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Guest Posts, Inspiration, Sex

Sex & Sickly Girl.

June 11, 2014

By Litsa Dremousis.

I stood nude in my doorway and laughed.

“Thomas! Come here!” I called to my dog, a willful Pomeranian who’d jetted into my building’s hallway on the heels of my new boyfriend Greg. So much for my sultry goodbye. Greg burst out laughing, too, scooped up the wriggling Thomas and set him behind my door jam, where I nudged him back with the red lacquered toes of my left foot. Still giggling, Greg and I kissed again, once more wrapping up a delightfully carnal twenty-four hours in which we only stopped for Thai food and cherry-almond pie.

I shut the door, hobbled to my bedroom and collapsed on my disheveled bed. The surrounding terrain resembled a Motley Crue video, with all manner of sex detritus strewn about, minus the drugs and hairspray. Thomas yelped and looked at me with pleading eyes, so I sat up, scooped him onto Greg’s pillow, then resumed lying flat, as joyful as I was immobile.

Greg had arrived at noon the previous day, ostensibly to see a documentary playing up the hill. It was our fourth date and when he kissed me hello as I reached for my purse, we kept kissing and soon were horizontal and writhing, despite Thomas’ unbroken barks of protest. I kept apologizing that my dog was losing his mind and Greg kept assuring me he didn’t care. And based on his performance, I believed him.

Our first time was free from the awkwardness that often hovers over such encounters, as each of you figures out who likes what and where and how. Greg and I simply clicked: we made wonderful discoveries, but felt like we’d known each other forever. He had the wisdom of an older man, but the parts of a younger one and while this wasn’t why I soon fell in love with him, it certainly didn’t hurt.

Thomas fell asleep and I wrapped the bedspread over myself and basked in post-coital giddiness. I was happy. Pure, undiluted happy. Greg was brilliant, compassionate, hilarious, had read my work before we’d met and was as handsome with his glasses off as he was with them on. (I have a thing for glasses.) My longtime partner had died four years prior and it’d taken me a long time to feel like a sexual human again, as opposed to a decaying lump of seaweed. The man I’d dated previously had helped me navigate this complex transition, but with Greg, I was starting off wholly libidinous and feeling like myself. My life was good. Great, even.

Then I tried to stand up.

I assumed, perhaps naively or maybe prematurely, that because my sex drive was fully recharged and because Greg already knew I have both a dead partner and Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, a chronic, incurable, degenerative illness that presents similarly to M.S., our sex life would be relatively uncomplicated. Which sounds counterintuitive, but all the weird stuff I can’t control was already out in the open and Greg still pursued me. He shared tales of his past to level the playing field, as such, and I still very much wanted him. I’m 47 and he’s 51 and as he sagely noted, it’d be so much stranger if neither of us had shades of color to our past. If you make it to middle age without some deep wounds but, also, a greater perspective and richer appreciation for joy, well, you’ve likely padded yourself in bubble wrap or just haven’t been paying attention.

So, traveling along merrily, I didn’t see the upcoming speed-bump. We’re engaged now, and our sex life largely consists of perpetual lust, food and dog appeasement. With no disrespect to our previous loves, Greg and I sometimes hold each other, laugh and ask, “Where the hell *were* you?” There’s an old Greek adage, “The pot rolled down the hill and found its lid” and we’ve heard it from my family a dozen or so times now. I’m the master of complicated relationships, but this one is as easy as it is loving. Unfortunately, though, no amount of love cures an incurable illness. And over time, any amount of illness will impact your sex life.

At first, the effects weren’t evident.

Greg and I reveled in each other’s minds and wit and this prompted still more disrobing. We remained devoted to our respective jobs–each of us is fortunate to love what we do–but quickly adjusted our schedules to see each other as much as possible.

And that’s when the speed-bump rose, forcing me to slow down. Because adhering to deadlines for two books and several essays, all while constantly seeing the love of your life and boffing him with vigor will, it turns out, lead to some immuno mayhem. The ceaseless activity and lack of sleep, i.e. frequent components of a super-fun new relationship, quickly led to less fun things like falling and fevers and secondary infections. (No, not those kind.) Nausea, chronic pain and near paralytic levels of exhaustion, all hallmarks of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, began kicking the crap out of me more so than is usual.

