Friday night, Lorelei asked me point blank, "If I could learn to deal with my jealousy issues, and be okay with the polyamory thing, would you want to get back together?"

Now, I've known all along that this conversation was bound to come up.  Despite that, I wasn't prepared for it.  So I sort of stumbled through it.  I told her that this was somewhat of a turnabout for her, because just a few months ago she was going on and on about how she could understand polyamory on an intellectual level, but could never accept it on an emotional level.  All the while, of course, trying to make me feel guilty for "choosing polyamory over our marriage."  (Not how it went down, of course, but whatever.)  And now here she is saying she can "work on it."

And it was sounding to me like she wanted to reunite now, and save the "working on it" until later.  I told her flat out that I thought that was a bad idea... that I felt she and I both need to heal and become strong as single individuals before we give serious thought to being a couple again.

I could tell she wasn't happy with this analysis, but we changed the subject and moved on.  And I'd hoped that she'd accept this logical response.

No such luck.

It came up again today, and it wasn't pleasant.  It was a two part conversation, with about four hours in between.  I wasn't up to talking about it at first, so I sort of ended the call quickly.  I could tell, though, that she felt put off.  Can't blame her, I guess.

Then later, when I called back, I could tell she'd been crying.  There was a lot said, but the gist of it was that she was trying to get me to say I wanted to get back together, unconditionally.  And that's simply not true.  I told her I had doubts about it, because of my doubts about turnaround on the poly subject.  She said I should feel flattered by the fact that she was willing to make such a change for me.  I told her I was, but that I couldn't help but also feel guilty about it, if that's what she chose to do.  And that I'd always fear that, some day in the not-too-distant future, she'd again decide that it wasn't a lifestyle she was comfortable with, and we'd be right back where we are now.

And finally, I admitted the biggie: that I was concerned that her whole reason for bringing this up at this point in time, her whole reason for wanting to get back together, was because she didn't want to be alone.  She very quickly said that wasn't it.  True, she didn't want to be alone, but she wanted to get back together because she loved me and wanted to be with me.

Again, I brought up my "sensible" approach... of us becoming healthier apart before reuniting.  She said, "Why does it have to be sensible?  Can't you just follow your heart?"

"Well, honestly," I said, "my heart's still a little sore."

She paused for a moment.  "Because of me?"

"Well, yeah," I said, remembering the rather brutal stomping she gave it last fall.  And at that point, she said she felt worse than before I called her, said she had to go, and hung up. 

After a minute, I called her niece, Kelli, who happens to live in the same apartment complex.  She said she'd pop over to see her, then call me back later.

To me - and of course, I could be wrong - this sounds like the co-dependency talking.  Oh, I'm sure she misses me, even still loves me...  but as I've written before, I really don't think she "gets" polyamory, so she's grasping at anything that will prevent her from having to live and function alone.  It's really sad, honestly.  I just wish she'd acknowledge this problem and get help for it.  She has a counseling session tomorrow.  Hopefully the doctor will be insightful enough to come to this realization quickly.

But what really kills me is how could she not think my heart would still be hurting?  Her actions last fall were very hurtful.  Looking back over entries from that period, I realize I've shared very little about these particular actions.  Why?  I'm not entirely sure.  Probably because I didn't want to reveal a whole lot about what she was going through, out of some sort of courtesy.  But the truth is, she treated me like shit for a while, and I've never felt as though she's totally acknowledged that, let alone apologized for it.

So yeah... I'm a bit hesitant to get re-involved, as you might expect.  And no, I'm not going to feel even the least bit guilty about saying so.