Our Baby

No, I'm not pregnant. We're not getting a dog either. I'm talking about our new relationship that is now just about a week old.

I've been thinking a lot about what C said in my last session about creating a space in which there are only the two of us. I spent a lot of time this weekend reading The Good Marriage and thinking about how a relationship needs to be nurtured and protected. It's a seriously brutal world out there for people just trying to make it as a couple. With all of the distorted images of what love is, it's challenging to unearth the truth about it and continually resist those ingrained cultural pressures to have a relationship look a certain way.

SCL hasn't told anyone about our getting back together. In the past I think this would have annoyed the hell out of me, but he said, "I want to wait until we've been back together for a little while. I don't want to feel like I have to defend our relationship to anyone." SCL is generally a more private person, so I think it's easier for him to keep things to himself. I've begun telling a few of my friends just because I need to process it, but likewise I'm quite cautious about whom I tell. I'm also not willing to be in a position in which I feel I have to defend my decision to give him a second chance.

Right now we both need to nurture and protect this baby of ours, this new infant relationship. We need to give it lots of care, reassure it, calm it when anxiety runs high.

When I got back from the airport, I was completely frazzled, not just from the exhaustion of traveling, but also from a turbulent flight in which I was seated next to a frightened passenger whom I reassured and then a very delayed, very crowded Metro ride back. I was feeling irritable and cranky until I walked in the door and there were beautiful flowers waiting there for me.

Sweet reassurance.