God Complex as a Coping Mechanism for Heartbreak

Dear S,

Can we go dancing? One day, when we are in the same city, I mean. My body is tired and wants to be held.

This is not new—it is always wanting to be held. With less intense hunger now —here, the Lexapro helps; here, the work done in therapy helped; here, hours-long calls with you and E help.

It is a polite ache, the kind that keeps to itself but it is there, and I still want to be held.

Things have been good. I fell in love recently, in a way that showed me that all those other times I was in love, I was not in love at all. This love did not lead to a continued connection though. Even so, the love itself feels too vast, too old, and too wise that it was barely affected at all by what happens temporally, as if it existed outside of time, regardless of whether it was returned, regardless of whether it was indulged or led to something. It is simply there. Perhaps it was there all this time in my body, waiting like a sleeper agent for when I meet them. There is nothing I can do about this love. I was sad, but that sadness was incredibly brief. This love is simply here; I am not sure for how long, but I am not one to dampen things of the heart. It is in me, it walks through me, it mingles.

You scold me for this all the time—how I constantly see things as black and white. In my emotional world, I am constantly all-or-nothing, sporting a constant ride-or-die type intensity. My emotional world has always been time-blind; I fall in love in the span of days, sometimes hours, don’t I? I used to think this was a sign of immaturity or a symptom of my own mental illness—how my past trauma warps the way I react to attachment. But the more I heal, the less I feel guilty about this. I want to be radical in the way I map my feelings in whatever form they need to take. I think this is beautiful.

I have pictures of them still on my camera, their face looking back nervously in these photos, but there is one in which they look so completely confident, yet still vulnerable and sweet. When I think of their face from a place of this wise, old love, I am thankful that I have, at the very least, a picture of that moment. When I am more mortal, though—when I feel the rejection, and I am petty and disappointed—I want nothing more than to wipe it away.

I am on the verge of another love affair—the shape of this one is homey, easy, and safe. This person bought me a little care package for me with a little yellow post it note when he learned that I was feeling sick. I watched him chop strawberries for me in the morning. He thanks me for communicating with them when I am anxious. I badly want to keep them. But my love for the person before them makes this new person weary. And I would be too. This person also wants to leave, and I think, in some sense, the whole situation is ironic. The person I loved did not want to stay because I wanted to have them all to myself, which terrified them. The person I could grow this new love with does not want to stay because then he wouldn’t have me all to himself— at least not right away, not just yet. This terrifies him.

I am not in love with this new person yet; I don’t think the kind of love I experienced is common, especially in a progression of such speed. Or perhaps it is not love at all. It’s hard to tell now that the person this love is for is not there anymore for me to shine it on. I don’t know how this love catches the light, so I can no longer tell its shape.

Anyway, I am trying to explain that though I am not in love with this new person, I can see myself eventually falling in love with them.

I like the way he moves. The way he holds his body intrigues me. He is also one of the most effortlessly sensitive people I have ever met, and it is beautiful to watch him feel things. I also feel like I don’t have to hold myself back with them. This itself is new and hasn’t happened before. I am intrigued enough to see where it goes, but I think the intensity of the moment has progressed too fast, and now he is too freaked out given that I can’t provide any confirmations of a future where I could be fully his. I feel like I can eventually. Just not so soon.

I am not sure if this love I have for the previous person is real, and if it is, I don’t know how long it is going to stay; I also don’t know if it has left already. The other day, I thought it was gone, but I can’t tell if it was my ego resisting.

Have I ever shown you that song I wrote for the Swedish boy who broke my heart by leaving Thailand too early? The lyrics go: Lord knows I don’t need another Icarus / who’d just die from my heat / sinking like a stone to the sea.

Dear S, I am the sun, and lovers drop around me like flies. I am soothing my predicament with the adoption of a God Complex. I can hear you laughing and opening your mouth to humble me as I write this. Be a good friend and let me have this.

I remembered you telling me a very kind thing, though, on the phone, as I was going over the fresh bruised feelings of rejection from the person I was/am in love with. How I jokingly said perhaps I am just too magnificent—that for most of the lovers I have ever had to buckle in the face of my intensity must make me quite terrifyingly special, for isn’t that the reaction a mortal would have in the face of something godly (rather than that I am too much; perhaps most people are too little). Using a God Complex as a coping mechanism feels like a much nicer alternative to the usual groove of self-hatred.

Here you made fun of me, cackling delightedly by the ridiculousness of my statement (but is it that ridiculous though? Have you seen me? I am terrifyingly amazing) but then said a very kind thing: that you think because I am sensitive and warm and tend to make people feel seen, it ends up drawing in people who are still deeply hurt and confused inside. And that these tend to be the people who just don’t have much capacity for the intense intimacy that happens, even if they want me.

I hope this is true. I want it to be. Even if my girl-turned-god theory is much more fun, the way you put it is more hopeful.

It is October and cold here in Wisconsin. Within the span of a month, I already have two almost-great-loves. The combination of both these things makes my desire to be held especially prominent.

So promise me we will go dancing if we are in the same city again? You will hold me tight and remind me I am not some untouchable thing? For right now I feel like a sun, watching the husks of all the could-have-been loves blanket my feet.

Lots of love - godly, and mortal,
Blue