Part 3: Are You Going To Marry Me?

After Dan and I graduated from business school we both got jobs in the same area where we went to school. We continued to date one another. The relationship wasn't getting any better and at a certain point I grew tired, feeling as if it was a never-ending battle of trying to fit a square peg into a round whole.

I still was not clear on what my part was. Instead, I was focused on what Dan wasn't doing to make the relationship better. So, I had every intention of ending the relationship with Dan. He came over to my place on afternoon and I knew that was when I had to do it. I did not expect Dan to react the way that he did. He basically freaked out - kind of like I would when I was afraid of being abandoned - and proceeded to beg me to stay in the relationship. He said that he wanted to get married, but that he "just needed 6 months of living together to make sure."

I was wary - and weary. However, I agreed. After he left I thought about our situation for a while. I came to terms with a few things for myself. I realized that I wanted to marry a man who was sure about marrying me. I didn't want to marry a man to whom I had to give an ultimatum. I was clear that would always leave a bad taste in my mouth throughout the marriage.

That got me thinking; "Well, what if after 6 months Dan doesn't take the initiative to get down on his hands and knees to propose to you? What are you going to do?" Wow. I was really putting it to myself. I would look back at this conversation that I had with myself and be eternally grateful for it. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was an example of an empowering, nurturing, healthy internal dialogue I was having in support of me.

I told myself that I would give living with Dan a year. The commitment I made with myself was that if after a year Dan did not ask me to marry him, I had to end the relationship and move on with my life. I only shared this with Pat, my trusted spiritual confidant. I did not in any way allude to Dan that this is what I was thinking. I did not tell any of my girlfriends that this was a commitment I made to myself.

At the time I did not know it, but this one agreement I made with myself proved to be one of the first steps that I made in over coming my fear of being abandoned.

~ Kalkae

Part 2: Are You Going To Marry Me?

After Dan and I had gone out on a few dates together, we were at one of our fellow student's place watching movies. There was a whole group of us there. When it was time to go, Dan and I walked out together and when we got to our cars I figured we were going to kiss and smooch a little before we said good night. We did, but in the middle of smooching Dan started to try and tell me something. He was expressing his uncertainty in he and I dating. I did not give any validation to what he was trying to tell me. I simply did the best job I could to talk him out of he and I doing anything but dating one another.

Years later as I looked back at where things went wrong with Dan, I realized that I could have handled that conversation with him differently. Instead of discounting his feeling, I could have given him room to express them. However, at the time I couldn't because my abandonment issues still had quit a hold on me. Because of my fears and limiting beliefs and because I had locked myself and Dan into the relationship without allowing us to explore what being together would be like, I could not contribute in a healthy way to the relationship.

It just got worse and we dated for three years. I became more and more insecure. I would actually chase Dan down if I saw him leaving school and "by passing" me. I was baffled by his behavior and felt so out of control at times. Here was a guy that started to ask me every so often, "So, are you going to marry me?" yet at the same time would flirt with other women in front of me and sometimes avoid me in public.

If you're asking yourself, "Why the heck did you stay with him?" then good for you, because that's just the point. The answer to that question has everything to do with what was not healed within me. If I was whole, healthy, and had a good sense of myself, I would have given Dan room to decide if he wanted to be involved with me that night he was trying to share his feeling with me. I would have been able to do with Dan what Art did with me years ago.

However, I had not connected all of those dots yet and instead I kept "trying to make it work" because the idea of it ending terrified me. I would get anxiety attacks. There were times when these anxiety attacks would happen when I was around Dan. Being on the receiving end of my anxiety attacks was not fun for Dan. On a certain level I knew this even then. However, I couldn't stop it. Simply put it was just a lot of drama.

~ Kalkae