I’ve had M.E. for 23 years and excel at symptom management. But I’ve grown sicker since the last time I spent this much time with a partner, and Greg is now my fiance, no less. I genuinely like partaking in his world. So, despite his culinary wizardry, I’m learning to make dishes with more than four ingredients and figuring out how to use his NASA-level coffee maker. I like watching him teach at the University of Washington or listening to him explain the finer points of his photography equipment. Not because Greg is pressuring me. Far from it. Indeed, he’s incredibly understanding that I do some of the aforementioned while lying flat on his couch. And he has immersed himself in my worlds, spending much time at literary events and with my friends and family. Basically, to poach Cole Porter, we get a kick out of each other.

The unavoidable fact, however, is that for the first time in my life, and much to my chagrin and occasional humiliation, there are brief times I’m simply too ill for sex. And then I feel like an idiot. Because I love Greg and we consistently have great sex. Saying no, however temporarily, is like declining the steak and ice cream right there on the table before me.

He and I can approach this in the touchy-feeliest way possible, but barring a fetish, there’s nothing sexy about illness. I have friends who don’t like to shag when they have a cold, for god’s sake. If I waited ‘til I felt well to have sex, I’d die celibate. So, I’m always ill when I have sex; it’s just a question of degree. Mildly symptomatic? “Fire down below!” Extremely symptomatic? “Can we wait ‘til morning, honey? In the meantime, can I have a shoulder rub because it kind of hurts to breathe?”

Greg loves me and has wryly noted it won’t fall off if he has to wait a few hours. He has lead the way in figuring out new and creative ways to make gravity work for us. In the best way, our bed has become a sort of laboratory. And because all sexual experimentation, sick or well, requires trust and communication, in a roundabout way, my illness has brought us even closer. I’m not fabricating a silver lining, but that is pretty wonderful. Especially as we plan to spend the rest of our lives together and all.

Of course, should there be a cure, start a pizza fund for us and please donate generously because we’re leaving the house again never.

 Litsa Dremousis' work appears in The Believer, Esquire, Hobart, Jezebel, McSweeney's, MSN, Nerve, New York Magazine, The Onion's A.V. Club, Salon, Slate, The Weeklings, on KUOW, NPR, and in sundry other venues. She’s completing her first novel, assuming it doesn't complete her first. On Twitter: @LitsaDremousis. Photo: Trent Hill


Litsa Dremousis’ work appears in The Believer, Esquire, Hobart, Jezebel, McSweeney’s, MSN, Nerve, New York Magazine, The Onion’s A.V. Club, Salon, Slate, The Weeklings, on KUOW, NPR, and in sundry other venues. She’s completing her first novel, assuming it doesn’t complete her first. On Twitter: @LitsaDremousis.
Photo credit: Trent Hill

 

Jen Pastiloff is the founder of The Manifest-Station. Join her in Tuscany for her annual Manifestation Retreat. Click the Tuscan hills above!

Jen Pastiloff is the founder of The Manifest-Station. Join her in Tuscany for her annual Manifestation Retreat. Click the Tuscan hills above!

Join Jen Pastiloff, the founder of The Manifest-Station, in The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts in Feb of 2015 for a weekend on being human. It involves writing and some yoga. In a word: it's magical.

Join Jen Pastiloff, the founder of The Manifest-Station, in The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts in Feb of 2015 for a weekend on being human. It involves writing and some yoga. In a word: it’s magical.

Beating Fear with a Stick, Jen Pastiloff, Jen's Musings

I Don’t Like You But I Want You To Want Me.

February 26, 2013

1

By Jen Pastiloff.

I used to play this game in my twenties with men. I don’t like you but I want you to want me it was called. I was insecure and wanted all the attention I could get from men but I didn’t want to have to give anything up for it: sex, intimacy, love. I wanted to feel pretty and desired without having to look into anyone’s eyes or have them claim me as theirs. I felt ugly and short and I overcompensated by wearing high platform shoes and low cut shirts which showed my cleavage. And a lot of makeup. I was a master at flirting. I could make men want me.

Then I would panic. I would avoid. I would not return phone calls or emails. I would hide. I would be distant. I was a fraud. I couldn’t hold my own.

I didn’t want to hold my own.

A good friend of mine has been in a situation where a man was flirting with her and showing signs of attraction. She was attracted to him. She was confused by some of his behaviors and she told him as much. He then called her up to say: Just to be clear, I have no romantic or sexual interest in you. 

(Easy there, cowboy!)

What an asshole I said over the phone. Until I realized he was playing the game I used to play, or a version of it. I want you to want me but I want no responsibility. I don’t want to take this any farther but I want to feel desired by you. I want you to fall in love with me and I want to have zero accountability. In fact, I will be somewhat shocked when you call me out on my behaviors was the name or names of his game.

