In order to make people happy I have compromised. I have agreed with things because it would make someone else happy or at least not mad. Even if this meant I didn’t enjoy it, I could tolerate it because the other person was more important than me.
The problem is that often they did not become happy because of my sacrifice. So this was a pointless sacrifice to martyr myself. That wasn’t my intent, but that allowed people to bulldoze over me, and disregard my feelings and view… or did it?
What I killed was my self-respect, because “we should love our neighbors as ourselves” cause the Bible says to. But I didn’t love myself, I did it to make others love me and so they didn’t, and I didn’t really love them.
Think about that wording… “as ourselves” so if you treat yourself bad, and hate yourself what about those poor neighbors. You can’t love them any better than yourself so stop trying to martyr yourself…
Speaking of Neighbors
One has a pair of pitbulls. The female is sweet. The male worries me. He actually scares me on occasion. The times I have been scared by a dog I could count on one hand… Even dogs who have made me nervous at first have calmed down around me.. No this one keeps getting more and more aggressive.
But he nor the dogs are really a next door neighbor. They belong to a house around the corner. There is a lot that behind that neighbor, then is partially behind house on the corner, completely behind the house beside me, and completely behind mine. So this is a house 4 houses away and a lot behind all 4 of us. I contacted animal control. They needed the property owner’s permission.
These dogs escape their yard and run down to my yard to be with my dogs. I didn’t like it, but ok. Then the male started getting into fights with the female. (I contacted their owner) Then he was lunging at Butch; my lab/rott who has a dementia, through the fence. (I contacted their owner) He then started tracking my cocker spaniel. (I contacted their owner) Butch would get torn up. Luna 🙁
He started lunging at the fence, biting, snapping and snarling. (I contacted their owner) I threw things at him to get him away, I piled things against my fence to keep him away (I contacted their owner.) And then as I dug a channel to place a little barrier against the bottom of my fence to pile dirt behind he started biting at me. He made contact, and busted my thumb. The fence kept him from actually biting me, but my thumb was swollen and purple. 🙁 This is when I realized being nice for the neighbor was disrespectful of myself, my dogs, our safety and our lives, possibly someone else if those dogs become more aggressive.
I contacted the police. I filed reports. If the dog comes through MY fence I can have animal control pick them up. If they bite me or my dogs, they will be quarantined and put down. I contacted the property owner, he is terrified of the dogs. I contacted animal control again with the property owner right there. He gave permission for them to come on his property and seize the dogs. I also filed pictures online with some of the documentation of the time frame, with contacts, and pictures of my thumb. This was public documentation with all but the FB exchange because it would show his name.
Another Lesson and A Friend Lost?
That was Wednesday, my lessons in self respect had not ended. Friday night came. Around 7 pm my ex-boyfriend called. Funny it had been exactly a year since last time I saw him. . I knew he was in town for the Dallas Cowboys game. He wanted to meet me and we could get together. He talked about meeting in Rockwall or at my house, from some of the things he said I didn’t feel comfortable with him at my house.
With good reason.
We met at an entertainment place. It has bowling, video games, kids games, mini golf, lazer tag (their spelling), go carts and more. More includes two bars, but both are pretty open to the public. We talked some but he kept trying to make out with me. Then he told me how I gave him the bad boyfriend speech and yelled at him. I reminded him he yelled at me every time we went to the lake… “I get it you hate the lake.” “I never said that, but you yelled at me every time so …” “so now you are bringing up the past.” “only because you did. I asked how you were.”
So he went back to telling me how he was. How his family was. He ordered from the bartender and insulted him when he walked off. Then he started trying to make out with me. This was at a public place and with kids. Twice I had to knock his hand out of my shirt. And twice away from my chest.
He kept trying to get me to invite him home. And he used lots of persuasive salesman type techniques. And they were very persuasive, but not enough. In the end he walked me to my car, just to flip me off. I got home at 11:30. I was happy, because it was good to see him again, because I still cared, because while he was charming I kept my self-respect… even if he was rude I wouldn’t be. Since he said he “was f*ing driving all the way to Abilene” I said on his FB wall, (like I do with many other friends) It was good to see you.
At 2:22 my phone woke me from a dead sleep. A call from him. it wouldn’t be good, so I turned it to silent and was dead asleep very soon after. 10 more calls in the next 30 minutes. The next morning it was because I “f*ing put that message on his wall and now his f*ing family wants to know if we were seeing each other again… no all we did is look at each other” “Because we didn’t have sex we didn’t see each other.” “no all we f*ing did is look at each other.” and he unfriended me because he had no idea what other f*ing sh*t I’d say next.
You know what?
It hurt. It hurt that he values me so little. It hurt that he thinks so little of me, it hurt and I contacted a few friends rather than to sink into it, and got a few opinions and that helped me find my path. (Which is a post for tomorrow). It still hurt, but then it stopped. I have known his sister for years. His cousins are my cousins. Hearts make family. I lost someone who didn’t respect me. Keeping him in my life was a personal disrespect. So I gain self respect. What did I lose?
Now while you are thinking this story is about how someone disrespected me… is it? maybe it’s how someone disrespects you and if you lose them, maybe you gain your own self respect. …. just a gentle reminder… that you rock.
Live ♥ Laugh ♥ Love
MJ Schrader
