Reptilian Thinking

I’ve been thinking about this whole grieving thing and whether it’s pathetic and whether pathetic is necessarily a bad thing.   Pathetic as defined as “affecting or moving the feelings” would seem to be an appropriate reaction to seeing someone you care about suffer.   But if being pathetic is to be “so miserable as to be ridiculous” to quote another source, then that’s another thing.  My friends and family love and care about me – they are worried about me.   They see me spinning my wheels like a whirling dervish, stuck in a heartsick place, not moving forward.   It has been almost two months since my two month relationship ended and I am not OK.   I am a broken record of “what if’s” and “if only’s”.  

Recently a friend ended a much longer relationship – a 13 year marriage.   He is being brave, forward moving, taking on the huge task of starting over, rebuilding his life.   And yet sometimes he descends into self pity, worry about the future, fearful he’s making the wrong choice.  And when he gets this way there is absolutely nothing I or anyone can say to him to budge him from his pity pot.   I can remind him of just how miserable he was, how it’s better to be alone than alone in a bad marriage, that he has, just in time, extricated his foot from the grave, that there are tons of eligible woman looking for someone as interesting as he.   That he is embarking on a wonderful new life.   He will hear none of it.  His reptilian brain is convinced he is never going to be loved again - that that he will die alone to be found weeks later, rotting in his bed.  The reptilian brain provides the drive for life and survival – it is primal thinking.   It doesn’t listen to reason.   So, when my friend is thinking like a lizard, there is no reasoning with him – at those times, all my positive comments can’t penetrate his leathery lizard skin.  And the reality is that some people DO die alone.   I recently inquired of a mutual acquaintance, about a woman I admired, a dog trainer extraordinaire who had worked with me and my first dog.   I was horrified to hear that she had died in her car, not to be found for weeks while her dogs starved in her house.   She had many.  A few lived but barely.  So yeah, these kinds of stories give us pause but they are not the norm, thankfully.

And who am I to cast stones and become impatient with my friend?   Seeing him descend to these unattractive depths is like holding a mirror to myself - pathetic.   It takes a lizard to know a lizard.   My friends and therapist have, for the past months, tried to reason with me.  Just as it’s statistically impossible for Earth to have the only intelligent life in the universes, it would be extremely unlikely that my relationship with Patrick spells the end of my love life.   My friends point out that I am beautiful, talented, outgoing, that I make connections easily, that I am loveable.   Patrick, himself, said that someone will snatch me up – that they won’t believe their good fortune that I am unattached.  So when I tell myself lightening won't strike twice, that maybe two months in a lifetime is all the love I get, that I will grow old alone - disappointed and bitter, that I will never again experience great sex, blah, blah blah I'm being an iguano or a gecko or a komodo dragon.  

I am not covered in scales or leathery bumps, I get it.   My life is NOT over.   There is love for me, probably right around the corner.   Kaveh says I have grown to have a huge heart, with the capacity for great love.   He says it wasn’t always that way – that when he met me, my heart had shrunk like the Grinch’s  - that I was operating like a tyrant robot.  Seriously bad, huh?    I’ve had a renaissance since then – I now live bravely, optimistically,  passionately and with gusto for the first time.   I take risks.  I trust in the future but enjoy the moment.  I love well and often.  I rejoice in my life.

Patrick was my first love despite the fact that I’ve had other boyfriends and two husbands - they were mostly all business relationships.  I was incapable of loving or being loved.   When I met Patrick I was ripe to experience all that love had to offer and I did.   It lasted too short (two months).   I didn’t get a whole meal, just a taste and I now want more.  I will get more.

So, I will tell my friend that he and I need to do better.   We need to recognize reptilian thinking for what it is and shut it down when we are in the throes of it.   We need to listen to logic and talk ourselves off the ledge of despair when what we are telling ourselves are irrational lies.   It’s a dangerous place to dwell – in that dank cave of gloom where, like Golum, we obsess and fret and grow weaker and paler, and start to believe in our own fearful scenarios.

I will tell him that creativity is the key to shedding our reptile skin.   Lizards are not creative - humans are.   By writing this blog I am creating something worthy.   By adopting an abused dog, I am creating a new life for a beautiful animal who deserves to be happy.   By singing, I am filling the air with art.   Tomorrow I will cook and write some more and if those lizard thoughts start to seep back into my brain, I will recognize them as primitive fears that should be given short shrift.

Can you tell I’m feeling better?  Hugs to you all. Tomorrow I will tell you about my "date" last night and we will discuss vodka.

Oh, and on an administrative note, I added a "gadget" to this site.   At the top of the post there is a spot where, if you put in your e-mail address and hit the submit button, you will get an e-mail notification of new content on the blog.   I'm not sure if the content will appear in the e-mail or whether it's just a reminder to read it with a link.