I remember after I got dumped in my 28th birthday I agreed to go on a date with a guy I had been waiting on for years. I had known he’d had a crush on me and I wasn’t attracted to him at all but I was trying to get over heartbreak and I thought it would be a good idea to get out. I wasn’t interested in him but the date was fun. He took me to a big famous Hollywood television producer’s house for a Christmas party and I felt funny and pretty and after we left he told me the big famous Hollywood producer kept asking about me. Who was the cute little Jewish girl? he said the producer kept saying. I’d felt flattered.

I wasn’t into this guy but I tried to make myself because I thought he would be good for me. He was a successful television writer and he was smart and funny. And he liked me. (I had been with someone for two years who didn’t like me very much.)

I just didn’t want to kiss him. Ever.

We went out on a few dates and finally he emailed me and called me out after I sent him a forwarded joke via email. He told me that he had enough friends. That he wasn’t interested in me as a friend and I needed to be straight. Was I interested in him or not?

I panicked. I wasn’t. I stared at the computer, horrified. I couldn’t bring myself to type the words. I admired him for his straightforwardness. Here I was sending him dumb emails just to keep him at bay, hoping he would disappear but not without pining for me.

I forget what I said exactly but it ended with No, I don’t want to date you. I probably beat around the bush. I probably made it sound nice and fluffy and a little dishonest.

I never heard from him again.

Look, I get it. He didn’t want to be my friend. He wanted to love me. He was being honest and fair.

I remember being shocked at his email. It was harsh, as I’m assuming his feelings were hurt, but I had never received such a blunt email before. He was so willing to speak what he wanted, to say what he felt and what he needed. And a friendship with me wasn’t any of those things. Fair enough.

I cringe when I think of the things I used to do for love. I hated myself and thought that if enough men wanted me it could fill that hatred with something. Even something I didn’t want.

Why so many lies?

I don’t want you but I want you to want me. Or even the I don’t like you but I can’t stand that you don’t like me. I want everyone to love me.

Oh, there it is. I want everyone to love me.

It’s so ugly and horrible and smelly that I throw it down the basement stairs before it burns my eyes and blinds me with its filth and stench.

There’s a roomful of people who are all nodding and digging what I am saying. They are into it. Then, there’s one who isn’t. I focus on the one.

I want you to like me. 

I focus on the one.

I sent an email to someone the other day which included my newsletter. I wrote about it the other day. He simply replied “unsubscribe.”

When I got really down and dirty with myself I was willing to ask Why did you send him the email in the first place, Jen? I’d had a hunch he didn’t like me. I had known. And the answer came. I was again in my twenties wearing a low cut shirt and high shoes to hide. I wanted him to like me was the wimpy little 5 year old kid answer.

The thing is, I only sent the email because of that. If I get down real low and look where I am afraid to look like under the bed and in the basement. It’s disgusting. Want me want me want me want me want me from the darkest crevices you can imagine.

Here’s the great thing about being honest with yourself. When you finally are, you leave the basement. The ugly truths about you aren’t so ugly once you face them. You just get a little wet washcloth and move forward with your day dusting off whatever needs dusting. It’s just that most of us are afraid to look inward so we keep throwing things under the bed and down the basement stairs.

I would be scared to go down there after a while too.

So that guy, the one who was leading my friend on, I don’t know what his deal was. (And yes, I still think he was an asshole for saying that to her.) I do know that he flirted with her and sent her every signal that he was interested and then when she called him out, he balked. He wanted what he wanted without having to be there for it.

Who wants to live that way? It’s ghost living. It’s like lying your way through your life and knocking people over with your big bag as you walk down the sidewalk. It’s like making a mess and walking out as you yell Someone else will clean it up without so much as even glancing over your shoulder.

There is a fine line between being honest and being an asshole.

Don’t get me wrong. At times I have been both. What I am concerned with now is the former.

I want to love you is a revision of I want you to want me. 

I want to love you. 

Imagine the world where we are all concerned with what people think of us and if they like us and how much better we feel when they do love us and how we don’t want to have to actually be in our bodies but rather parade them around looking perfect.

Oh wait. Right.

We live in the world. You and me and all the other pots calling the kettles black.

We get to create what the experience is like for ourselves. I want to love you. I don’t care if you like me. 

Except that’s a lie and we all know it.

We care.

