The Little Prince and the Fox

Here and now, at home in Colorado. 

It’s warm, already too warm for me to go for a run at 9am. It’s sunny and bright and there’s a very gentle breeze. Some birds are chirping. Somebody is mowing a lawn not too far from my front porch — I cannot see them but I can hear the lawnmower and the people’s voices when the machine is off. 

It feels like a lazy summer morning. 

Grounding myself, here and now. This is a great part of self-regulation. What I see here, what I smell, what I hear, what I feel on my skin. Here and now. Not last week, not a month ago, not in some unknown future. 

Being here and now is all I can really do to keep my mind from spinning, triggered by the renewed wave of grief and resurfacing abandonment trauma. 

And if I do want to think about the past or need to plan for the future, do it to the extent that it serves and heals me. Like planning for the grad course I’ll be teaching and focusing on my research work again. Or like remembering all the lovely moments from my road trip out in nature last week, my long walks along several rivers, my swims in reservoirs, my hikes — the mountains, the lakes, the meadows, the woods; the sky full of stars and the Milky Way so clearly visible and the shooting star I was able to admire while tent-camping; the sounds of the creek and the rain while I was cozily sleeping in my little tent that kept both me and my friend who paid me a surprise visit from Iowa warm & dry; the lovely moments with this dear friend who made the trek from Iowa to see & support me for a few days in the mountains, who went swimming in the reservoir with me, played music and sang with me, hugged me when I burst into tears and held my hand when I couldn’t sleep; the fun moments with the other friend who offered me hospitality once again in his house in southern Colorado at the end of my trip and with whom I went for a beautiful and fun morning hike, feeling so free and happy in a wonderfully childish way on our jog back downhill throw the bushes. Remember all the moments I was held, be it by loving, supportive, fun friends or by Nature itself and the connection I felt with it All. 

A connection that I can recapture again now, sitting on my front porch at home on this warm, lazy summer morning, if only I allow it. 

A connection that might lessen or soften the pain from the loss of my dad and the separation from my genderqueer European friend.

Here and now, at home in Colorado, I might not have all that I would want or wish for, but I have enough.

I really like and relate to the idea(s) of “safe haven & secure basis” mentioned in Jessica Fern’s book Polysecure. 

The “safe haven & secure basis” are the two main aspects of healthy attachment-based relationships. 

When my European genderqueer lover/friend left to go back home to Europe a week ago, one of my most significant “safe havens” (& “secure bases”) disappeared abruptly. Despite it being “expected”, and thus I being “mentally prepared for it”, it still felt like it had been abruptly ripped away from me, which probably triggered some deep abandonment issues from my childhood/past with the ensuing anxiety and almost feelings of panic from being alone. Which I had expected and prepared for to the extent that I could. So the support from friends, their actual presence with me either in person or on the phone, was a huge help, maybe more significant and fundamental than they can imagine, as they were contributing to my being able to rebuild a sense of safety. They were (& still are) helping me rebuild a safe haven. Which in turn allows me to have, and feel, a secure basis from which I can grow further, explore, go on adventures — thrive as my authentic self. 

Since my years in California it has become extremely, and sometimes painfully, clear to me that I really need both, the “safe haven” and the “secure basis” within my most important relationships: I need to have the space and time and liberty to be wild, adventurous, free; but I also need to feel that I’m coming home to somebody, that someone is expecting me, that someone is thinking of me and will be sad if I don’t come home. I don’t want to come back to an empty home (whether figuratively or literally). And I want to be able to provide the same “safe haven & secure basis” to my friends and partners, offering supportive, non-possessive love. 

A week after the painful and triggering separation from my European genderqueer lover/friend I am setting off for my own, long-awaited vacation/adventure. A lot of the next week will be spent alone in the outdoors, all by myself in nature. I am a little scared but I’m also feeling eager and looking forward to it, in need of it. But I am also, and especially, very aware of the fact that I might not have reached enough peace, even physiologically within my nervous system, if it hadn’t been for my friends’ support over the past week. 

They are my “safe haven & secure basis”, and for that I will never be able to thank them all enough.

It hit me all of a sudden last night while I was brushing my teeth: four months is a third of a year, a consistent part of a whole year. Four and a half months was the time my European genderqueer friend spent here in Colorado this year and the amount of time they were hoping to spend with me — me, one of the three people they ultimately came to love (& consider) as a partner. All of a sudden it hit me that I might have been more important to them than I ever realized, and that I might have missed out on something big. 

When they arrived in March, we reconnected at the end of the month as I was struggling with huge stress from my housing situation and still feeling uncomfortable & vulnerable in the outside world with my post-op body. The reconnection was joyful and intense and immediate on both sides but then I got totally (re)absorbed by trying to get myself back onto my feet, trying to get my life back on track. They pursued me throughout April without my realizing it — I only understood it in retrospect when they brought it up and pointed it out to me explicitly last week. 

