It's Different for Girls

It's Different for Girls

There's a difference in how men and women handle a break-up, a heart break, broken trust, and the process of letting go. I'm not saying ALL men react the same but in general the reaction and the coping process are different. 

I recently was talking to/getting to really know a man that I have known for years. This guy has tried for a very long time to "date" me. It's been and off and on "goal" of his for a few years. I recently realized it was more of a "quest to concur" than a said "goal". 

I admittedly was scared, skeptical, and held back a lot for the first while, to protect myself. It seemed that this man had a sort of pattern and my gut was telling me that the only thing that would come out of this is hurt.... and I didn't listen as well as I should have. 

We started talking on a very regular basis and I was finally opening up about some very personal things and trying so hard to trust this man. I trusted him with some very dark periods in my recent past and felt like we had really started to form a bond and maybe I could trust him. And then the "slap in the face" that I had ignored from the beginning came one night while on the phone. We were having a very deep conversation on the phone about what the next steps were going to be and what we both wanted to see happen.... I let my guard down and told him my feelings. Told him I cared and was ready to try and make it work. Almost instantaneously I could see and feel that "slap in the face" happening.... he started to back step saying he didn't think it would work because we lived a few hours apart and he had tried that before... WHAT?!

Is this not something he thought about for the years, months, and days leading up to this point?? Why would he pursue me for so long to just say "never mind" the minute I said let's go for it? I was stunned and confused! And I shutdown and walked away.....

I was HURT! I was CONFUSED! I was PISSED! And I was SAD....

In the days and weeks that followed I heard this song.... it hit home. 

I started scrolling through FB a few weeks after this all went down and noticed (I'm a damn good investigator) the normal patterns you see on social media when a new relationship has began.... Yep he had another one on the line and that was when it all started to hit that I had only been a quest that he intended to concur. 

How had I fallen for this game? How could he already have someone else? And then the cloud in my brain started to clear and ALL of the patterns I had known about and had ignored concerning this man came flooding back.... I'm not saying he's a bad guy, though I have definitely called him a few choice names to my friends and in my own head a few times) but what kind of guy purposely messes with a woman's head the way he did? This is something I will never understand....

The only conclusion I can come up with is It's Different for Girls.... Men and women deal with these situations differently. 

Strong and Insecure in the same mix?

We all know that person that won't hold on to toxic friendships. Won't settle for men that treat her disrespectfully. She has high standards and won't let anything remain in her life that brings her down. 

We think she's SO strong and hard that we even label her as cold-hearted at times.... but if we were REALLY to get to know her we would see how insecure she is. 

No one sees how terrified she is. No one notices that she struggles every day to stay strong.

She's the woman that looks like she has it all together, so no one thinks she needs any reminders of how beautiful or talented she is. You stay quiet while she is silently screaming inside for some encouragement, to be told that she's doing her best and that her best IS good enough. 

She may seem like a superhero, but she's still human. She needs her friends. She needs support. She needs the reminder that no one is perfect and the insecurities she feels inside don't make her less of a person. They make her REAL. 

She's very selective of who she allows in her life, so if you're in her life you matter. 

She tries to make everyone happy, but that's impossible to do. She wants her family to be proud of her. She tries to make sure her friends are happy and cheer them up when they're down. She tries to make her partner happy and buy and do all of the "perfect" things for him. 

And it all drains her.... She feels responsible to take care of everyone else.... but some days just taking care of herself is hard enough. She finds the strength to make it through the day and rarely tells others exactly how long her day is or the struggle it is to just make it through.

She isn't the type to give up. She's a fixer. She's a giver. She's an achiever. 

Even though her insecurities slow her down at times, they never stop her. She fights off the annoying voices in her head that tell her she's stupid, not enough, ugly, or doesn't have enough experience. 

She does what she sets out to do... even when she's unsure if she will succeed.  

How can you blame her for being insecure when she has such high standards for herself? She never feels as though she's done enough. She's her worst critic but she's also her strongest attribute because she won't allow herself to fail. She knows what she wants and she won't stop until it's a reality.