I Struggle With Chaos

There is a lot that I have struggled with over the past months. I believe that my biggest struggle was the chaos. I didn't feel like there was much stability in my relationship with JP, which started carrying over in my life. I'm very good and happy when I have a schedule, when things are predictable, when my emotions aren't rollercoastering, and when I don't receive conflicting feelings/stimuli. These are the reasons why I started falling apart. I didn't feel like I had a good solid schedule and my life wasn't predictable. I didn't know when I would be seeing JP and if he wanted to see me. I felt like I was constantly waiting around so that he and I could schedule things, and hope that he would want to do something with. I also wasn't keeping a good exercise, cooking, and sleeping schedule. I neglected seeing friends. This brought my chaos in my life. The only thing that was keeping me together was my regular work and tutoring schedule. That was regular and predictable. It rarely changed and I knew what was coming. There were no surprises. I think that kept me on somewhat solid ground and prevented my complete spiral downward.

In addition to the lack of a schedule, I was receiving conflicting feelings and contradictory words from JP. This caused my emotions to be up one day and down the next day. I was on a rollercoaster that I had difficulty controlling. At therapy I was constantly talking about the same things... my ups and downs--how there were times that JP would make me so high and then bring me so low. It was mainly because I was reading into things, which is the bane of my existence. If things aren't perfect (and they never will be), I start to read into small things. These start out to not be a big deal, but eventually if they continue, they become larger and larger. It becomes harder for me to let them go. I'm working on this and I'm working on letting things go. I'm learning that when I'm reading into things, most of time, it doesn't matter and means nothing. But there were some big things that I was accurately reading into that JP wasn't telling me. I knew that he was creating distance between us and purposely avoiding me, but I didn't know why. He finally told me it was because I was nagging him all the time about his imperfections. I think that there were other reasons as well, but I'm glad that he told me one. Moral of the story... sometimes when I read into things, they are correct (most likely only when they are big things) and most times when I read into things, they are incorrect (most likely only when they are small/medium things).

I'm also learning that I cannot control the chaos, especially others chaos. That's what I was trying to do to JP. I was trying to control him and force him to go back to what he once was and move away from the chaos inside of him. I wasn't working with him at all. I was trying to put our relationship in a box and make things better by doing that. I'm guessing that I made it worse, because I couldn't control my own chaos and inner turmoil. I struggled and wasn't my best self. I couldn't help him because of that and he couldn't help me because he wasn't his best self as well. I feel bad that I put him through that. But I'm learning to be a better man for him.

I want to be a better man for him. I'm trying to avoid going to the dark and extreme parts of my mind. I've been working to control the chaos and turmoil in my mind. I feel like I am getting on fairly stable ground right now. I've got a good schedule with work, cooking, baking, exercise, friends, and family. I have a sense of predictability in my life again. When we first went on break, I had my ups and downs, but I'm stable now. With the one year anniversary coming up, I might be more emotional with ups and downs again, but I think that I will be able to make it through without too much reading into things. I also feel like JP and I are on the same page now, albeit we haven't really talked. From our limited interactions, it seems like he still cares for me, loves me, and misses me. I hope that this translates into us both wanting to maintain our relationship and find stable ground again.

When I first met JP, I fell in love with his stability and maturity. Since then I have struggled with the chaos, but I believe that we can help each other to move beyond the chaos and find that stability once more.