Throughout the relationship with my European genderqueer friend I often thought about various examples and true stories recounted in the book by Amy Gahran Stepping off the relationship escalator, which relates many different types of profound, significant relationships and different ways of living them or handling them, including polyamory, distance relationships, and tribe/village/extended chosen family situations. I read this book in February and already back then the true stories of people with (more or less significant) partners in distant parts of the country or even on another continent really struck me: in some cases, the relationships were casual and far apart; in others, the people involved spent chunks of dedicated time together, like several months every year, often dividing the year between periods they spent with one partner in one part of the world and other periods they spent in (a) different location(s) with other partner(s) or on their own. These stories in the book really hit home with me, already back then in February, as something that I could potentially imagine happening in my own life, maybe because of old “friends with benefits” or “special friends” that I have had in the past and with whom I could have imagined — or still could envision — such a development, if only we considered it a viable option. 

So all of a sudden last night the thought, or question, hit me — and then a whole chain-reaction of questions: “was this what my European genderqueer friend had imagined for/between us? or maybe not quite envisioned for us but sort of spontaneously, almost unconsciously, sought out? if so, why didn’t they bring it up when we were discussing future options/solutions before our forced separation? why did they limit themself to proposing we meet for a week at a conference next June?? on the other hand, would I really want, or be ready for, a one-third-of-a-year steady, nearby relationship with this person (or anyone else) & two-thirds-of-the-year distance relationship? would I really want another spring or summer like the one I had this year with my European genderqueer friend? 

The only answer I have now is to the last of these questions, and the answer to that, in all honesty, is NO. It was lovely the way it was for a couple months this year but it wasn’t, and wouldn’t be, sustainable in that way. 

The other questions I’m going to let sit, maybe discuss them with my European genderqueer friend when we eventually reconnect and if it seems appropriate then. 

In the meantime, I’m going to rebuild my wholeness here — or, at least, try to do my best at that — try to live beyond that “one third” again… 

I’m tired from having run myself ragged all week, from having gotten up at 5am and spent all day climbing outdoors both days this weekend, from the long, solitary walk along the creek after today’s climbing. 

But it’s precisely these two days of climbing outdoors, learning new skills, meeting new people, pushing my comfort zone a little further, getting back in touch with my bold & wild side, finding my grounding on the wall as well as along the rushing water of the familiar & beloved creek — my home here, in this geographical place as well as my home within me — it’s all this that has lit the fire within me again. And as I sat relaxing — finally relaxing, finally able to sit and write in my journal — sipping hot chocolate from my favorite chocolaterie, finally I felt it again: some peace but also, and especially, the conviction deep down inside me and surfacing powerfully again to not give up. To not give up seeking, not give up pursuing my dreams, not give up hoping, not give up loving. 

The hard moves requiring new skills on the routes I faced in this weekend’s climbing course, navigating and overcoming those difficulties, seeing my efforts being repaid immediately — it all brought back some sense of power and hope to me: that not all is lost, that I can still do it, I can still do something. 

My friends’ supportive responses and loving presence this week also helped in the same way: seeing my questions answered, my seeking hand lovingly held, my requests generously understood — this also contributed immensely to help me rebuild and regain the will to not give up. 

And I’m not going to give up! 

I can cry because it ended — something beautiful ended — but eventually I want to, and will, smile because it happened. And in the meantime I’ll smile because of what I have here & now, because of who I am and what I can do, because of who is with me, by my side, here & now (maybe even on the other side of the ocean or of the country but still part of my life), because of the new friends and connections I can make and maybe, hopefully, also because of the new lovers I might eventually find. 

I’m not giving up. Not yet.

How can it hurt so much? How is it even physically possible for it to hurt so much? 

Is it worse today than Tuesday or Wednesday or yesterday because it’s finally starting to sink in? The initial shock and void from their departure is now turning into an established reality of their absence being for ever? Is it finally starting to hit me, the tragic reality of it, that I’m in love with someone who’s building their life on a different continent and with whom I have no possibility of a common/shared future? Is it finally dawning on me for real that I can never be with that person, that those two months we had together were truly only a temporary bubble? 

I “knew” it a the time, we both knew it all along. But “knowing” it in advance does not — cannot — lessen the pain now. 

In my earlier blog today I wrote about them as “my genderqueer European sweetheart”, instinctively, almost out of habit. Then, as I re-read, I realized that isn’t appropriate anymore… 

Last week they were my “temporary partner”; today they’re my “ex-partner”. Another one of those to add to my list. But this one I still love to pieces today. 

