The Woman Question 2: picking at wounds

the story of my second long term girlfriend + home surgery tips & tricks

When I was a young man I seduced and broke the heart of a innocent young woman. It’s the most worst thing I have ever done, and the reason for a lot of my current problems with women is that I can’t forgive myself for it. A lot of what I thought had to do with trust issues, of being too anxious, is really about forgiveness issues. It’s the most evil thing I have ever done. Simple as.

When I say I “seduced” her, I mean it. Took me 6 months. I saw her, and decided on a whim, “this one, I want this one”, and I pursued her and courted her - very directly and openly - for months and months, even as she many times told me, well, all kinds of things. “I just can’t see anyone right now”. Mysterious.

We were young. Living in a dorm. So I had plenty of opportunities to see her - it’s much easier when you’re young. Plenty of opportunities to walk her home at night and sit in her bedroom and have her fall asleep as you gentle lay her off your shoulder onto the bed, without assaulting her. Over and over again, I’d gently refrain from assaulting her and politely put her to bed and slip out. like the ghost of a gentleman, in the night.

We did this song and dance over and over again. I kept telling her I liked her, she kept telling me I should find someone else. Then at a Christmas party I fucked some other people, and being a small community of teenagers, this was of course public knowledge. The next day she came over to have a talk about maybe we should start dating. We did so for a year.

Fishing metaphor, whatever. reeled her in, manipulated her, I finally got her. I broke her spirit, like taming a wild horse. Right? This you can forgive. This could be forgiven. it’s even kind of cool, right? I demonstrated value by fucking three other girls in a weekend, and then all of a sudden she saw I was worthwhile, that’s what the scientific explanation says, right. If you think that way, you are damned.

A year later I broke up with her and broke her heart, and I didn’t even tell her why. The real answer was, I had decided to do a lot of drugs, and I would like to have sex with many different women, so show the ghost of my dad that lives in my head how big and tough I am. And in the moment, I thought I was sparing her. I thought I was doing her a favor - get her out of my life, before I start doing drugs, so she wont be hurt by it (and then the other stuff was unsaid - I didn’t actively, formally admit this at the time).

Doesnt sound so bad? Well here’s the thing you’re missing. She was a good person. She was good and kind and gentle, and she had been hurt and victimized, and I helped her become a more whole and stronger person, and she loved me intensely and deeply, and I tortured her. She was loyal to me, unquestionably. she loved me. and I threated her like a thing. Threw her away. I hurt her, knowingly, I chose to. I knew full well what I was doing, stone cold sober. And I told myself I was doing her a favor.

Many years later I saw her again. She contacted me. We met a couple of times, talked about what happened back then. at this point I had gone through addiction and sobriety. Back then, I had borrowed james frey’s “A million little pieces” from her brother, and read it and felt a intense kinship with the author - and then I went right out and became an alcoholic. Knowingly, willingly, I chose to. Stone cold sober decision.

She got in touch because she wanted to know why I had broken up with her, and at that point I was adult enough, honest enough, to tell her. What I just told you. She had thought about me ever since. after helping her with her own traumatic past and having her let herself love and trust and open up, me suddenly and out of nowhere disappearing from her life, was now the worst thing that had ever happened to her. And not-knowing had driven her mad. She had been drinking, dating a guy who beat her. All sorts of things.

It terrified me. All those years of drinking and drugging, and deliberately being a piece of shit - all the evil things I did, and I did a lot of evil things. I seduced and exploited and cheated and lied and stole and caused pain and misery for no reason except my own petty gratification. Through all of this, all this evil, whenever it got to be too much for me, I would think about her. My one good breakup, I thought. my one good ex girlfriend - my one ex girlfriend I could think about and be happy for. I saw she had found a new guy on facebook - and it made me happy for her. She was my muse, and my excuse - the one thing I did right. I left her, so she didnt have to see this. I spared her all of this. My one good deed, which tempered the guilt of everything else.

And then she shows up at my apartment and tells me the guy fucking beat her. And I could no longer hide my shame, I no longer had an out. I was just a monster. A monster twice over, now.

She got angry with me, which I thought was good and righteous. I thought to myself, let her hate me then - let her be free. She ought to hate me, for what I did to her.

We went on a date. We didn’t call it that. It was nice. Everything was just like it was. We missed each other.

She got angry with me, and I thought, yes, for god’s sake. Then she asked me if we could talk one evening. I said, I probably need some time to think about what more to say. Then the next day she said, although not quite so directly, that I was an idiot and she had just wanted me to come over and have sex with her. Seduce her once more. Start all over again.

Maybe I should have. Maybe that would have made her able to hate me. I would do anything she asks me, now and forever. Unfortunately, her being a woman and me being autistic, she didn’t ask directly.

This is all well in the past. But as I was working my manual labour job today, mind wandering, I was struct by this impression: This is the worst thing I have ever done, and I can’t forgive myself for it.

And that’s why my last big relationship didn’t work out.

I am attracted to women who I intuit, or judge to be, “broken”, to avoid this kind of responsibilty. To avoid having this happen again, but circumventing the possibility on a technicality, instead of solving the problem by being a stronger and better man. “She was already broken - she was already evil”. To “date” without risking your soul - and that’s a very important thing. To court a woman, you must risk everything. Otherwise it doesn’t work - otherwise it doesn’t matter.

That’s the reason online dating, dating apps, etc, doesn’t work. That’s what you sense is “off” about it, somehow: as a man, you don’t risk anything by trying to court a woman. on tinder, she already “liked” you - having this certainty ruins it, both for you and her. The purpose of going up and talking to a girl who smiled at you, is to make a fool of yourself. It’s not a risk. it is a necessary condition. You must risk everything. That’s what she likes about it. It’s brave.

All the women I dated after her - some of them I grew very fond of, and knew for a long time, and even lived with. but in the first meeting, the first moment of me talking to them, they weren’t the girls I felt afraid to talk to. They were the ones I felt I could talk to without risking my soul. And then when it didn’t work out - I didn’t feel bad, because she was already evil - and she had hurt me too!

It’s called, we do a little setting ourselves up to fail.

I finally got around to having a doctor look at the spot on my leg. I got an appointment with a young female doctor, my own age. Might even be a bit younger. She said, lets cut it off and send it into the lab and see what up, and I said, great, lets.

When I got home, she called me to ask if I have aids. I said, excuse me. She said, she got some of my blood in her eye earlier, and then dug through my medical file and saw I had been tested 4 years ago. I said, oh that was nothing, nothing to worry about. I just had a very neurotic girlfriend who wanted me to cum inside her.

When I walked home, I thought to myself, I should have really checked her fingers for rings. Then I thought, that’s how old I’m getting now, Christ. Then I thought, when she asked what I do for a living I should have said pianist/world famous poet/cult author, and not, line chef/dishwasher. I thought we got along pretty well. She reminds me a bit of the other girl I just told you about.

Normally I would just cut of off myself. I’ve done that before. Self surgery. I’m coming in on Monday to have the stings removed, she dug pretty deep in there. I’ve been telling people jokes about wanting to ask her out. She’s pretty cute. But I’m afraid doing so would risk my soul.