I care.

How about this: I want to care less.

I want to care less about the things that don’t matter and the people who don’t love me back (there will always be some so get over that now.) I want to care less about who is loving me and more about who I am loving.

We live in the world. There’s not much we can to to change that fact except not live in the world and that choice seems grim. We live in the world and we live in our bodies and the capacity to love is great. It’s so great that we don’t even have to do anything about it except acknowledge it and ask it to sit down for a glass of wine. It has a dog’s nose and can smell shit a mile away so don’t worry about that.

Your capacity to love is so great that it will carry you through most things in this world.

 

Join Jen Pastiloff, the founder of The Manifest-Station, in The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts in Feb of 2015 for a weekend on being human.

Join Jen Pastiloff, the founder of The Manifest-Station, in The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts March 3-5, 2017 for a weekend on being human.

 

 

Jen Pastiloff is the founder of The Manifest-Station. Join her in Tuscany for her annual Manifestation Retreat. Click the sunflowers!

Jen Pastiloff is the founder of The Manifest-Station. Join her in Tuscany for her annual Manifestation Retreat. Email barbara@jenniferpastiloff.com to register. June 17-24, 2016 or Sep 9-16! Click pic of info.

 The 12 Day Detox is here. Sign up now for the next cleanse on November 30th. Space is limited. This detox comes at just the perfect time. Reprogram your body and mind as we move into the holiday season. This is your time of rejuvenation and renewal.This is not a juice fast, or a detox based on deprivation.


The 12 Day Detox is here. Sign up now for the next cleanse on November 7, 2016. Space is limited. This detox comes at just the perfect time. Reprogram your body and mind as we move into the holiday season. This is your time of rejuvenation and renewal.This is not a juice fast, or a detox based on deprivation.

 

 

Ring in New Years 2016 with Jen Pastiloff at her annual Ojai retreat. It’s magic! It sells out quickly so book early. No yoga experience required. Just be a human being. With a sense of humor. Email barbara@jenniferpastiloff.com with questions or click photo to book. NO yoga experience needed. Just be a human being

Ring in New Years 2017 with Jen Pastiloff at her annual Ojai retreat. It’s magic! It sells out quickly so book early. No yoga experience required. Just be a human being. With a sense of humor. Email barbara@jenniferpastiloff.com with questions or click photo to book. NO yoga experience needed. Just be a human being

 

Featured image by Simplereminders.com.

 

 

 

 

Guest Posts

The Nudist.

January 28, 2013

He sits across from me, his cock on a chair. Cutting and eating. I watch him, knowing full well that he is wearing no pants.

This is not unusual. I am not awed by his penis lying on the kitchen chair.

He doesn’t even bother to slice the bananas really thin. He just sort of slops them on the chunk of peanut butter and throws the other slice of bread on top. The son takes the sandwich and twists the bread downward because he won’t eat it unless the bread is smashed down into the peanut butter. He is very used to his father walking around without any clothes on. It doesn’t seem to phase him. He’s only seven so he probably doesn’t realize that its not the norm for his father to be making sandwiches for him while he’s wearing no pants, especially when I am also in the room.  (And the I is me, a friend staying at her friend’s apartment while the friend is out of tow

The man eats his own sandwich and most of his son’s, as he absently clips articles from auto magazines. He is making a scrapbook for his shop. He has an auto shop, which he originally started from the garage out of the house he grew up in. Now he is solely a Mercedes specialist, but back when he started I think he pretty much worked on anything with wheels. Like, even bicycles.

He is only wearing a blue work shirt with the name Roger written across it in red cursive.

I haven’t decided yet which is more disturbing: going around completely nude or simply wearing a shirt that barely comes to your midriff and a pair of socks? Actually, it is more subtle to be completely nude rather than stop abruptly right before the genitals, causing one an awkward moment before one can regain one’s composure and look away.  

Still, I haven’t decided which degree of nudity of your friend’s “partner”  is worse: partial or complete.

I know he is testing me. He’s waiting to see how long he can walk around naked before I actually say something about it. The more time I spend here, the more clothing he sheds. A while back he walked around in his underwear. Then he walked around in a towel. I can’t quite remember exactly when he made this bold transition to genital exposure.  

He’s waiting for me to acknowledge his nakedness, sitting here at the kitchen table, reading and cutting, going back and forth to the refrigerator, eating, sighing loudly. He gets up, goes to the refrigerator, peers in, sees nothing, looks at me to see what I’m doing. He sits back down and cuts more cars out of Auto World. Five minutes later he gets up and does the same routine all over again. Since his girlfriend has been out of town he hasn’t bothered to buy any new groceries. (How could he think something new has gotten into the refrigerator since he last looked?)   

