Never get married.

Original Post

So I realize I am probably the last person on earth that anyone wants to hear an update from. Many of you all made it pretty clear that you think I'm a terrible human being, and honestly I think it's what I needed to hear.

See, there's a lot I didn't share. I was sexually abused as a teenager. People looked at me like a piece of meat that they could just play with, and as a result I'm not a very sexual person. I don't feel good about my body. I feel gross and fat, and when I am intimate with my husband, I leave the lights off, hide under the covers, don't want to be seen.

I didn't share this, because frankly it's embarrassing and because it's not a justification for how I'm feeling, though it does play into it.

So I met with my therapist today. She's a lovely woman but she tells me to do what feels good in my heart. So I went in there today and instead of talking about how I felt, I talked about the comments here and how those made me feel, and we had a very productive discussion. Basically, I'm projecting those feelings from my past onto my relationship with Chris. It's hard because while he's not old, he is older than me. So I immediately just feel like prey, even though he's never treated me like that.

Also, I never had a plan for being out of debt. My therapist asked me what I planned to do, and I didn't have an answer. In the back of my mind, I've seen myself as someone that Chris was just taking care of in exchange for my body. Note: I literally just said this out loud for the first time today, so please don't think this was a hold-back. So once I was out of debt, my flight response took over. She thinks that I saw the baby as something he was asking for in exchange for what he did for me, and that's why I reacted as I did.

I will probably catch flack for this, though I can't imagine some of you could possibly hate me more than you already do, but on my way home I called up Brad, the guy from work. He's one of a few people that have been flirting with me. He's funny, sweet, good looking, and constantly tells me I'm beautiful. I told him that this Friday, my car is being worked on and asked if he would be able to drive me to and from work. My car is not being worked on, it's his day off, and I wanted to test him. He immediately said that he already had plans to go out with friends, but if I wanted to play hooky I was welcome to tag along. I politely declined. The fact is, the flirting is nice, but at the end of the day, he's not the guy I can count on. Deep down inside I knew that, and I did this to prove it to myself.

Tonight, I sat him down and asked him why he wanted a baby. He laughed and said he always wanted kids with me, that we'd make beautiful kids together, and that he wanted to be young enough to actively participate in their lives and not put the whole thing on me. I could feel tears welling up in my eyes.

"Why did you ask me to marry you?" I asked him. He laughed at the question, "Because I'm in love with you! I liked you the minute I met you, but you were so much younger. I didn't want to be creepy and gross you out. Then you moved in, we realized how much we had in common, and I just really loved having you here. When things became romantic, it was like life came together and I didn't want to go another day without making that promise to you."

"Why do you want to have sex so much? You know it makes me uncomfortable, and I just feel gross."

He apologized saying that he knew I wasn't terribly sexual, but that he got so excited with me. He described it as sharing a bed with the most beautiful girl ever, wanting to just hold her close forever, and wanting to be with her in every way. And being frustrated at the fact that she can't see how beautiful she is. I started crying, and he put his arms around me.

We kissed, and it was nice. It was passionate, it was deep, I could feel it, I love this man. I let him undress me without hiding, it was hard, I was scared, and he kept repeating over and over how beautiful I was. We made love, and after we were finished, I honestly felt it.

As I'm approaching 30, I realized I'm scared of getting old. But regardless of whether or not I'm with Chris, I'm still going to get old. While I may have missed out on dating in my 20's I also got to skip a lot of the bullshit (shame I dealt with that between 19-22) and probably saved myself a lot of aggravation that would have led me to a much worse place.

I know many of you are probably reading this thinking that I don't deserve my husband. You're right, I don't, but for some reason, he chose me. To all of you, especially those who told me what an awful human being I am, thank you. You told me exactly what I needed to hear to stop myself from ruining both of our lives over a quarter-life crisis. While I'm not 100% where I need to be, I'm working on it, and he's worth making myself uncomfortable to get better.