A New Devious Chapter

The day that Rabbit was feeling overwhelmed, we first went to drop off something to my brother.  Squishy had plans to go meet friends, so we didn't have to be up and moving super early like we normally would during the school year.  When we did get out the door though, we initially had plans, but it didn't quite work out.   However, while on the ride, I don't remember what prompted it, but something came up that had Rabbit saying about how he didn't need group sex anymore because he had me, and that I wasn't interested in it.  I told him that regardless of me, if he wanted to do something, we'd figure out a safe way to go about it that made us both comfortable and happy.  He assured me that if he wanted to, he would tell me, and that he understood that I wouldn't provide everything he might ever want, just like how I couldn't do some things for him.  Then he gave the example that he couldn't do impact the way I want, because I don't see him that

 While I'm finally getting back to being productive with a lot of things, and finding my way in juggling everything I do, I'm also taking on even more new things this month.  I'm writing for more platforms, sharing some writing amongst different platforms, and at the same time, trying to figure out the logistics of all these things.  That means design projects, timeline organization, as well as figuring exactly how much time I have, and will need to do all of these things. To top that off, I'm trying to do more to take care of myself at the same time again.  With so much travel back and forth, I tend to quickly let go of physical care for me, and that isn't the best in the long run.  I'm trying to make sure I integrate that into my day as well, and I need to figure out how that can stay a habit even when I travel, because summer means more long stays with Rabbit. So many new things also means that I need to remember the things that are a little less urgent or fi

As I continue to get caught up on things here, I was reminded of something that happened about a week before leaving for Israel.  There was a massive relationship landmark, which for many, would now consider Rabbit and I, nearly eight months in at the time, to have a real relationship finally.  Amusingly enough, we didn't even realize it at the time, but we wound up having our first fight.  And of all things, it was about money in a way, which makes it count double. Leading up to the trip, I had wanted to send Rabbit money to cover expenses.  His parents wanted me to pay them back for the ticket, which I was prepared for, and likewise intended to pay for everything else I did.  We both use different platforms to send funds normally, so I asked him to set up one so that I could send him money, and brought it up regularly, in the months and weeks leading up to the trip. Well, while many times he legitimately forgot, and I try to stay patient because he can't juggle as many things

 It took a few weeks after traveling, honestly.  With trying to get everything as caught up and ahead as it needed to be, and juggling preparation for a major trip, I was constantly working at my maximum for the weeks leading up to Israel.  Then while I had intended to get some things done, I only worked for maybe two hours total in those two weeks, along with the frantically changing plans due to things happening as soon as we were back in the states. The first week back was a hobble of a return to routine.  I was doing the things I needed to do, sure.  I got Squishy off to school every day, but jet lag had me getting tired early.  Anything that had a deadline was being met, but anything extra in those beginning days, I just didn't have the energy for.  Luckily, I had prepared for that, and was ahead on as much as possible for the entirety of May.  Knowing I'd only have about a week home before another night at Rabbit's and having to do some prep for his birthday didn'

While in Israel, I was talking to my mother, and she mentioned an old friend was cleaning her pond, and wound up shattering her ankle.  She would need some heavy surgery, and my parents intended to go out there for a couple of days to help give a hand as she recovered.  I told her we would look at dates once I got home, but I planned to be gone for most of the weekend after I returned, because it was Rabbit's birthday.  She asked for then twentieth time when his birthday was, and I reminded her, with the same landmark of being the day after my grandmother. A few days later and I'm back in the states.  We have a day or so to recover from jet lag, but rather than just some relaxing sleep and getting through a mountain of laundry, Rabbit was in the middle of moving rooms around, due to some roommate issues, and other friends moving in.  We got a call during our trip that had Rabbit dreading conversations that needed to happen, and were keeping him from sleeping.  He had a plan in

 One day my parents get home and I help them bring in some rocking chairs that need to be assembled.  They're going to be put together in the house, and then put on the front porch, my mom having finally decided on what she wanted.  The old man asks me about something he doesn't know about, then starts yelling at me when I go to explain it, because apparently I'm wrong, even though he didn't know to start. I went upstairs afterward, and thought about it.  I thought about how different my relationship now is with Rabbit.  How we listen and care, making sure to respond rather than react.  We learn from each other, both with the questions we ask, and as well how to respond to issues.   There's a part of my mind that's constantly yelling because of it.  That love and a relationship can't be this peaceful.  Something this healthy and considerate must be a trick.  It tells me that I should run, before I'm torn apart, abused in pieces like so many times before.

