January 10th, 2017
And then I fell in love...
When you have the freedom to choose how you spend your time,
and you choose to spend it with them.
When your life and your future is in your hands,
and you choose to put it in theirs.
When the first kiss was as playful and sweet as I am...
and even more passionate.
When I gave the last and most intimate
part of myself because I knew
that he would be the last and only.
When I stopped being so objective in
my relationships because I knew it was time to invest.
I knew then, that I was really,
truly, and finally in love.
~Jennifer
Note from present day Jennifer: It does not escape my attention this pattern of feeling like I made progress or had an epiphany about what I should be doing only to be derailed by romance shortly after. Some call it Disney-syndrome, I feel overall in our society, at least in my experience, there isn't much to show people how relationships should actually work. From Disney princesses falling in love in a day (or less), to hallmark movies and romance novels, to porn making it seem like it's all about sex, to society saying we should follow our whims and desires, to the divorce rate, to unhappy and disrespectful couples, to affairs, etc. it's no wonder it seems to be getting more and more difficult to cultivate a healthy relationship long term.
It also does not escape my notice that these journals are actually back to back in the original journal. Previously I have skipped some journals that have nothig to do wiith my addiction and relationship troubles. But these, SEVEN months apart, stands out to me. Finally feeling like I am in a healthy relationship now at the age of 26, I can say that before now I had tried for years to balance taking care of myself and developing my character and healing my baggage only to often fail. I didn't even make time to journal for seven months. And you'll see how quickly things fell apart in the next journal. What does all of this have to do with a porn addiction? There have been studies and findings that porn can decrease our ability to empathize, I have definitely found this to be true. I am normally an incredibly empathetic person but in a previous journal I think I showed how quickly I was willing to hurt someone for a sexual foray. I wonder then, looking at my history, if porn has also taught me to give up everything for a man. Since women in a lot of porn seem to have no autonomy whatsoever, or at least sex, or maybe a free plumbing service or pizza delivery is worth more.
Ironically I also almost gave up my faith to be with the man talked about in this journal as well. When faced with an ultimatum of converting to his faith or breaking up, tormented I agreed to convert. Until that night came and in bed, in the absolute dark, faced with nothing but my own thoughts I realized I couldn't do it. The irony being I almost gave up my faith because my church had taught me that having sex with more than one person was especially wrong. Now that I had given my virginity, it almost felt like I had no choice and I wanted to be with him. Thank God my anger at the loss of freedom won out over the ultimatum, and at the time, I chose to keep my faith... as a sinner.