Emotional Baggage

Sitting on my coach watching the new hit TV show 'Girls' I came across the notion of emotional baggage - the shit people get left with after being with someone. And every experience counts - from a meaningless one-night stand to a full-blow ten year relationship. Anytime you open up yourself to someone new, you add a little something to your baggage. Your 'suitcase' just gets heavier and heavier until you reach a point when your baggage becomes a part of who you are. Or maybe you have been that person all along and just needed someone to trigger it. Suddenly your emotional baggages become your greatest insecurities. My current baggage is drunk texting. Getting so plastered I turn into a text-monster sending over twenty rubbish texts a night. It recently got so bad that my 2012-man told me he is no longer interested and that I should just stop messaging him! Harsh to hear but I am glad he told me. It made me question myself and my bad habits so I decided to do a little survey among my friends and discover their baggages.

And this is what they told me:

1) Drunk Texting - no person wants to wake up to a full inbox of random messages from a current/former partner. As a serial drunk-texter I understand the annoyance people experience when they receive my midnight epiphanies. It is borderline obsessive. In my defence, I rarely remember wanting to talk to you anyway (oops!). 

2) Not Over Your Ex - after a bad break-up many people rush back into dating and no one enjoys sitting through a dinner date where 99% of the conversation evolves around someone's ex. Take your time before you decide to dine and wine someone new. How would you feel if you were someone's rebound? 

[If you are having trouble letting go, please, read my previous blog:
http://daliawhite12.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/7-steps-of-letting-go-failed.html]

3) Married/kids - seeing a married man. Technically this should not even be considered a baggage but as it is such a common occurrence I have decided to include it in my list. Married men with kids is a bad baggage and for me personally a big NO NO!

4) Virginity - in the 21st Century being a virgin over twenty is almost unheard of, and yet still possible. Since the introduction of the hippy-era being an adult-virgin has transformed from a sought-after virtue to a burden. Especially if the virgin is male. No modern woman wants to experience the sloppiness of a virgin lover. Losing your virginity once was bad enough so why bother corrupt the innocent?

5) Distrust - sooner or later we all get cheated or lied to. It is a harsh part of dating and no one gets a free pass. And yet the betrayal can cut so deep it never really goes away. My friend, for example, had been so hurt by their ex's indiscretions that years later, even if only seeing someone casually, suspicions creep in. He will never trust anyone entirely. He will count their dishes, go through their phone and trash, and even count the condoms in their night drawer just to be sure history has not repeated itself. Sad but true.

6) Hormonal/Erratic behaviour - come on, ladies, no point in denying that at least once a month we all PMS hard. We wake up in the morning and suddenly everything is terrible. We don't like our hair, our dangling stomach, the newly-formed pimple on our forehead - everything has gone to shit! And yes, it happens to all of us. We always need someone close to vent to and end up biting their heads off instead. I can't count the times I have done it. And erratic behaviour is a big baggage, especially for men. They do not understand our hormonal misbalance and the need to vent out. Damn biology! Wish they would invent a sanity-pill already (!)

7) Childhood issues - ever dated a mummy's boy? Or a man who hates his parents? I was blessed enough to have both types in my life and trust me both carry deep emotional scars. The former so attached to his mother he will never be able to love another woman truly; and the latter so distanced from his emotions he will never allow anyone to get close to him. And these type of emotional baggages are so deep-rooted it is almost impossible to heal. 

But remember: we all have emotional baggage and when the right person comes along we will start to heal...