I wonder if they miss me as much as I miss them… Honestly, I hope they don’t. Because I could never wish so much pain on anyone, especially not on someone I love so much. From the bottom of my heart I hope they’re finding, or regaining, their own happiness and homeliness back in Europe. 

And with all of my heart, I also hope this pain passes for me as soon as possible because it is unbearable.

How can it be that today hurts even more than yesterday? 

Maybe it’s the physical exhaustion, all the running around and wearing myself out, which has thankfully allowed me to sleep at night, now catching up with me and making me feel even more sad and anxious from loneliness. 

Or maybe it’s the dream I had last night, another one of those vivid dreams I have been having so often recently. I dreamt about my genderqueer European sweetheart and their wife. I know their wife, she’s a lovely person, we spent most of the time all three of us together last year and I saw her twice this year when she was visiting for a couple weeks in April: we get along wonderfully and there’s even some mutual liking between me & her. It was mainly me & her in my dream, and there was tenderness between us —  my genderqueer European sweetheart (her spouse) was more on the side. I cannot remember details except for a sense of delicate tenderness and strong connection, closeness among all three of us but especially between me & her. I woke up feeling as if they had both really been there by my side… so vivid… and so much more heartbreaking this morning. 

Maybe I should tell them, tell them both, about this dream at some point? 

I’ve asked my genderqueer European ex-partner for some “radio silence” to hopefully make the separation, or at least the regaining of my balance alone here in Colorado, easier for me. But maybe there’s value in sharing the sadness, sharing the pain…? 

For now, I feel the need to try and regain my footing here in Colorado, in this place that I have chosen as home, with my friends here, my job here, my life here. Because this love story with my genderqueer European friend has also rattled some of my certainty with respect to my choice of staying in the U.S. and staying away from Europe. 

For the first three decades of my life all I wanted was to move from Europe, where I grew up, to the U.S., where part of my maternal family resides. When I finally moved to California in 2016 it felt like — and actually was — a great liberation for me and I have never wanted to go back to Europe even for a short visit since then. But in all these years living in the U.S., and especially since moving to Colorado, I keep making strong connections with people who are either fully European or partly European or, at least, who’ve lived in Europe for a significant amount of time and have a clear idea of places, languages, customs there. It feels like Europe keeps calling to me through these connections I keep making as well as through the deep friendships I still have with many people overseas. 

I don’t think I want to move back to Europe to live, I cannot imagine myself living & working there anymore (I never really did) but there are lots of things that I miss of/from Europe. I still feel an extremely strong connection to Europe, especially certain areas or countries or cities there — there’s still so much I miss from there. Most of the time I forget about those things, forget how much I miss them; but then I meet someone who is (also) European and still lives there or someone who knows those things because they’ve been there, and the connection feels revived and the longing comes back. And this happened extremely intensely with my genderqueer European sweetheart: so many of the things we did together felt so “European” — speaking German together; talking about cities in European that we both know; walking (instead of driving) everywhere regardless of the road; spending hours at a cafe or restaurant even after the check had been brought to us; sitting around the kitchen table with their other European housemate sharing meals and chatting for hours… I loved doing all those things. 

Maybe — probably, certainly — I can continue doing them anyway even with my (local and/or American) friends here — for sure I could! But somehow the relationship with my genderqueer European sweetheart switched on that longing and now it hurts… Being with them felt like a “coming home”… 

Was that feeling of “coming home” my genderqueer sweetheart due to their being European or was it simply the persons that they & I are, our connection as people, our soul connection? 

That’s what I need to understand now — one of the things I need to understand — and one of my reasons for needing “radio silence” from them for a while now: I need to understand my deeper feelings and needs not only with respect to them and our relationship but also regarding my own connection and/or relationship with Europe and my different (geographical & cultural) identities.

[Trigger warnings & spoiler alerts: loss, grief, pain, anxiety; PTSD; long-COVID; a couple details about Fredrik’s Backman’s novel “Anxious people”]

Once again, I’m going to use Fredrik Backman’s words (from his book Anxious people) to express my current emotions and feelings I have already had several other times in the past — that horrible, terrifying anxiety that comes from loss, pain, sadness, loneliness: 

“[…] Unfortunately I think most people would still get more sympathy from their colleagues and bosses at work if they show up looking rough one morning and say ‘I’m hung over’ than if they say ‘I’m suffering from anxiety’. But I think we pass people in the street every day who feel the same way as you and I, many of them just don’t know what it is. Men and women going around for months having trouble breathing and seeing doctor after doctor because they think there’s something wrong with their lungs. All because it’s so damn difficult to admit that something else is… broken. That’s it’s an ache in our soul, invisible lead weighs in our blood, an indescribable pressure in our chest. Our brains are lying to us, telling us we’re going to die. But there’s nothing wrong with our lungs. […]”

So many times I have felt that, the “ache in my soul”, the “invisible lead in my blood”, the “indescribable pressure in my chest”. And I’m feeling it in these days more terribly intense than ever, as I did a couple other times during the month of July. 