I stare at the dishes and the other things in the kitchen. I don’t want to get up and leave because then Roger will think he has gotten my attention. And if I leave, then I have to say something to him, at least a “Goodbye Roger.”

If I have to say anything at all to him I know I will look down by accident. I want to make him think I could care less what he’s wearing or isn’t wearing.  I want him to think that I did not even notice his lack of pants.

 I have to remember to clean up the kitchen and restore it to its spotless condition. Roger said he talked to Claire and that she’d be home from Texas in 2 days. I wonder if he told her that he has been staying here with me. They are going through one of their “separations” so I don’t know why he came over the day after Claire left. 

It seems he has apparently moved back in. I bet when he called her he “forgets” to mention that he’s living here (with me).

Before she left, she told me that Roger and the kids were going to be staying at his apartment. She said it would be nice for me to have the place all to myself for three weeks, but that I had to keep it neat. Then she gave me a little slip of paper, which I have since lost. The paper had Roger’s phone number to his new apartment on it. 

I don’t think I need his telephone number to get in touch with him.

He probably told Claire that he has been stopping by her apartment to check up on how well I’m holding the place up or to make sure I haven’t burnt the place down. I really should say something to him about why he is here.  

He makes me feel uncomfortable and young. 

 Maybe I’ll put it in a really subtle way, like, Hey Rog, I thought you and C. broke up? Weren’t you and the kids supposed to be staying at your new apartment while she was out of town? Why are you here? And why don’t you go put on a nice warm pair of pants?

I am a wimp. 

I’d rather sit here and feel uncomfortable than muster up the guts to question him. He probably told Claire that I left dishes in her sink, that I did not pick up after myself, that I drank her Japanese beer, and that I threw too much food down the garbage disposal and he had to help me fix it. When he told her he had to help me fix the garbage disposal, I bet he said he had to come over especially for that. There’s no way he told her that he simply rolled out of her bed, completely naked, when he heard a fork being ground up in the sink. 

He had not even bothered to put anything on as he reached his hand down into the disposal system and pulled out a fork and an avocado pit. 

I stare at the Japanese calendar on the kitchen wall for the thirteenth time, as I have done twelve other times this afternoon in order to avoid looking at Roger. I pretend I can read the Japanese lettering at the bottom of the calendar, which is probably nothing other than the artist’s signature. During one of Claire and Roger’s numerous separations, one that had actually lasted for a whole year, Claire’d had a Japanese boyfriend.  I think this calendar was a gift that boyfriend had given her on their first date. 

Roger will never marry Claire.

If he was going to marry her, he would’ve done so by now. They have been together for ten years. They have two children. He just isn’t the marrying type, he tells her. 

So Claire keeps that calendar hanging on the wall, hoping it will make Roger jealous. 

For ten whole minutes I stare at the month of July on the wall. It has now been August for twenty-eight days. 

I think Claire still hopes Roger will want marry her.

Roger stands up again. This time he wants to know, should he put the peanut butter away, or, would I like some?

I look up, completely forgetting my supposed absorption in the Japanese calendar, and find his crotch level to my head. No, no,  I tell him. Please just put it away.

After Claire returned home from Texas, she and Roger got into a big fight about respect and trust and stuff. I only caught some of it because I left to come back home a few hours after she got home from her trip.

That was a year ago.

           ****************************************************

I talked to Claire today. I just remembered her birthday was nine days ago so I called her. She tells me California is doing great, and, as usual, I tell her that someday she has to come visit me in New York.

Although I know she never will. 

She has this hang up about New York. She says she hates the East Coast. Often I remind her that she has never been to the East Coast. You have never been east of Oregon, I tell her. 

Roger has just moved out again. This time it’s for good, she said. She always says that this time it’s for good.  I held back from saying that that is what she said the last time. I hate when people say things like,“ I told you so.”               

All of a sudden, after I hung up with Claire, I get this incredible urge to call her back, to ask her if she still has that Japanese calendar. I can see that calendar before my eyes, with its picture of a garden and its Japanese lettering.

I should have just taken a long look at Roger’s penis when I had the chance last summer. 

Because I’m having trouble. I feel obsessed.

