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Space

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Space.

The final frontier?

Or a dark empty place where we’re all alone?

Having been married to a sci-fi nerd, I heard space referred to in the Spock and Captain Kirk sense for almost two decades. While living in that dark empty place.

A place which wasn’t unfamiliar.

You see, I was so desperate for companionship that I wandered into a marriage which wasn’t right for me.

He knew it. I knew it. But instead of dealing with it, he hid himself away in his computer room and I nursed a bottle of wine in front of the TV to block out the reality that my husband didn’t love me.

For years.

Because I was afraid of that dark empty place. Space.

I admire people who enjoy their own company. How exactly do you do that?

As a kid I would play all by myself, wishing I had a sibling to spend time with – or a father.

My mother was thrice divorced and so full of bitterness – probably suffering depression – that the neglect was palpable.

She didn’t hide her sneers when I tried to tell her about my day at school.

It wasn’t just that she was absent. She was emotionally missing in action. There was no feeling for me. Nothing.

And it chipped away at my self worth, at my sense of who I was (did I ever know who I was?), at my soul.

Leaving someone who puts on a face of confidence and independence, but deep down is just crying out for someone to love her.

When my marriage inevitably crumbled and he left me for someone else, I started dating in my early 40s.

Then space became the term which meant my attempts at finding real love were slipping through my fingers.

“I just need some space,” was the last thing one partner of six months said to me, before I never saw him again.

Now I’m in a relationship where arguments end with my partner seeking ‘space’.

And it terrifies me.

Because I’m suddenly enveloped in loneliness and fear that I’m back to living with someone who can switch off, emotionally. And that little girl is once again trying to entertain herself. Wondering what’s so wrong with her.

The angry tears come, and I’m swearing I hate that person and will never speak to them again. Until the feelings of loneliness and abandonment take over and I’m that lost kid.

How can people be so self sufficient that they’re happy being alone for long periods of time?

How can they be so sure of others’ love for them that they spend ages apart, knowing they’ll come back together again?

I guess those people were given a gift from an early age I have never known.

And I’ve spent years grieving. Making the wrong choices and drowning myself in alcohol to block out that grief, to numb the pain.

Every friend who has dropped me, every relationship that has gone south, I’ve wondered what is wrong with me.

Not whether that person was worthy of me. Always the other way round.

But I’m kind. I worry about other people’s feelings. I put everyone first, before myself. These are traits born out of brutal beginnings. Good traits. Things I like about myself. And I’ll keep trying to appreciate them and find a strength within me – not in the bottom of a bottle or the heart of another person.

In me.

And find a space I’m comfortable with.

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