Lately I’ve noticed there are a lot of people out there in shitty relationships. Okay, not lately, I”ve always noticed this.
Specifically, why do people get into relationships where their every move is seemingly questioned if not controlled? Relationships where their whole existence seems to revolve around just trying not to piss the other person off?
Why do people accept a life of walking on eggshells?
I say fuck all that bullshit.
“But Christine, in relationships sometimes you have to pick your battles. You just don’t know what it’s like til you’re in it.” The fuck I don’t. Been there done that bro.
I’ve absolutely been stuck in “pick your battle” relationships, carefully watching my steps so as to not stir things up with God forbid my own wants and needs. How dare I do something to inadvertently inconvenience the other person, let alone piss them off, or even worse, propagate a silent treatment? Whoever talks to the other person first loses – so dumb.
Try living like that while also trying to preserve some semblance of your own freedom and identity and you’ve got yourself a scrambled mess. No thank you.
I’m not talking about domestic violence situations here or ones where there is outright abuse. But being in a relationship with someone who is short-tempered, controlling, uncommunicative and extremely selfish is abuse in a way – emotional abuse.
And some people just sit there and take it.
Now I’m not saying don’t be a person who doesn’t ever compromise. Obviously, relationships are a two-way street. But if you feel like you’re the only one always falling on the sword, you might want to ask yourself what the fuck? Swords are sharp!
But maybe you say it’s easier to just go with the flow and not rock the boat. That’s not compromise, that’s saying that the other person’s wants and needs are more important than your own. And when you’re going and flowing too much, the whole relationship becomes about them.
The fallout of not rocking the boat is that you lose yourself in a sea of acquiescence.
I’ve recently started seeing a therapist (about time right). She’s taught me that many of the behaviors we learn when we are children become so deeply ingrained in us that they stick with us our entire lives. Like tangled up Christmas lights, they are hard to undo.
Maybe we learned to be eggshell walkers because we saw our parents be that way? Maybe we don’t voice our own wants and needs enough because we weren’t listened to enough as children? Maybe somewhere along the way we developed a phobia of boats?
Maybe all those things falsely taught us that our own feelings just aren’t important.
Your own feelings, wants, needs, desires, dreams – they are all important. Always. If you remember that, you’re already on your way to untangling those lights.
Whatever the reason why we became eggshell walkers, it’s never too late to change. No one has a claim to tell you how to live your life. No one.
So pick up those eggshells and throw them out the window, it makes your path a lot easier to walk on. Oh and while you’re at it, clean up those straws too.
You come in alone and go out alone so why let someone tell you what to do in between?
❤️
CM
7/5/23
