Is This Growth?

Just a few days more than a year ago,
12/06/20, 
I started the week off living 
In a $25 a night motel room in G-town, TX...
King of the Road...
One year anniversary of the end of my last relationship... 
Just in time for the "holidays"... 
Bittersweet, 
But I'm glad to be out of that mess... 
Our respective dysfunctions
Didn't "work"...
Not together...
Life is still interesting, 
but more peaceful...
It's strange being alone, 
but not feeling loneliness. 
I think I rather enjoy it... 
Is this growth? 
I should be thankful for the opportunity 
To learn and to grow that she gave me... 
The experience led me here, 
To myself...
I hope that on some level
Our shared "experience"
Can help her do the same
For herself...
Two people
Who genuinely were trying
Each in their own way
To deal with 
Over-reactive limbic systems
While attempting to maintain
A "stable" committed relationship...
Two very different
Psychological profiles
Despite superficially similar
Relationship histories...
Me, the people pleaser, co-dependent, yes man, 
Problem fixer, mother's little helper...
Seeking validation through
Pragmatic deeds....
Support...
Financial and emotional...
Not always comfortable 
With raw exposition of emotions
Outside of writing...
Hiding in my mind
When things get dicey...
Somewhat dissociative under stress...
Her, pathologically unable
To accept herself
As a valid human being...
Pathologically unable to accept,
With object permanence,
That she could be loved...
Consequently,
Relatively impossible to please...
Emotionally reactive enough
To feel like home...
Like lying face down on the
Kitchen floor
Because some angry drunk
Is waving around a shotgun
From your grandmother's porch...
Yeah,
Adrenaline like that...
We've always produced colorful memories...
Home sweet home...
So...
Anyways...
I had to confront that thing
About myself
A bit more strenuously 
Than I have in the past...
I mean, I do love my family,
Most of them,
But
We are 
generations of dysfunction...
Just like everyone else...
Functional dysfunction, 
Nobody's perfect...
We get things done...
We are capable of growth...
And this woman,
She felt like family
In that fashion...
Down to how she related to her own family...
Home...
Familiarity...
Cyclic crises...
It's always something...
I've grown too comfortable
With feeling uncomfortable...
Most at ease
When I am not at ease...
That feeling that
When things are going well,
There is a timer ticking...
Our relationship
Reinforced that particular anxiety...
Emotions can shift
In an instant...
Angel or monster?
Demon or saint?
What is waiting at home for me tonight?
Yeah,
Really had to confront that one, too...
The therapy helped...
Highly recommended...
Gave me some tools I still use
Out here on my own...
I'm allowing myself to "feel..."
Creating that space...
It's new...
Can't run from yourself forever,
I confess...
And it's the holidays again
This full year later...
Writing this one
Because I'm pretty much over 
Feeling angry...
Or sad...
Or hurt...
(I held onto that last one
For a minute...)
Everything is square...
Financially and emotionally...
We're square...
And I am thankful for the opportunity 
She gave me
To really examine
Why I do the things that I do...
Choose the people that I choose...
It was a challenge...
Damn near broke me...
But
I'm doing alright.
I actually hope she's doing so, as well...