Do You Mind If I Sniff That Handbag?

Relationships.  Grrrrrrrr.

Manfriend and I are engaged.  I love him.  I’m pretty confident he loves me too.  When things are good, they are really good.  When things are bad, we are reminded that we are relationship-retarded.  We have been alone for a long time.  We certainly aren’t spring chickens.  We don’t see eye-to-eye on a lot of issues.  We are pretty set in our ways.  We have issues.  When you put former military with a former lawyer in a debate, you are never really sure who is going to come out the winner.  Sometimes after several hours of debating, we realize we are on the same side.  But we continue, until we are exhausted and call a truce.  I seriously doubt it is a coincidence that I’ve dreamed more than once that I was wrestling with him on the 14^th Street Bridge and we both fell over the side.

This weekend we both seemed to be in one of our moods.  We couldn’t agree on anything.  We reminded each other of all our inadequacies.  We compared our compromises for the benefit of the relationship.  We complained.  We yelled.  I cried.  At one point, one of us said, “some days I can’t stand you.”  Later that night we went to a baseball game and I sat through the entire game wondering if he was going to dump me on the jumbotron.  Heidi, we’re over. You suck.

By the end of the weekend, we were back to “I love you”s but I had to ask “why can’t this just be easy?”

I carried the question over to my shrink the next morning.  I figured since I’m paying almost five dollars a minute, I can ask whatever I want.

“Relationships aren’t easy, whether they are romantic or friendships. They take work.  They take compromise.  They take adjustments.  Both people give up things to gain new things.  To make matters worse, everyone brings their own issues to the table that have nothing to do with the relationship but affect the relationship.  In fact, one in four individuals will experience some sort of emotional issue in a given year that warrants medical diagnosis.”

What I heard: Not easy. Work.  Compromise. Adjustments. Everyone is messed up.

I think my brain was warped as a small child to think that relationships are supposed to be easy.  My bedtime stories always ended up with the princess marrying the knight in shining armor.  Ken and Barbie never had a prenup.  The Care Bears never got in a fight.

I presumed that my very first childhood friend would grow up with me, be my maid of honor and my next door neighbor forever.  Until one day, she deliberately chopped off the hair of my favorite doll.  I don’t remember having a play date with her after that incident.

It’s never been easy.  From school age to adulthood, I think we can all agree that relationships have always taken work, and yet, despite our first hand experiences, we still make our brains believe that THIS relationship, whether it is a friend or a lover, is somehow going to be all roses, gumdrops, and rainbows.  Cue Bon Jovi – I’ll Be There for You.

A few years ago, I got on one of those dating sites so I could complete the questionnaire, a “scientifically proven matchmaking tool.” Halfway through answering questions about things I like and dislike and how I would describe my perfect date, I kept looking for the questions that really get to the heart of the matter.  After all, I seriously doubt that a major deal breaker to the “perfect relationship” is whether or not I enjoy long walks on the beach or vigorous hikes up the side of mountain.  I kept looking for the real doozies.  Where were the questions labeled: THINGS THAT HAVE ME REALLY F@$KED UP IN THE HEAD? Where were the questions asking, “how many times have you been cheated on?”  “what types of trauma have you endured?”  “what issues have distorted your trust in others?”  “how loudly is your biological clock ticking?” “how many prescription drugs do you have prescribed to you in your medicine cabinet?”  “how many prescription drugs do you have not prescribed to you in your medicine cabinet?”

Social media hasn’t helped.  Somehow we think we have strong relationships that require no work based upon the number of “friends” on Facebook, our “followers” on Twitter, our “connections” on LinkedIn or the several hundred people subscribing to our blog.

By the way, who are all of you people actually reading  this crap?

When we finally get the relationship, we want it to be easy because we all love easy.  God bless the microwave, online banking and pizza delivery.  When it isn’t easy and we see the first sign of trauma, we do the next best thing.  We make getting OUT of the relationship easy…we bail…block…delete…pull a Kim Kardashian…run for the hills.

We automatically think we are on the sinking Titantic, when maybe, just maybe, we are weathering a storm?  So why are we so quick to jump overboard?

Why aren’t we having real discussions about relationships not being easy while we are still in the relationship?  I mean really…what do we accomplish talking about relationships once they are dead besides six months of reading passive-aggressive Facebook statuses explaining why you aren’t together or why you ditched your friend?  I get it. You were perfect.  He sucked.

Instead of having real discussions, we are too busy faking it.  On the outside we are all telling one another that it is easy.  We make it look easy.  We talk about how easy it is. Hello world.  We are together and everything is perfect.   It’s like those fake handbags on the side of the street.  For years I used to buy them because they looked so perfect on the outside.  It wasn’t until I got them home that I realized they smiled like cat piss on the inside.  Why wasn’t I told that I’d have to spray those things with a bottle of Frebreze for two months and store them outside?

Where are the conversations from you folks who have the relationship thing figured out?  Instead of flashing your photos with your Colgate smiles, hosting the parties, celebrating your double digit years together, do us all a favor.  Tell us how even though you’re wearing the BFF necklaces, there were moments where you tried to strangle each other with them and didn’t stop until one of you turned blue.  Explain to us how you’ve been with the same partner for over 20 years and at least once a week one of you spent the night in the dog house.  Send out the memo that says, “Relationships aren’t easy.  In fact, some days they are miserable and most days they are tough.”  Describe how you made the compromises but didn’t lose yourself.  But most importantly, show us that it’s the tough times that make the relationship real, and real is what makes it worth it.  If you can easily walk away, it just isn’t real.

When can we just be real?

All the fake handbags I ever purchased ended up in the trash.  The handles broke within the first few weeks.  My relationships that weren’t solid always ended up the same way…always great at first until the first sign of conflict.  It’s the handful of relationships that have endured my mood swings, hung up on me during telephone calls, argued with me for hours, but have come to my aide when I’ve needed them, that will be with me my entire life.

I remember the first time I bought a real designer handbag.  The sales person could see the hesitancy in my face.  “It’s going to make you cry at the register, but I promise you it will last forever.  The real thing isn’t always going to feel new, and it’s going to get some scratches, but it is going to be just as wonderful when it’s vintage.”

I’m going to start looking at relationships the same way.  When they are tough and require a lot of work and sometimes make me want to scream, I’m going to remind myself to weather the storm because we are on our way to vintage….

…and that is what I want.

Love Heidi

xoxo