Loss induces these feelings in me — the departure of someone I love; the separation from a place where I feel at home; the grief from a missed opportunity. 

And now that I’ve done the methacholine challenge test with no evident effects, I know for a fact that it’s not asthma for me. It was a reasonable doubt after my severe COVID in March 2020 and consequent long-COVID. But my lungs are clear, have been clear for years now, and while I most likely have some form of “performance anxiety” and/or EILO when doing certain types of exercise or races, it is mainly in my head. Be it PTSD from my COVID or the traumatic effects of abandonment or attachment issues from my childhood, I am one of those “anxious people” of whom Fredrik Backman writes in his lovely novel. I’m one of the ones who don’t jump off the bridge, one of the ones who wear themselves out to dampen the pain. 

But eventually I will sit with it, walk with it, once it’s ready to be endured, once it’s bearable and can be faced.   

Here it is, that pain that hardly allows me to sit still, hardly allows me to breathe. 

The sense of loss, the loneliness, the broken habits even — it’s so hard to bear, especially in an empty house. 

Yesterday — the day of the big, painful separation from my European sweetheart and a week from my father’s funeral — I got through the day thanks to friends and trying to keep my body & mind busy to dampen the pain. It’s so sharp in this moment that I need to dull it a little, it’s too hard to endure otherwise. 

Today will be the same. And probably it will be this way for a while… 

For how long?

Focus on the little things, on what I have here and now. My pet snake who needs to be cleaned and fed again. Our house cat sitting right next to me, here & now, while I type out these words with my mug of tea, licking his front paws with great gusto, acting like I’m not here but actually coming over to the seat on the front porch precisely in the moment when I step outside for my breakfast. And then grocery shopping that needs to be done later, after a climbing session with a new climbing partner. And finally dinner with friends tonight. 

One step at a time. Here & now. That’s all I can do for the moment. 

And once the grief has become endurable, I can turn to it (again) and mend this broken heart.

The pain is real. It’s here: concrete, insistent, physical even. The renewed waves of grief are washing over me again already, physically painful and profoundly lonely.

Last night, I dreamt that I was crossing a sea, THE SEA, i.e. the Atlantic Ocean, in a big ship sailing across through huge waves in a violent storm. I was scared and the people with me were afraid, too — strangers who knew nothing about sailing and were truly terrified of the gale. But my fear was limited, under control, quite rational and even peaceful in some way. I knew the ship was built to sustain, to navigate through, such stormy weather and make it safely to the other side. So I trusted it would. I braced myself, I did what I could to ease my discomfort in that difficult moment, even finding the courage to look out of the ship’s portholes, out at the storm, out at the huge waves that seemed like they would engulf the ship and annihilate us any moment. I looked out, scared, uncomfortable, but still trusting. And also making peace with the possibility that the ship might not make it through the storm “alive” or whole. But I knew that the ship (or its captain) was doing its best, and that was enough. Somehow that was enough. 

And eventually the ship got itself & all of us passengers safely to the other side, to the other coast, to Europe. 

And it did so by navigating through the huge stormy waves in a new and unusual way: instead of sailing straight across them in a straight line, it moved forward in a sort of horizontal spiral motion, revolving on itself (like pirouetting) to sort of “flatten out” some of the volume of the waves, as if making some extra space for itself, smoothing a little more of the water’s rough surface, while moving forward — or in order to move forward. 

Weird and dizzying and confusing… but it worked! 

What is this dream saying to me, about me, about life? 

That I can weather this storm, too, I can navigate these difficult moments once again; and maybe, also, that although it might feel to me that I’m treading water and only moving in circles, I actually still am moving forward nonetheless — and maybe it’s precisely these circles that are keeping my ship afloat?

Maybe this dream is also telling me that I can go back to Europe, i.e. I’ll be able to endure it, if/when I ever decide to embark on that voyage (be it only a visit)? 

For now — here & now — what I need to navigate is this current pain, this current painful loneliness, the current losses: these current renewed & huge waves of grief washing over me (again).

It’s been six months since my gender-affirming top-surgery. Six months ago at this time I was being operated on. 

Six months ago. It almost feels like a lifetime ago. This body, this chest, this torso seems and feels so “right” to me that I can hardly even remember how it was or felt before, and I can hardly believe how I was able to live with breasts, to bear it, in a body that didn’t belong to me…