I Did Not See This Coming

“Yikes,” my Dad yelped out. I laughed ironically. “Yikes is right. I did not see this coming,” I choked out through tears and a nervous giggle. The life I had pictured a year ago – becoming a wife, building a life in a house we bought, adventuring as an “us” – evaporated in what felt like a minute but also months. I had been here before but this hit differently. A week before I laid out under the stars in Mexico hoping for some sort of Lion King moment from God. I got exactly what I asked for. THAT was the difference: accepting the outcome. Embracing the chaos. Stop trying so hard. 

I have spent most of my life thinking that if I did this or did that, I could control any outcome. I could earn love, approval, gold stars, money, success, a husband.  I could paint the picture that I thought everyone would want to see and get my accolades. Then COVID shut the world down and I woke up. Rather than looking outward I learned to stare my demons in the face and shake their hand, thank them for coming. A friend told me the other day that I was the best Betsy back then. Back then…woof. It feels so far away now. 

As the story goes, I met a man. A man that I knew would change my life. I had a feeling about him and I was right – he felt special. I became a “we”. I pictured what it would be like to be his wife, his life partner. We immediately entangled our lives from our hearts to our finances. It was glorious, until it wasn’t. You see, I had another lesson to learn. It was easy to look inward and be your own Hero when you’re standing alone. It was much harder to do in a relationship when you have a codependent roommate in your head and a partner struggling hard with his own vibe. I dove head first into giving all of myself to earn his love and approval, twisting and turning in hope of being enough – just to find another waypoint. I forced myself into situations that I thought would earn me my gold stars. I blamed him for turning away from me because I wasn’t “enough”, when I had turned away from us too because I turned away from myself to some external end game. I just couldn’t see that My Hero (my true self) had been buried by my desire to be everything to someone else, when I just needed to accept that I only had to be enough for myself. The rest would come. And boy, oh boy did our demons come out to play together. No friendly handshakes this time.