Perfectly normal

You'll have to excuse me whilst I use this as a forum for screaming into a bucket. The alternative is to go and find an actual bucket, which may well also occur. Things are not going well, to say the least. This morning I sacrificed the last shred of my dignity onto the altar of my feelings - phoning The Photographer to beg him (yes, I used those words, yes, I am now mortified not to mention guilty over absurdly dramatic language) to leave his other partner. Of course, he said no. Of course, I cried. Of course, I'm an idiot for doing it in the first place. But there's a part of me that needed to be that blunt and needed to do that thing. Because I am not rational, I am about as far from rational as it is possible to be whilst still being in control of a keyboard and internet connection. Part of this irrationality involves trying absolutely anything that might, in some way, make the situation manageable. And by manageable, I mean to fix it, to be together with him again.

I'm still stuck in that place. The place which states that if two people really cared about each other that much then there would be a way to resolve this. Even though he wants polyamory and I want monogamy (which are about as uncompromising as you could get, as situations go) surely there should be a way. In black and white, typed on the page or speaking to friends with my non-wobbly voice, I know that there is not. It doesn't work. The circle cannot be squared. But I keep coming back to it like a tongue probing a tooth, finger nail picking at scabs. I know it won't get better if I keep picking at it, however the temptation is too great. I think I need a straitjacket for my brain, or an emotional version those cotton mitts that they give children with eczema, to stop them from scratching their skin at night.

People keep asking me how I'm doing and I pause for a moment before replying "shit" (if they are friends) or "ok" (if I'm at work). Neither are precisely true. I'm a mess. I'm all over the place. I feel a lot like an empty glass which every now and then gets too full up of these watery feelings and spills. I shout, stamp and get upset. Then I'm all empty again. This is, according to my mother, perfectly normal. The things that I want are perfectly normal. The feelings I have, the way that I am upset is also perfectly normal. My frustration, anger and sorrow are perfectly normal.

I am coming to the very rapid conclusion that "perfectly normal" is a terrible state to be and would much rather be both imperfect and freakish.