 For a couple of months now, I've had the feeling that Rabbit and I are gonna make it for the long haul.  We're both committed to us, and have created a patient, caring relationship that is the complete opposite from everything I've ever experienced.  In many ways, we still have the comfortable friendship we've always had, just with the loving space of a relationship on top of that strong foundation.  I realized one day, that I wanted to make him a permanent part of my life, and even started quietly looking at rings for him. At first, I didn't tell him.  I didn't want to feel too forward, and had a lot of anxiety over some of the surrounding issues, and the logistics of them which were very in the air.  Eventually though, while spending time with him, he started tiptoeing around similar topics, and I called him out on it.  He begrudgingly admitted to feeling about the same way, but didn't go into details then.  For a couple of days afterward, we danced aroun

 A while ago, probably near the end of March, my old man asked me what was up with Rabbit and I and our relationship.  Having just passed being together for six months, I sort of shrugged and said that it's still a relatively new relationship.  He just asked if it was looking like we might live together at some point.  I told him that I still liked him, but not much past that. I wasn't going to tell him that we had just talked about some day living together.  Likewise, I wasn't going to even remotely mention that I had already been looking at rings to pop the question to Rabbit. So he started on about how we've been dating for a while, and how he liked him, and then kept saying all the things that reminded Rabbit of himself. And I won't lie, there was a moment as he said it that my brain tried telling me that because he liked my boyfriend, I couldn't.  That anyone like him was going to be horrible for me, and anyone he likes is clearly not the right option.  As

Rabbit and I are at an amount of time where it's just on that verge of being considered a long term relationship, and yet due to having very long previous relationships, still feels short.  It's only just about seven months altogether, but is still at a point where we now feel settled in in many ways. And one of the things that I recently had seen, as well as having talked about, was that most couples stop dating once they become exclusive, and find some routine in simply existing around each other.  That most couples spend their time watching tv together, not talking, or discussing, or doing anything to grow themselves or their relationship.  It causes stagnation, or even the seeds of resentment if the timeline goes long enough. We still try to find pockets of time, whenever we can, to go on little adventures together.  Even if it's just taking a short drive to somewhere to walk around, we get time when we can focus on each other, our relationship, and strengthening our bo

 I spent a weekend that I initially wasn't planning to with Rabbit again.  Well, we were planning on it, to the point of him initially taking the weekend off of work.  When we both got the plague however, I suggested he swap to his normal work schedule, and I would stay home to try and get more caught up on things.  Then he mentioned his parents wanting to have a talk with me before we left the country about expectations and all, and because we didn't know when they were leaving, we decided it was best for me to go with him again. Well, his parents aren't leaving for almost another month, so we didn't need to rush, but it was a good dinner to have with them.  I'll be there in the middle of Passover, so we'll have the whole talk then.  There was a funny moment though, when his father said that I need to start speaking Hebrew, and I told him I was working on it, having never mentioned that I was learning previously.  He asked how it was coming along, and I just to

 Since being sick, I've been trying to get back on track with everything, and caught up with many others.  It's tough, and means that I've had to be extra on top of everything I'm doing every day in order to be sure I'm making progress on getting back to where I should be.  Top that off with how spring is always a bit of madness with so much going on, and it means things are a bit more stacked against me in not just getting caught back up, but ahead as much as I want to be. I've been trying to use every pocket of time that I get to record, as I'm at a point where it feels like every piece of the story I'm reading is super long, and each entry is a full recording, rather than being able to get through swathes at a time.  Those long recordings also take time to edit, before turning into a video, although I am getting faster.  Luckily, I've been on top of getting ahead with drawing, so I technically have everything I need to do finished for that, and am

 It's been about twenty years since I've been on a plane.  Not only that, but both times I was on a plane previously I was with my parents, and I've never left the country.  While I typically have realistic ideas on what to expect in different places, doing new things in regard to travel makes me very anxious. And I've just realized recently that in only a couple of weeks, I'm going to be flying over an ocean with just my boyfriend to meet his family for the first time.  I know I'll be overpacking in some ways, but no more than I would on any other trip.  I'm making sure to account for many things I know Rabbit won't think of, and trying to be on top of everything, as I know how forgetful he is.   At the same time, I'm trying to be as minimal with packing as possible.  I want to make sure I have room for souvenirs, and with probably staying with different family, don't want to have too much to keep track of.  Not to mention that in regards to fam

 In all my back and forth with Instagram, I've kind of settled into mostly using it as a way to find cute things to send to Rabbit.  Some of them are flirty, and some of them talk about aspects of relationships we identify with in good ways, and once in a while things about healing, which we're both still very much doing. And one day, while sending silly things about butts, I found a video that simply mentioned "Who you are now, is who would have made you feel safe as a child."  As I sat with it, tears came to my eyes, and ran down my face.  I only really let myself think about it for a few moments at the time, but it was true. I grew up having no idea what safe was.  That feeling on eggshells was normal, and having to hide everything about myself.  That sharing things got you harmed, and that everyone was in a position of power over you.  I've grown up learning how not to be.  How to create a balanced space.  Wanting to be nothing like the people who raised me, a

