I've realized that although my plan is to have nice, strong boundaries, I've actually got holes in mine big enough to let a Great Dane through.
So easy to see, to advise when its somebody else, to hard to recognize and follow through when it's yourself.
Part of the problem is I've been trying to coax my b-f along, to lure him into making changes. Instead, consensus is, I've given him the impression he can lure me.
I thought I was being patient, being kind, yet when I honestly think about it, maybe I've just been giving him false hope. I'm not sure, even if he began getting help today, that I would ever be open to living with him again.
I know I am not willing to live with the old, leaky camper rusting into the ground. The battered truck and the stacks and stacks of videotapes he simply can't bear to part with, even though everything has been re-recorded onto DVD and there is no longer any reason to keep the tapes.
Like his brain, his physical life is constipated with junk. I need flow and change in my life, and his OCPD makes him so miserable with anything new or different.
He desperately needs me - well, he needs somebody, and I was willing to play along. Did he ever really love me, the person I am, or just see me as something he could fix? There certainly were eighteen billion things he found wrong or annoying about me, as he constantly pointed out.
Did I ever love him, or just a fantasy of him? I still see glimpses of a very cool person in there, but he comes out to play so seldom. I know I feel deeply sorry for him. I want to take care of him, I worry about what's he's doing, how he's feeling - but I know, in the logical part of my brain, that's co-dependence, not love.
So how do I move what I know, in my head, into my heart, where I feel it?
Do you have problems with boundaries or co-dependency, too? How'd you get over it - or are you still struggling? Please share in the comments section, below.
