Really productive chat

Holden and I had a really good talk today. It was nice out so we went for a walk around the neighborhood and talked about my jealousy and insecurity issues. Since I’ve been doing a lot of solo thinking and writing about jealousy and insecurity, I felt a lot better equipped to talk with Holden about it without getting quite so overly emotional.

We started out talking about how I’m changing my approach to how I deal with my jealousy. I learned from one of Cunning Minx’s back episodes (don’t know which one, listened to about five of them today) that one way to think about jealousy is not as a flaw in itself, but as a spotlight on the flaws you perceive in yourself when you feel insecure. To put it another way, I shouldn’t be trying to eliminate my jealousy; I should be trying to alleviate my insecurities. I also learned from Minx that jealousy and insecurity will never go away altogether and it’s not realistic to expect that. Instead of trying to destroy it completely, I need to figure out specific methods to deal with it when it’s a problem. I explained all that to Holden and he got really excited about wanting to help.

We spent the rest of the walk coming up with specific ideas for dealing with bouts of jealousy. One thing I learned from him is that he’s not always very sure of what actions of his make me feel jealous. The particular solution I proposed for that was for me to send him a message at the moment I’m feeling jealous, rather than wait for the end of the night to unload all my pent up jealousies on him. For example, if we’re at a gathering of our friends and he does something that makes me jealous (like sits really close to a girl or says something in particular or whatever) I’ll somehow let him know discreetly that I’m feeling jealous. That way he knows what might trigger my jealousy. I told him it doesn’t necessarily mean “stop it right now.” But just so he’s aware of how I’m feeling, and maybe he can make an effort to include me in his affection at that moment too.

Another thing I heard about on Poly Weekly that hit home for me was the idea that my imagination is sometimes causing me more problems than anything Holden is actually doing or thinking. This is especially a problem where it comes to instant messaging with our friends. Holden’s job is such that he can have the instant messaging client open all day at work and he chats with our friends “back home” all day long. My job is not nearly so cool, so I’m largely cut off from all human contact until after 5pm (sucks to be a temp.) During that time he’s often talking about really important things with friends like sexuality, his coming to terms with his own desires, his hopes and dreams for our future together, and sometimes he flirts with the girls. Sometimes when I get home from work and I find he’s been carrying on a flirtatious conversation with a female friend of ours all day, I get jealous because I wasn’t included, and also because I don’t know how far their flirtation has gone. For all I know they’re getting all hot and bothered over each other and lusting after each other’s cyber bodies. While I have no problem with innocent flirtation, there’s definitely a line that can be crossed, and cyber lusting definitely crosses it. So far, Holden hasn’t really given me reason to believe he’s done anything over the line, but the fact that I don’t know anything at all just leaves me to imagine the worst.

Due to a beautiful development in messaging technology, the IM client we both use has the option to log every conversation and save it to a text file. Holden and I have agreed that I can read selections from the logs from his past conversations (only so long as they do not betray anything private that the other party would not want shared with me or anybody else.) We’ll read them together and chances are, everything will be cool. But if something does come up that makes me uncomfortable, we’ll have a chance to talk about it. Of course, the people he’s chatting with are all my friends too, so it’s not like I’m reading his chats with total strangers.

The next part we talked about was a little harder for me, but it’s something I’ve been working up to for a long time and I finally think I might be ready for it. We haven’t really talked about this possible action yet, so it was a surprise when I asked Holden about it. We have a very close-knit circle of friends, and there are certain girls in the group that Holden is attracted to. These are the girls he tends to flirt with and therefore, they are the girls that often make me feel jealous. In another effort to keep my imagination in check, I have proposed that when Holden and I are together at a gathering of our friends, and he is finding something about a particular girl attractive, he should discreetly whisper in my ear exactly what it is he likes about her. I want to get inside his head and understand how he thinks about women. I may not always like hearing what he has to say, and it may actually make me feel worse, but here’s how I choose to look at it (now that I feel equipped enough to handle this): Holden has always thought this way. He is always going to think this way. Nothing about how he thinks is going to change no matter how it makes me feel. I have tried for years to ignore it, which I now know was a mistake. So I am going to have to beat it into my head until it doesn’t bother me anymore. At least that’s the current plan. If this plan doesn’t work to help me deal with my insecurity over Holden’s appreciation of other women’s beauty, then I’ll have to come up with something else later. Short of learning how to do a Vulcan mind-meld on him, this is the best way I can think of to understand him.

Incidentally, when I explained this idea to him, his face lit up in a big grin! “You know what? That is such a turn on. I am really turned on that you want me to tell you what I find attractive in other women. And it’s not that it would heighten my attraction to the other women, it would heighten my attraction to you! The fact that I can be so honest to you means we have such a deep connection. It really turns me on that you are so open to me. ” Additionally, we talked about how it’s another way for him to become more self-aware, to figure out how to put to words exactly what he finds attractive about the women he thinks about, and also so he can apply that same technique to me, so he can tell me what he finds attractive about me. (Not that he doesn’t tell me all the time already! *blush*)

After dinner (while we were munching on some delectable Girl Scout cookies) we talked about some hypothetical situations in an effort to understand each other’s comfortable boundaries. We both reminded each other how this part of our conversation was about things way off in the future, but they were still very helpful and reassuring for me to hear from him.

One of the things we talked about was fluid bonding (something I only recently learned there was a word for.) I was happy to hear from him that firstly, fluid bonding would only be an option for him after a long time serious relationship had been established, and then only after talking with everybody involved (directly and indirectly) and having STD tests on a regular schedule. Even then, he would only want to fluid bond with somebody else via oral sex. Vaginal intercourse would still require full protection. Again, this is all speculation on what would probably be several years from now, but it reassured me to know that he had some boundaries where that’s concerned.

Part of why these talks are so important for me, and why I’m so glad they’re able to move forward without me completely melting down is that Holden talks a big talk when it comes to “loving without boundaries.” I’m all for opening up unnecessary barriers, but in my book boundaries equal safety, both emotional and biological. Sometimes I imagine and worry that Holden will want to challenge every limit, even the ones that are there to protect him and me from harm against our best interest. Of course when I stop panicking I know that he’s actually much more reasonable and responsible than that and that it’s not a genuine worry of mine. But it helps so much to hear him describe his boundaries in his own words.

So now we’re off to bed with full hearts and worry-free heads (for the moment.) We’re going to be ok because we’ve got a plan!

-Grace