 February really was full of a lot of hard talks with Rabbit, where we both wound up in a processing space to understand everything that the other had been through.  It left us feeling closer, but drained, and wishing just for some boring time together. One of those times was my sharing how I found out about the gnome cheating on me, the lies inside of that, and the horrible things pertaining to it that just got worse the longer you looked at it.  We went into some of the abuse he put me through, how it's affected me in the long run, and how I deal with it now. And his first response while on the phone, was asking if he was allowed to cause him harm.  Saying that he didn't know how I wasn't expecting him to go murder him. So I told him, that while none of what he did was ok, and none of it is something anyone should deal with, I've used it as something to learn from rather than letting myself be a victim.  It's taught me in a way how to be a better person for him, a

 Since the start of the new year I've been slowly moving back toward all the habits I had early last year.  Because of the summer, being away from home, being more social, and starting a new relationship that is present and healthy, a lot of things went to the wayside in some bad ways.  There's also been some other happenings at home, that have really given a hit to my mental health, which also makes it difficult to do all the things I need to. Squishy has simply not been doing school work.  I'm constantly getting emails about her not handing in assignments, which only require her to push a button.  Most of the grades on the things she does hand in are good, so it's not that she doesn't understand, it's that she just doesn't want to do the work, and would rather play around on discord.  Because all the work is on the computer, it's at the point where I need to have her where I can see her screen to ensure that she's actually doing anything related to

For years, I've written about how I see Valentine's as a day to show love for everyone in your life.  That it's important to me to remove the romance from it, and make love something to celebrate in all forms, and show that to anyone you care about. This year, I have a Rabbit who is silly, cheesy, and encourages actually observing and celebrating holidays together.  Something that honestly, I've never really had. We made plans to spend the weekend after the holiday together, because Squishy had a long weekend, and we've both had a lot going on.  It worked out well as far as I was concerned, because initially it was supposed to be a long weekend after over a week apart, due to his work schedule being messed with.  After the emergency with one of the dogs, it still worked in my head, because we would each get a chunk of time to get our own things taken care of. I was entirely prepared to spend Valentine's apart, and ok with it, because it was something I was used

 I remember for the longest time seeing the idea of couples apps, and shrugging them off.  Thinking that I was above them, because I could manage a relationship myself, and that using any tools was a failure. And then I started thinking about ways to help Rabbit, and keep him on track, or provide some amount of accountability.  Initially, I had wanted a sort of shared to-do list.  Something I could add pertinent reminders to, that he knew we could both see, and so it would stay visible in a way that might keep so many things from falling through the cracks. So I went looking, and the majority of what I had found happened to be a relationship app.  I almost refused to even ask about any of them, because they seemed ridiculous to me.  As I looked at it though, it had all the tools I was looking for, as well as some other cute things.  So I tossed the idea at him, and while it took a week or so for us to get to it, because he still does have ADHD, we finally tried it. We found something a

 For a while, I noticed some of Rabbit's behaviors, and how he would joke about ADHD.  I saw how he was functioning now that there is time and space from his ex moving out, but could see the patterns in his habits.  I had thought those would be things that simply changed with time, and eventually when things fell on him, he would start to be more productive, especially as he felt happier. And yes, I noticed also the things that motivated him, or helped him continue to get things done.  Still though, there were many things that he simply hasn't made progress with, opting instead to continue on this path of least resistance.  Recently, it helped me realize that we're moving out of the honeymoon phase, because I could see how eventually I would wind up frustrated by this, and need to end things. But then, he told me that he actually is diagnosed on paper with ADHD.  That he tried multiple different kinds of meds as a kid, and they all had a horrible effect on him.  So while ma

 One of the biggest conversations that Rabbit and I had coming up to the decision to be together, was one about polyamory.  While I've had multiple serious partners before, and made sure to put effort into all of them, he's only ever had open relationships where he had one serious connection, and the freedom to have sex with others.  In fact, the few times he had a partner who asked for additional relationships, they wound up hurting him, or abandoning him soon after. And that's an entirely valid reason to not feel safe with trying.  Still, whenever the subject came up, I mentioned that he might feel different if he saw he was still being taken care of.  Constantly with the thought process that he might change.  While he didn't seem opposed, he was definitely uncomfortable, and I only realized a couple of weeks after the last time that it came up how self centered the idea was. Sure, I may be capable of polyamory, I don't actually know if I need it.  I've never

 Health issues are nothing new to me.  Almost everyone closest to me has a myriad of mental and physical maladies, which I have learned the workings of, and have gotten used to.  They come with rules, and everyone has learned to manage them as well as possible. And now I have a Rabbit, who also comes with his own collection.  His biological parents weren't the best during pregnancy, which has caused him to grow up with a lot of interesting things.  He has an assortment of allergies which are nice in some ways, and difficult in others, a pile of digestion issues which have a lot of rules, and some other medical things that make him feel mentally uncomfortable. It's lead to him always checking with me.  Asking if I actually love him so much that I don't want to run away.  Having him feel anxious or shameful, because of things that are just the way his body works. And then I read something that clicked.  It talked about the price of admission to have a person in your life.  If