship would be living in the same building in separate apartments”.  It’s like I have relationship Tourettes.

So, around New Year I made a deal with myself – that I would be a man free zone for 2010 – no emotional complications – no decoding text messages – no wondering why he hasn’t called – no deciphering “what he really meant” – no disappointments – no painful getting to know you – no explaining my life history (it’s freakin complicated & confusing) – no explaining myself – no commitments – no entanglements.  

Man Ban 2010 – a year to get to know myself, to indulge myself, to be happy being alone, to explore new things & to really work out what I want – and to reassess my beliefs.