Quantum Leap

Greetings! In honor of today being a Leap Day, I wanted to express my thoughts on this past month. What can I say? Overall, this month was enlightening to say the least. I will keep this short and sweet. Speaking of sweet, as much as I tried avoiding the question, someone asked me about my Valentines Day at work today. It ruined my day but I had to stay in character. I explained that I didn’t have a Valentine because me and the guy that I was talking to “broke up” before February. The reason they asked is because when the month started I asked everyone in the shop if they had plans for the holiday.

We went into this long debate about whether Valentines Day mattered or not. Here is my conclusion. IT MATTERS TO ME. I am very tired of people trying to make me feel guilty for having my opinion. One thing that bothered me is how quickly they labeled me as “cold”. If I had to describe this month, yes COLD would be a great word. However, I wasn’t being cold. I felt cold. There’s a difference. I still feel cold now. People have a very wrong perception of me. People seem to think that I am difficult.

What people don’t know is how far I’ve come. I don’t want to make this about him but today is my ex boyfriend’s birthday. When I found out he was born on a leap year, I should’ve known that is a red flag. I will never forget how he treated me during our relationship. I’m leaving it in the past but I remember him making sure I had a horrible Valentines Day. I was upset because I thought to myself “I might as well have been single.” Despite having a horrible Valentines Day, I still did something nice for his birthday. I am mentioning this because I have come such a long way. Why did I do those stupid things when I was younger? Because I cared too much about them and not enough about myself. I tolerated a lot of crap from guys that were supposed to “care” about me. My problem was “caring” too much. I shouldn’t have gotten my ex sh!t for his birthday.

When I think about how far I’ve come when it comes to dealing with men since my ex I must say I’ve come a long way. I’m proud of myself but I have some more work to do. Valentines Day is over but this year reminded me that I need to step up my game. Being alone on Valentines Day was not part of my plans but it happened. The only way to guarantee it doesn’t happen again is to keep dating until next year. I started reading Sabrina Parr’s ebook and after answering all the question that were asked I realized that I may not be the problem after all. I’m not here to play the blame game. However, I have a bad tendency of blaming myself and feeling shame. In her book, they ask questions that you need to ask yourself. That is when I realized how much I do over extend myself for guys I “care” about. That is when it clicked. I don’t need to focus too much on guys. I need to focus on me and whatever guy is also focused on me then I can see if we’re meant to be. IF we’re not meant to be than at least I’ll get some good practice in. I refuse to allow my ex to stop me from having meaningful relationships again. It’s crazy how much we don’t realize how much damage we allowed someone else to do to our lives. I am the one to blame for why I don’t have much dating experience but my ex is the reason why I never wanted the experience. I had enough. Now that I am a lot older and mature, I feel differently. After tonight, I’m in Spring Fling mode. I forgot what it felt like to date. That relationship with my ex was over 10 years ago. I should be over it.

Starting in March, I am preparing to Quantum leap myself into a new direction when it comes to dating and being “flirty”. When I said I wanted “Birthday sex” for my 30th birthday I was serious but my birthday been over. If I want to have Birthday sex or experience a Valentines Day like the girls do, then I have to start my dating journey tomorrow. I ended my celibacy because I felt that my decision was associated with the sexual trauma I experienced with my ex. I really want to get over that. I also want to have sex to see if it will help my hip problem. In the words of Lizzo, “I been through a lot but I’m still flirty.” After this month, I’m bringing back my alter ego “Slim Shady” to help me. I know my “real self” is going to have fears and doubts. The ego is great protection when you can identify it.

I would also like to mention that this was the best Black History Month ever and shall go down in history!

-Malon Mahotiere