Every time I see a Japanese person, or eat Japanese food, I associate it with Roger. The Japanese calendar was the thing I stared at every time I didn’t want to look at Roger’s nakedness. 

I should have just looked and gotten it over with. 

She still has the calendar. She says she wants to stop playing games with Roger, that she admits she still has the outdated calendar hanging on the wall to make Roger jealous of her old boyfriend. 

She says she knows how much I liked it and that she is sending it to me. 

I thought women nudists would be easier on the eyes

I thought women nudists would be easier on the eyes

(written when I was 19 years old xo jen pastiloff)

courage, Jen Pastiloff, Jen's Musings

Roar.

January 18, 2013

beauty-hunting-jen-logo-black

By Jen Pastiloff.

Lie to me. 

That’s what I might have well have said by saying I don’t look like I gained any weight, right? It’s going to be okay, isn’t it? You are not having sex with anyone else, right? 

Tell me what I think I want to hear.

Some people like it straight. They want to be told what is. They want what is and what can be without any embellishments or I will make you feel betters. State the facts, please.

Not me.

I want to be appeased. Make me believe I am safe.

Recently, I decided that the truth is a much better version of the truth than a lie.

In my late twenties I had this boyfriend, the one who wouldn’t let himself be called “boyfriend”. I loved this not-boyfriend boyfriend . I went on the birth control pill for this not-boyfriend boyfriend. We’d been together a year, albeit a year where I was unsure of my standing with him beyond the fact that I knew I loved him and that he made me feel like I was crazy. Birth control pills meant no more condoms and that made the not-boyfriend boyfriend happy.

The first thing I remember about the garbage bag incident that red wrapper invading me with its plastic face. Everywhere I looked: red. His carpet, red, the inside of my eyelids, red. The (unfortunately for him) clear plastic trash bag had fallen over. Inside, grays and whites of innocent I will not hurt you trash, and then there it was: a Lifestyles condom stuck to a chicken take-out container. Nothing but the torn red of the wrapper visible through the clear plastic trash bag.

Of course I will take out the garbage on my way out.

The significance of images, powerful enough to place two people right there inside my mind, naked on a bed. Maybe they’re in a dark room, the blue glow of the television bobbing on the wall. The woman with him (not me), imagined as perfect and leggy.

And then there he was on top of me. All I could see were red Lifestyle wrappers like sheep jumping fences. Rows of them. One condom, two condom, three…

 

(Wow, all that work you’re doing, for nothing! All that huffing and grunting

and straining and pushing and pulling and I am not even here with you. I am an eyeball in a trash bag searching for clues of infidelity.) 

 I am lying to you. I am not here. Only my body is.

But as long as you have my body here, does it matter that you don’t have my mind too? 

I wondered how many women lied in this way? Making love to someone with their body

while their mind drifts I’m fat, who else is he having sex with, what can I eat for dinner? I wonder what time the movie starts, do I even love this guy? I wish he would hurry up, why would he want to have sex with anyone but me? Why don’t I satisfy him, Am I not enough? I’m not good enough for him, what’s wrong with me? I’m fat. Shit, I never called my mother back. I have to remember to pay the electric bill., Damn it, is he done yet? I am good enough for him, he’s not good enough for me….. No, not like that, like this!  I can’t even say that to him because he will get offended. Maybe I should try being with a woman. No, I couldn’t do that. He is such a selfish lover. I wonder what time it is, I wonder if I could fit into those jeans? Did I shut the stove? What day is it? Do I smell bad? I wonder if he thinks I smell bad? He smells kind of musty. It’s so gross when a guy smells bad. Is he done yet? Man, what is he doing? Does he think he is King Kong? Why does he play so many video games still? What? Is he five? I’m tired, Ouch, that hurts, what is he doing? I wonder if they have a class for men to become better lovers at The Learning Annexx?

His eyes, red burning slits. All I could see was that condom wrapper. Obsessed by a red remnant that was most certainly not my remnant, I couldn’t move. I was that paralyzed with not wanting to know the truth. You love me, right? You love me, right? Right? You love me?

My mind can be made to believe anything.

I’d known this all my life but the trash bag incident finalized it for me. Everywhere I looked I waited to be convinced of  I love yous and You’re safes and nothing bad will happens and I am not going anywheres.

My face in his pillow (do I smell another woman? Whose hair is that lying there?) The red wrapper actually turned into a body and that body turned into his body and his body in someone else’s body. Metamorphosis. Isn’t this, the chain of events, absolutely astounding?

