my far-away and much-missed Soulmate

So it's high time I wrote about love.

This blog is about what is close to my heart and the intricacies of my everyday life; and mostly at the moment that is my children, my writing and my illness.

But there is someone else who dominates a lot of my thinking time : my far-away soulmate, love of my life who makes me so happy and yet so sad at the same time. Think of Bonny and Clyde, Scarlett O Hara and Rhett Butler, Romeo and Juliet.... well, not quite such a cliche, but heading that way.




We really love each other. That much is clear and simple. At times this year he has been the only, and I mean the only, person willing to listen to me sob and break down over my illness and say all kinds of unthinkable things that you would only otherwise say to the Samaritans. And he's walked to a cold call-box and stood there to listen to me crying and working through this awful condition in my head; he has held me from afar, even when he cannot hold me close.

So anyone who thinks he doesn't love me is wrong. If you didn't love someone, there is no way you'd do that. Full stop.

And as for me - well, since I met him over 5 years ago, I've had two other relationships, one minor, one major, neither of them worked out. I've always loved him since the day we got together, the second time we met (the first time we were both too drunk); I cannot help myself.

He is the other half of me. He does, actually, complete me. So when we are together, in our bubble, holding hands, I am blissfully happy, and I believe he is too. You can never crawl inside someone else's head or heart but I have a fairly good idea. He hardly ever leaves my side when we're together and he never gets bored with me or says he needs to just pop out or be somewhere else or leaves the room on some pretext. I am never 'too intense' or 'too much first thing in the morning' or 'can't we just be quiet now and listen to Radio 4' (Mr Sleezeball's favourite line in bed - lovely). But we never have enough time. However much time we manage to snatch - a day, three days, a week, even a bit longer... it is never enough. It's like grains of sand slipping through a sand timer far too quickly... and then they're gone.


So my far-away, co-dependent Soulmate. We're working on the co-dependency, but it's tough. Our circumstances have been such that we have not (yet) been able to build a life together and yet I cannot stand it when he is with or near someone else. I do need him; I hate it when I can't get hold of him; and it's the same for him, I think.

He has had two relationships also during the past five years, apart from with me; one with a young girl which still gives me the shivers (it was legal, but only just, and he lied to me about it saying they were just friends; he used to do crazy things, like calling me from her phone at midnight on New Year's Eve, I wonder how she felt about that) and one 'casual' one which was still going on when we got back in touch and started to reconnect earlier this year.

This last one took a while to end and there was a bit of an overlap - though luckily not with the sex - we never slept together until that other 'relationship' was finally over thank God. He lied to me about it and that did hurt; the betrayal. I turned up with a pink rose for him and we had a beautiful cuddle and then he got a text from another girl and it ruined the moment. I felt like Scarlett O Hara then. I could have slapped him, but instead I slapped her, from afar, by text message.

Our major problems do not really include fidelity, though, as once we're together we completely fill each other up. There is nobody else for me now; and I do trust there is nobody else for him.

Our major problems are, in this order I think: lies, fear, addiction and prejudice. His addiction; his lies; my fear; my family and friends' prejudice. Major problems, all four of them. And they all feed into each other. The more he lies, the more frightened I become that I can never trust him. If his battle with his addiction hits a 'blip', my fear increases more and more and I'm sure the prejudice that he can never win his battle would increase too if my family/friends were to find out.

Conversely, my fear sometimes blocks him from fighting the good fight; I expect he sometimes thinks, what's the point as I'm never going to be good enough anyway. And even if I do everything right, her family will still hate me.

And to an extent, he is right - they would. But if he were to overcome his demons, which I know that he can, I would stand by his side and we would face it all together and I know we would be ok. So I do feel at the moment that the ball is in his court: not to lie to me, to be more reliable, to fight those things and temptations that hold him back and keep him trapped in a cycle of destructive behaviour and disintegration. He has got some great Christian people around him at the moment helping him - he's lucky! I believe in Jesus if Jesus believes in my true love :)



I am holding on and keeping on hoping because I just cannot imagine a life without him. I've lived it; we've had periods of no contact; and it's grey and miserable. I wonder about him constantly. When I got ill a year ago, I began to think about him all the time again. By this point we had been out of touch for just under a year. It took me months to get back in touch. It took me months to even begin to contemplate letting him back into my life.

When I finally posted a letter, in February, he was on the phone within ten minutes, and we were both crying with relief. It was amazing to hear his voice again and to know he was out there in the world. I didn't even know what situation he was in; I thought he could be with the younger girl, maybe even having a baby with her or something. But I just didn't care. At my lowest point; I needed him, and he was there, straight away, no questions asked. On the day I was diagnosed with IC, he was at the railway station with open arms. It was the first time we had laid eyes on each other for eighteen months.

So it's like that. We could be apart for twenty years and we would still click back in place, like pieces of a puzzle. We make a great puzzle. There are no gaps, and you don't have to wonder whether it is really such a great fit or not, it just IS.

But life is not a puzzle. Life is a circular entanglement and not just of love, but commitments, family, friends, ideas, dreams, wishes, fears and dramas. Love is a lot; but it is not everything, and sometimes, heartbreakingly, it is simply not enough.

The question is: can we live in our beautiful bubble in the real world? One day, I really, really hope so. We deserve it, after this long. I want to fast forward 5 years, be magically better, and be living with him and my son down near the sea while my daughter is finishing off her education at boarding school. We are happy; I am writing lots, he is working in a cafe or on a building site or wherever the hell he wants. Perhaps we have a market stall. We are really, really content and happy and healthy and fine.

I have this dream and I'm finding it hard to let go of it. Sometimes it is all that gets me through the day. It is healthy and unhealthy; beautiful and painful; positive and negative.... Right now, I'm waiting to see which way it will go. I know the way that will break my heart and I'm praying to whatever I believe in that he will find the strength to make the changes he needs to make in order for our dream to become a reality.