The Perspective Shift That Changed Dating for Me
+ some personal updates beyond the paywall!
Typically, I reserve Fridays for a weekly rundown of what I’ve been watching, reading, listening to, cooking, and buying, but I’ve done hardly anything worth reporting this week, so I decided to pivot and give y’all an essay that’s been on my mind for some time.
Earlier this week, I sent out a round-up of all the maternity clothes I’ve bought so far to paid subscribers, so if that’s something that interests you, you can upgrade your subscription to check it out! At the end of this essay, I’ll be sharing some personal updates on personal stuff that I’ve personally decided to put behind a personal paywall because, personally? That’s just my personality. So again, if you want to Jon Snow it and go beyond the wall, now’s the time to lean in.
Essay: The Perspective Shift That Changed Dating for Me
To say I was boy crazy would be the understatement of the century. I took my life over boys. I loved them so much, and I loved how much loving them fucked me up. It was an addiction, really. The absolute mental hell I’d put myself through over a crush made me feel alive.
This carried on way past my adolescence. My preteen hormones were just the tip of the obsession iceberg. For my entire dating career, I was always much more concerned about how he felt about me rather than if I even liked him. Because of course I liked him. He was a boy so I was already obsessed. And the less he wanted me, the more I needed him to realize his underlying desire for me he just hadn’t tapped into yet.
I dated a lot. I had a few long term boyfriends, but the majority of my dating history was 1-3 month situationships that started out passionately and usually ended in an explosion of miscommunication, unmet expectations, and mismatched personalities.
In terms of my long term boyfriends, there are clear cut reasons why none of them worked out for the longer haul:
First college boyfriend (I think a year?): He was my “first.” Period. That’s really all it was. A very safe, committed first. We were 18/19, so it was going nowhere fast.
Second college boyfriend (3 years, off and on): Our relationship was painfully collegiate and not meant to withstand anything past binge drinking, going at it like rabbits, and bonding over LOST.
First “real world” boyfriend (10 months): He was so nice, and at that point in my life, that’s what I needed — just someone nice. He was uncomplicated, vanilla, had no swag, was kind of socially awkward, not emotionally vulnerable whatsoever, and cried harder saying good-bye to my dog when we broke up than he did saying good-bye to me. But he was so nice.
Second “real world” boyfriend (10 months): 3 months into dating, he refused to label us and also verbatim said to me “Usually I’m so obsessed with the girl right off the bat, and it’s just not that way with you, but I like you and I still want to see where this goes” and I stayed? For 7 months too long. We had no business being together; we couldn’t have been more different, but… I was obsessed. I put him on a pedestal.
And that, my friends, was my biggest issue.
For years (excluding the first three aforementioned “long term” boyfriends), I put the most undeserving men you could imagine on the highest pedestal I could find. Losers, jerk-offs, emotionally abusive, emotionally cut-off, “mysterious,” “complicated,” worthless men ruled my world and my heart. I was so desperate to release all this love I had bottled inside of me on any man who would take it that I made every excuse in the book for shitty behavior.
I never put my needs first.
It was always “I hope they like me” and never “I hope I like them.”
Sure, I got “love bombed” plenty of times, but getting love bombed is not the same as being put on a pedestal. Love bombing is intoxicating, passionate, blinding even. It’s not special to just you — chances are, if they’ve bombed you, they’ve bombed plenty of times before. You’re not their first victim and you won’t be their last.
Being put on a pedestal is different. It’s quiet. It’s intimate. It’s not so in your face. It’s elevated (literally and figuratively). And it doesn’t happen very often unless you’re like me and did it to every guy you ever dated because you didn’t know any better.
It didn’t matter what his hang-ups were — if I liked him, he was immediately placed on a podium, a shrine. I spent my time daydreaming about him, obsessing over him, acting like he hung the moon. Even if he was an asshole. Even if he was cheap. Even if he was emotionally abusive. Even if he led me on. Even if he made and broke plans. Even if he treated me like an afterthought. Even if he wasn’t very funny or nice or interesting or committed. If for some unknown reason I was drawn to him, he lived above me on a platform I looked up to and desired 24/7.
Again, I never bothered to concern myself about if he thought about me this way or if he even really deserved this kind of attention from me. It was a boy who was giving me attention in some way, shape or form, so I was obsessed. Period.
I don’t have to tell you this was/is a horrible approach that never worked out for me. It caused me a lot of upset, heartache, and stress. It chipped away at my self confidence and left me constantly wondering what it was about me that wasn’t good enough for them when the reality is that they never deserved my pedestal placement in the first place. But it took me years to understand that. 33 years to be exact.
Zac was the first guy who beat me to the pedestal punch. He fell hard and fast, telling me under the New Mexican sky one night two months into our relationship “I’m done. You’re it. And it’s fine if you aren’t there yet, but I’m just letting you know. I’ve never been more sure about anything.” Naturally, my reaction was to sob from shock that anyone could ever feel this way about me and also debilitating fear that anyone could ever feel this way about me. I’d been so used to feeling this way about everyone else that hearing someone so explicitly express the same toward me was completely foreign.
He didn’t love bomb me. He never carried on about how he felt, and he didn’t oversaturate me mentally with words of affirmation. He stated his feelings simply and intimately, and quietly yet obviously placed me on my first ever pedestal. His actions said “I’m gonna set you right here, where you belong. You may not think you deserve to be up here, but believe me, you do. I’m not going to carry on or fawn, but I will ensure every day that you know exactly how high my regards are for you. That you’ll always be certain of.”
Being on that pedestal made such a difference. My typical anxiety-attachment tendencies melted away. I never questioned how Zac felt about me or where we stood. Sitting up high where he had put me made it all so clear, like a literal clearing in the clouds. The sun broke through and for once, I was the prize on the pedestal.
I’m not perfect by any means. Neither is my husband. No one is. That’s not the point. Being put on a pedestal doesn’t mean you’ve never done anything wrong ever in your entire life. It just means that the person who put you there reveres you even in your low moments. You are celebrated, seen, and loved how you deserve to be. You aren’t just anyone to this person — you’re everything.
Over time, I put Zac up on his own pedestal where he belongs but I enjoyed his reverence for a while before I got there. I basked in this newfound glow he had gifted me and delighted in his turning of the tables. He didn’t outwardly obsess, he wasn’t icky or too much — he just did something I hadn’t really experienced in my dating life up until that point…
He loved me wholly and unconditionally and made me feel chosen. Not like an afterthought, not like an option, not just anyone — but his someone.
Allow yourself to be put on a pedestal and it could all change for you.