How quickly the mind latches on to what it wants to believe is the truth. How little it takes to seal the deal.

You love me, right?

This logical procession of things is survival of the fittest. Except the fittest know how to survive, they know how to dispose of any evidence instead of asking me to pick it up with my own two small trembling fists. The fittest aren’t as stupid as you I thought as I waited to be convinced that the condom wasn’t his, that he didn’t know how it got there, that he swore it, that he loved me and was sorry.

I used to think reality was relative and irrelevant. Tell me what I want to hear. Tell me it wasn’t yours. Make me believe. 

Mine, and perhaps yours too, is a mind that filters everything through a vicious process of hypothetical situations, of beautifully formed sentences, of what ifs. Images left in a room of the brain to ferment will create an alternate universe where no matter what time it was with my not-boyfriend the time in my head was a red red world where he was having sex with someone other than me.

You love me, right? It wasn’t yours, right?

That really was the end of the not-relationship although it probably ended before that if I don’t lie to you. Of course he convinced me that it hadn’t been his condom. That it had been old or that it was his cousin’s and I’d nodded and said okay and shook from the I’m going be sick adrenaline in my body but I’d stayed. And I stayed. 

 

And for as much as I wanted him to lie to me to make me feel better in the moment, I’d known the truth all along. 

We always know the truth.

If he hadn’t lied, if he’d just said Yes, yes it’s mine and I am sleeping with someone else. Or, aren’t you at least glad I am using protection? I would have had to leave him. The lies gave me permission to stay. They gave me permission to hate myself more. The lies got me off the hook.

I am writing this from an airplane where I get some of my best (read: distraction free) writing done. I just ran into a man on the plane, who, along with his wife, sent me to Atlanta 6 years ago to visit my nephew when he was newborn and in the NICU. There were complications and he was having his little tiny blonde head scanned. He couldn’t eat. He was floppy. I didn’t even know what a floppy baby was back then. He might not survive were words nobody wanted to speak. They’d been my regulars at the restaurant where I’d worked for years. As I walked away with tears streaming down my face to get their Arnold Palmers they’d decided they would send me to Atlanta the next day. You have to be with your family. No discussion will be had. I simply had to say yes, they’d said over turkey sandwiches. And so I did.

Six years ago I went and held my sweet floppy buddy for the first time, once he was released from the hospital in Georgia.

 When I walked onto the plane this morning, the husband was on the flight, because you know, the world is really quite small like that. It’s so small that people who did for you the kindest things will pop up on airplanes Houston. He’d tried to jog my memory as if it needed jogging. As if I could ever forget them and what they did for me when I was a destitute waitress with a sick nephew. He kindly asked So, everything turned out okay then? With your nephew?

The lies. The lies when he was born and until he was two years old, when he finally got diagnosed with Prader Willi Syndrome and Autism. The subtle lies. The bold faced ones. To ourselves mainly. He is just taking his time. All babies develop differently. He’s fine. 

 When of course we knew. But how much safer it felt to be nestled inside a world where there is nothing wrong then thrown out into the wolves and the world of missing chromosomes. The wolves would eat us. Let’s stay safe. The baby’s fine. There is nothing wrong. He is healthy. Swimming with sharks was safer than telling the lies, but what did we know? We were scared, and I, for one, was used to lying to myself. It was not a foreign country. It was home.

I’d said to the kind husband It did turn out there was something. He has a rare genetic disorder. That is actually where I am going now. It’s hard, but he’s doing great. I will never forget what you and your wife did for me back then. I think of you all the time.

We hugged and took a photo together and I thought about how many people have done kind things for me along the way and how many untruths I have told myself about not deserving them.

Watching my friend Emily Rapp deal with the impending death of her baby boy I see how liberating the truth really is.

She could flail her arms and curse God and fate and Tay Sachs. She could tell lies about herself and her luck and what is in store for her (she might do this on occasion, she is a human being, after all) but the truth is what seems to keep her tethered. Without the truth she would float away into You’ll get over its and He’s going to be in a better place and everything happens for a reason. 

The truth of what is happening now and now and now. 

That is all there is.

She, nor any of us, knows what is going to happen beyond his death and that is the truest true. What keeps her writing and breathing are the sure facts of what is true now and now and now. In the moments her son has a tube in his nose for medication and some fluids. In the moments he sleeps and in the moments he is choking and in the moments she sits down to write when maybe all she wants to do is beat her fist at the sky and scream but she writes anyway.

