Hidden In Plain Sight

Sometimes it can feel harsh to be forced out of a rut. I may be miserable, but sometimes there’s a familiarity in being stuck that can feel like comfort somehow. And then I am forced into action. Having to face the decisions I’ve been slowly hiding from.

I resist and get angry and hate the world.

And if I’m lucky, I then reflect and see the greater picture. I’m so thankful when those moments happen.

Yet again I find myself back in my family home, licking wounds. But this time is different. This time it’s not falling into a pit, it’s climbing out of one. During the drive here I couldn’t help but smile as the thought crossed my mind: “here’s to the end of the making bad decisions era, and here’s to stepping into the era of finally making good decisions for myself.”

Because that’s what it feels like. It feels like the last period of time has just been one bad decision after the next. And in a weird way I can see how I was making those choices on purpose. A last ditch attempt at not growing up. A final hurrah. Kind of like a little kid running around the candy store trying to shove as much candy in their mouth before they knew it was time to leave the store.

Because I saw leaving the store as missing out.

But what I’ve realised is I’ve actually reached a place where I no longer want the candy. And that’s a huge shift in perception. I now understand that candy makes me sick, and I don’t want to feel sick anymore.

I want to live with ease- not just in wording, but in action. I want the peace of not being constantly at war with myself. And I finally feel ready to be there. It’s scary. It’s a place I’ve never been. It doesn’t feel like adventure. It feels boring and mundane and unfamiliar. And maybe that’s what peace is. I wouldn’t know.

Maybe after a lifetime of chaos, it takes a little adjusting to understand that just maybe, actually feeling good isn’t boring, and isn’t the same as being stuck, and doesn’t equal being trapped, or doesn’t equal death.

Maybe it equals choosing life. Maybe it means that I can stop proving to myself that I can survive, and realising that that’s no longer the goal. Because survival isn’t a goal, it’s an emergency response- not a way of life. It’s time to stop being that rat, pushing the red button to get my quick-fix pellets to drop. There is no emergency anymore, and I need to stop creating situations to feel like there is. It’s an artificial high.

I want the real deal. And finally I’m ready to do the real work. 

He’s back in town for a few days. I had cut contact (don’t leave me again, baby). But I had a day of weakness, and it started the way all bad ideas start… “hey.”

He’s the most perverted person I know. And I hate that we’re compatible in that way. What’s worse is he’s actually a really nice guy who’s quite romantic. I hate that too.

When we fuck I always have the urge to tell him how disgusting he is. It’s so weird. I’ve never had those thoughts with anyone else before. But in a twisted way it’s because I find him safe. He accepts all of me- even my ugliness. That’s what I hate. That’s why I want to tell him he’s disgusting. Because it’s not him I’m really saying it to. I’m saying it to the parts of me he allows to creep to the surface. The deep, hidden parts I don’t show anyone, barely even myself. We fuck and I hate him. And he calls me baby. And I love it. And when we finish we cuddle, and I trace his tattoos with my fingers as we lay intertwined, and I feel his soft, smooth skin (how can skin be so soft?).

As the sun comes up, I roll out from under his arms and quietly whisper, “I’m making coffee, do you want one? Or would you rather sleep some more?” (he’s tired from his travelling). “Sleep some more,” he replies. “But don’t leave without waking me.”

“I won’t,” I say, knowing he needs that promise.

Someone said to me recently, “I've a feeling it takes a strong man to calm your soul.”

To which I replied, “I don’t need someone to calm my soul. I just need someone who can stand in their own space so that my soul can feel calm around them.”

This pretty much sums up most of my interactions. Men wanting to save me. And then realising I don’t want them to. What I want is for them to save themselves so that I can feel safe around them to soften and unfold. Does that require a strong man? Absolutely. The strongest.

Sometimes it takes a while to find that moment of grace, to finally find closure on a chapter. And sometimes it simply pops up unexpectedly in something articulated so beautifully that you go “ah, yes… that’s it”:

*(not my writing)*

he wasn’t a bad person.

he just didn’t know how to hold a heart like mine.

i think he tried.
in the ways he knew how.
in the spaces he was capable of reaching.

but it always felt like
we were speaking different languages.
standing in the same room
and still missing each other.

it wasn’t that he didn’t care.
it was that the way i needed to be loved,
the way i needed to be understood,
wasn’t something he could give without losing himself.

and that’s okay.

there were moments we understood each other.
in small ways.
in smiles across the room.
in quiet tears we didn’t explain.
in hello.
in goodbye.

i think he did love me.

just not in the way my heart was asking for.
not in the way i needed to feel safe.
not in the way that stayed.

he loved me in fragments.
in effort when he remembered.
in presence when he could manage it.
in silence when he didn’t know what to say.

and I loved him, too.
with questions.
with patience.
with hope that maybe one day
we’d finally speak the same language.

some days we felt close.
some days we felt like strangers
sharing the same air.

i don’t think either of us was wrong.
i just think we wanted different kinds of love
and didn’t know how to stop hurting each other
while trying to give it.

i think we cared in different volumes,
i think timing asked more of us
than we knew how to give.

for what it’s worth,
i think what we had was real.
i think we did try.

he wasn’t a bad person.
i believe that.

and I don’t think i was either.

~Ria Olita~

It can become an addiction in and of itself. The desire to be seen. After a lifetime of hiding and feeling invisible, when we experience feeling seen for the first time it’s like finally breathing air we knew we had once breathed, but couldn’t quite remember. We come to life. We shout it from the rooftops. And we want more. More. More. More.

We do whatever it takes to get that fix again.

