This past year, starting from the middle of last July, has not been the best I've ever had.  My relationship ended, I lost the home I was sharing with him and I had to move back into my own place, which it turned out was full of mold.  I spent the rest of the summer on couches and in hotels, trying to pull myself back together. After what felt like endless dealings with contractors and condo corporation reps,  I finally got back home at the end of August, and returned to work the next week.

Truth be told, although I am over the relationship, I haven't ever really recovered my confidence.  I have never exactly been overflowing with it, but after being completely blindsided the way I was I have struggled with trying to come to terms with the fact that there's a chance I may never have a successful long term relationship.  I don't say this to be self-pitying, and it doesn't mean I have given up on the idea altogether, but the fact is most of the men I meet in my life are already in relationships, and the ones that aren't are either not interested in me or just not what I am looking for.  I know I could be in a relationship if I wanted to compromise what I want, but I think I would rather be alone than be with someone just for the sake of not being alone.

Since coming to this understanding, I have spent a lot of time trying to find happiness in the things I do have, such as my friends, my family, my cat (yeah yeah, I know) and my job.  This past year has been the best one of my career to date, and  a lot of days when I found myself struggling to get out of bed I have found that it was the pleasure I get from my job, and specifically my students, that has helped me get through a lot of the self-doubt I've faced.  Since rejoining the dating world I've faced a great deal of rejection so far and I just found that work really seemed to help me get through it and give me a sense of purpose.

So last month when I was officially notified I was being declared excess at my school it was a really tough blow.  I felt like my one constant, the one thing I had to rely on when everything else was in a constant state of transition, was my job.  I can't really think of a better illustration of the "being kicked when your down" sentiment.

I have been trying very hard not to let it show at work how hard I am actually taking this.  I know there are a lot of people in even less stable positions than I am and I feel a little self-absorbed getting upset about it when I know that at the very least I will have a job somewhere.

The thing is, as far as I can tell, those people have other things in their lives, people in their lives, that they can rely on. I've spent so much time convincing myself not to be unhappy about the lack of a relationship in my life because of the relationships I had cultivated at work that losing this position feels kind of like getting dumped all over again.

It wasn't until today, however, when I received a rejection email for the transfer job I desperately wanted, that I realized I have reached my rejection threshold.  The number of times I have been rejected over the past year compared to the number of times I've been accepted is severely out of whack, and I have finally reached my breaking point.  So the meltdown I had tonight wasn't really about the job, or the Penguins losing, or the fact that I really want this guy to ask me out and he won't, or the loss of my position at Carter, or all of the guys who've gone on just enough dates to get to know me before rejecting me for various reasons, or the end of my relationship this summer.  It's the fact that for the past year I've been struggling so hard to get back up on my feet every time I have pushed down by rejection and I just don't know how to keep pushing forward anymore.

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It may have come up once or twice in my blogging past that I suck at dating.  Well guess what?  I still suck at dating. 

Now I could dedicate an entire entry to the many shortcomings of men in general, but truthfully, I think I've been there and done that. I briefly flirted with the idea of focusing on my shortcomings, but then I realized I don't actually have any. 

While I was tossing around these ideas, I had a conversation with a friend of mine.  We'll call her Sara.  Sara is nineteen, and is still learning about the ways of men.  Currently, she is going through the unfortunate experience of learning that some guys will do or say just about anything to sleep with a woman, and once they get what they want, they become a completely different person.

Listening to Sara tell me what she was feeling, I started to get angry.  Somehow this cowardly excuse for a human being had convinced one of the nicest, sweetest girls I know that she was worthless.  She felt stupid and used and worst of all, she still wanted him. Not the asshole he really is, but the person he pretended to be in order to win her over in the first place.

The thing is, the only stupid one in this situation is him.  Perhaps Sara was a bit naive, but we've all been guilty of that.  But she didn't mislead anyone, or lie, or pretend to be something she's not.  And what is really hurting her isn't the fact that she slept with him and he didn't call, it's that she misjudged him, and now she doesn't trust her ability to recognize when someone actually likes her as opposed to someone who is playing her to get some action.

When I realized this was what the real issue was for Sara, I had a minor epiphany about my own life.  All of my recent dating issues are stemming from the same root cause - I don't trust my own judgement. I understand why this seems like a bit of an obvious statement, but sometimes things that are so glaringly apparent to everyone else are difficult to see in the mirror of self-reflection.

So what does this do for me?  Well really, not a hell of a lot.  But it did help me to chill out a little in regards to my own current dating situation.  I've been on a few dates recently with a particular person, and so far I have thought that they were pretty good dates.  From my perspective they were - I had fun, never felt uncomfortable, we seem to have a lot of common interests and attitudes, and he actually seems to get my sense of humour.  For all intents and purposes this should be a positive thing.  Yet lately I've found myself making that same mistake I always do - over-analyzing everything.  What he does or doesn't do, what he says or doesn't say, and what it means (or might mean).  Now I realize, I am doing this because so far, I think he likes me.  But I don't trust myself enough to accept that, so instead I analyze everything to death, looking for proof.

What it boils down to is this - maybe he likes me, maybe he doesn't.  But examining and re-examining everything he says isn't going to do anything to change that.  I find guys to be pretty simple creatures.  If he talks to you, and agrees to spend time with you, and seems to have fun with you when he does, it's most likely because he wants to. 

I've realized I need to start to just take things at face value.  There are always going to be people who deceive me, and people I misjudge.  But I don't think it's worth missing out on the good in life just to avoid the bad.

That said, I still think I suck at this whole dating thing.  I'm just not going to worry about it so much.

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