Weddingbee Blog

I’ve always thought of myself as independent and happy to be. I wanted to WANT a partner, never NEED one. People use the word “co-dependent” with a sneer when they’re mad that their friend showed up for dinner with her (uninvited) significant other. I never wanted to be that person, so I consciously stayed independent. I’m not irresponsible or selfish about my independence, and it’s not that I’m unwilling to compromise or “settle down.” I just know myself very, very well after years of trying to understand what works for my delicate emotional balance.

I am someone who needs alone time, and I get very moody without it. I am someone who needs space to wander around the city by myself for a day, to go on a week-long roadtrip with my friends, to have lunch with an ex I’m still friends with. I need to be allowed time to read a whole book in one sitting, and I need to close my door on a Wednesday night and talk to my best friend for an hour.

I could not be with someone, long-term, who did not allow me this freedom. I would feel squelched, like I had no room to be myself, and I think I would run. Another way of looking at it is this: I am very, very good at articulating what I’m feeling, what I need, and I need a partner who can do the same. Fortunately for me, there are some days when I swear God himself slipped Mr. PD an owner’s manual: Operation Instructions for Dating a Crazy Lady. He loves me for it, even, that heaven-sent fool.

And yet…I’m not nearly as independent as I like to think. As I’ve grown up these past eight years, he’s been there the whole time—from a time when I was practically a child to now that I’m (practically) an adult. Whether I like it or not, I’ve grown up not only with him, but around him. He is a part of how my coping mechanisms have developed into my adult life. Him beside me is part of who I am and how I work as a person, even on a very basic level. There are moments—tiny disappointments and great tragedies—that leave me marveling at this. He holds all of my pieces together when I feel like they’re coming loose left and right.

On vacations, out with friends, at home after work, of course I can be without him.

But when it really counts—when life is confusing or overwhelming or seemingly hell-bent on chipping away at my spirit—I need him. NEED him. And that’s OK.

I like to think of us as interdependent, but let’s call a spade a spade. Co-dependent it is! I need my guy like a kid needs a blankie, and I like it that way.

Anyone else want to own it? Co-dependent, holla!