If you face what is so, you will be the roar that wakes up the sun. You will be the day and the night and then the day again because it is the one thing no one can take away from you. The truth of what is will make you the strongest mountain lion. 

The truth will set you free some say. The truth hurts.

I don’t know, I think lies will set you free too. They will unglue you so much that you will have no idea who you are anymore as you float above everyone else with your own set of facts and knowledge. The lies hurt more than the truth but in that slow and painful death kind of way. 

The truth hurts too, at times. But, it’s what keeps you knowing this one very important fact: who you are. The fact of who you are in the world.

The truth was that I was a girl who didn’t love herself enough to leave someone who hurt her again and again. The lie was that it was all I deserved. The truth was that my nephew has a chromosome missing and he could possibly eat himself to death if not carefully watched and cared for. The lie was that nothing was wrong. The truth is that Emily loves her son and that yes, he will die. The lie is that anyone knows what that means for her or for him.

We think we are protecting ourselves when we lie to ourselves or when we have someone lie to us. Oh, our sweet unquiet minds, so prone to crave safety. So willing to cling to what is not real, to trade in lovers who don’t love us, missing chromosomes, death.

11 years ago my childhood friend came out to California to visit me after having hiked the Appalachian trail for 6 months by himself. I remember thinking it was the craziest thing I had ever heard, and also being slightly jealous because I knew I didn’t have the balls to do that at the time.

I might have the balls now.

I am the mountain lion.

I have finally been able to turn on the light and invite it in. The Truth, shivering and lonely. And unafraid. 

My friend had told me he’d started with a huge backpack and that by the end it was almost empty. All the weight he’d shed during the hike. He said he’d gone to find himself and I remember thinking at the time that I didn’t know any guys that talked like that. Find himself? Find the truth?

I asked him how he’d managed though, at the end, with almost nothing in his pack? Didn’t he need stuff?

Nothing is lost when you dump the untruths. It’s the letting go, the starting out with so much weight and ending up with water and a sleeping bag.

The truth is your sleeping bag. It’s your water.

It’s what carries you the rest of the way from here.

It’s what says Yes, I do love you and I have been here all along. Waiting.

It’s what takes your quivering body lying there in the corner of your kitchen floor and picks it up. It’s what turns you into the strongest mountain lion.

Speak the truth. 

You know what? Fuck that.

Roar.

 

 

Join Jen Pastiloff, the founder of The Manifest-Station, in The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts in Feb of 2015 for a weekend on being human. It involves writing and some yoga. In a word: it's magical.

Join Jen Pastiloff, the founder of The Manifest-Station, in The Berkshires of Western Massachusetts in Feb of 2016 for a weekend on being human. It involves writing and some yoga. In a word: it’s magical.

 The 12 Day Detox is here. Sign up now for the next cleanse on November 30th. Space is limited. This detox comes at just the perfect time. Reprogram your body and mind as we move into the holiday season. This is your time of rejuvenation and renewal.This is not a juice fast, or a detox based on deprivation.


The 12 Day Detox is here. Sign up now for the next cleanse on November 30th. Space is limited. This detox comes at just the perfect time. Reprogram your body and mind as we move into the holiday season. This is your time of rejuvenation and renewal.This is not a juice fast, or a detox based on deprivation.

Ring in New Years 2016 with Jen Pastiloff at her annual Ojai retreat. It’s magic! It sells out quickly so book early. No yoga experience required. Just be a human being. With a sense of humor. Email barbara@jenniferpastiloff.com with questions or click photo to book. NO yoga experience needed. Just be a human being

Ring in New Years 2016 with Jen Pastiloff at her annual Ojai retreat. It’s magic! It sells out quickly so book early. No yoga experience required. Just be a human being. With a sense of humor. Email barbara@jenniferpastiloff.com with questions or click photo to book. NO yoga experience needed. Just be a human being

 

funny

Sexorcism: The Sequel.

October 11, 2012

Okay, so my Sexorcism note apparently made it to Reddit yesterday and I have to admit that the social media geek in me was bummed that I didn’t put my website on it or something that had my name. A million people saw it! Gah! I had no idea it would go viral.

C’est l’avie.

Funny to also see what these Reddit people are saying like ” this is fake” and that it was “a friend of theirs’ note” etc. Oh, the internet, you crazy thing, you! Click here to see.

Anyway, I guess one of the people that saw it was my neighbor who wrote the note and this morning a new note was there. Ha! Here it is:

 

Anyway, all in good fun. Here’s to great sex!

The original note.