Kneel, beg, Demand, fight. Information-dump. We know the price. It requires some form of “connection.” So we rush the connection to get the goodies. Reaching a point of simply lugging around our suitcase of stuff and dumping it into the lap of anyone who glances our way. “Sort through this as quickly as possible because I want my next fix, NOW!”

I did this. I so desperately needed to feel seen. And yet it also felt unsafe, but I never knew why. Now I know. I was forcing it to get the outcome. I was forcing myself and the other. It was artificial connection. But I’ve started wondering, what’s the rush? Why do I need to share everything as quickly as possible? Why don’t we unwrap each other slowly? I’ve realised I want to do that nowadays. I want to take the time to learn someone, and have them learn me. No rush. No desperation. Just curiosity.

The successful, fit, smart, confident, skinny, fashionable, perfect girlfriend… all the things society tells us we should be.

I am all things opposite- curvy, languid, emotional, messy, lost… all the things seen as weakness.

Him. The super fit, hot, sporty, successful, has-his-shit-together, guy. Cheat. Who crawls into my arms just so he can breathe.

No one would suspect it.

When I run my hands over his body, I can’t believe it’s real. Abs like that only exist in magazines. There are moments in between where shame creeps in. About everything. What we’re doing, the enormity of this secret, the potential devastation.

And then he pours himself into those cracks and fills them. Touches me… and I forget. Everything.

Teasing. Taunting. Electric. With a purpose that I don’t think even he is aware of.
Our bodies speak a language that our tongues are not privy to.
Devouring me like a man starved. And I, him. Sometimes he stares at me like a creature he has never seen. Something magnificent. And I wonder what it is that he’s missing, that he comes searching for in me. Enticing a self I always knew was there but could never reach, to the surface, so he can possess her if only for that moment. Is that it?

I’m not looking for love or validation.
He will never be mine, nor I, his.

Maybe that’s what makes him so safe.

Road trip 😊

Everyone is so emotionally intelligent nowadays they completely miss the part where love sometimes means being patient with someone who's still figuring things out.
We've learned the language of boundaries and red flags so well we forget that healing doesn't always look pretty or perform well. We live in a time where one wrong text can end a connection and one imperfect moment can brand someone as unsafe. Where protecting your peace is sometimes just avoiding intimacy. We confuse regulation with disconnection, clarity with control,
detachment with wisdom. And in doing so we build curated lives filled with people who never challenge our edges and only mirror them. We mistake emotional intelligence for emotional convenience. And then we wonder why everything feels so distant even when
we’re doing everything right.

It occurred to me just now that I actually made it. Easily, if I’m honest. Probably because most of the time I’ve just felt lost, and focused on working at letting go of the past.

A year ago I made a pact. No contemplation of a relationship for at least a year. I had a few friends with benefits, who actually are good friends now, no longer with the benefits. This is the first time in my life I’ve been truly alone, and it actually feels pretty good. It’s odd to feel so content. Ok ok… I’m not alone anymore… I have just landed a furry adventure buddy.

It’s a strange experience. I met a wonderful man at the beach recently. When I told my sister about him she laughed and asked if she needed to slap me (that was part of the pact I made- she was to slap me if I came to her gushing about a man lol). I said no, no I’m good. And I really was. I didn’t ask for his number, nor feel that desperation I once would’ve had… that fear of missing out on something. I could simply trust that if our paths crossed again that would be nice, however, if they didn’t, oh well.

It’s the lack of desperation that feels so freeing. And I didn’t even realise I was desperate. Desperate to be loved, to be wanted, to be “chosen,” to be enough. I’ve given myself all those gifts. So I no longer need to look for them externally. It feels wonderful to be able to meet people in a space of not wanting something from them. I once moved in that way, but somehow had forgotten why or how. Lost in a need for validation.

I don’t know how it would look to welcome someone into my life these days. I feel so different. How do I love from a place of enoughness? It’s so new to me that I can’t even fathom what that could look like. It sounds quite pathetic to write that. It makes me feel sorry for the pathetic part of me that carried so many painful beliefs. But also proud that I no longer do. It also makes me acutely aware that my dating pool just got even smaller lol.

Overall, I feel happy again. My heart is beginning to shine again. My smile and laugh have returned. That spark of adventure is finding its way back. That curiosity at what might be around the corner. An upcoming well-overdue road trip. Good friends. Good food. Outdoors. Peace.

I’ve taken in a rescue dog. It happened unexpectedly, but he needed a home and I was in a position to be able to give him one with me. When we met for the first time, the people were astonished that he didn’t bark at me. When I arrived he simply came and met me with a curiosity that reminded me of my own.

In our time together I’ve been reminded of how things come to be. It now seems quite serendipitous. I’m the perfect person for him. And he is the perfect dog for me.

He’s had a past. One of which I’ll never know. But there are signs that it wasn’t good. He hides it. Like me, he fawns his fear behind good behaviour and being pleasing. His anxiety can easily be mistaken for happiness and excitement. The more I see him, the more I see myself. And in a way, caring for him is teaching me how to care for myself. He needs tenderness and kindness and gentle encouragement. He needs peace and comfort and stability. It’s a challenge for me to provide these things predictably and consistently. But I’m learning. He reminds me to be soft. Open. Gentle. To not try to force outcomes or hold expectations as though they’re a “cure all.” Acceptance of what is, instead of what I hope. I’m realising that he’s saving me just as much as I think I’m saving him.

Dogs have an uncanny ability to find their way into our heart. They work their way around our walls and nestle themselves into a space in our lives that makes you wonder what it was like before they came to be there. There’s a magic in that. A wisdom. He is reminding me how much I value being a safe space, both for myself and others… but he’s forcing me to learn to actually put that into practice. What a beautiful gift. Seeing him content feels like such a reward. I can only hope he feels the same way.