I couldn’t believe my luck: Charlotte was everything I wanted! Smart, beautiful, supportive, a pet lover, and an English teacher! Just like me!
And I knew in my gut that she was the one I had been looking for: one of my beloved soul-partners. I saw her in my mind’s eye the moment I decided to leave the city to move across state lines to live in a small town near Lake Michigan.
Two months after I arrived at my new home, I saw Charlotte’s photo on a dating app and knew it was her. I already knew that we had had several lives together. The most impactful one being when we were witches together in France in the 1500s. Unfortunately, in that life, we were publicly humiliated due to our status as female lovers (we were forced to walk naked through the town square). Oh - and the being burned at the stake thing. That wasn’t awesome either.
But I remembered our life together. Living in a small cabin. Dried herbs hanging from the ceiling. A warm and loving home. A cute loft area where we held on to each other as we fell asleep every night.
And after a LONG Pandemic of living alone and feeling isolated, here was my chance to [re]connect after hundreds of years of being apart! And we were both still Pagans! (She was also still part Christian. A paradox that was challenging for her to navigate.)
We immediately connected - FB messaging, texting, talking on the phone, and meeting in person when we could (we lived 75 minutes away from each other). When we met for the first time, it was powerful. But also confusing. I both recognized her and didn’t recognize her at the same time. The familiarity was comforting. But I could sense a divide right away.
Charlotte and I were able to chat easily and connect about a lot of topics, there was a palpable spark, and we seemed to really enjoy being in each other’s presence. I met her wonderful daughter and her family. It was exciting and natural. But I could tell there was a steep wall - one that was impossible to breach.
A lot can happen in hundreds of years and multiple lifetimes that makes you not compatible with your soul-partners anymore. I have spent this lifetime trying to heal from my past traumas, but she has spent this lifetime trapped in religious totalitarianism. The six years she spent in a Christian Cult - followed by living out the tenets for over a decade in her personal life - really took a toll on her.
My therapist taught me how difficult it can be to have healthy relationships after living in a cult. Charlotte was thoroughly trained how to be a Stepford Wife for ministers. She seemed so supportive and nurturing at first, but these attributes ended up being a performative side effect of her training. In reality, the need for her to reclaim power and control was so great that she couldn’t bear to share it with anyone else. And it went to the other extreme because after she left the cult, Charlotte transformed from being the oppressed to being the oppressor.
It makes sense. When you have had all your decisions made for you, it is probably difficult to “give up” (or compromise) any of your choices ever again. Her agency was everything to her. But she was unwilling to accept that my agency also mattered to me. Codependence was a requirement for her; she needed me to sacrifice my needs for her. But I wasn’t interested in that dynamic anymore. I desired a relationship that was rooted in equity.
Charlotte told me the week after we first met that I wasn’t allowed to question or challenge her. About anything. Ever. And I soon found out that she didn’t ever want to be disagreed with. About anything. Ever. Nor was I to tell her about what I needed or wanted. And I was NEVER supposed to reveal if she ever did something that upset me.
At first, I just thought it was about emotional consent. A concept that intrigued me - understanding that not everyone wants a mirror held up and/or to be fully “seen.” I am a curious soul who embraces critical thinking and questions everything. I value authenticity and vulnerability. My favorite quote (from 1984) is, “Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood,” and I am aware that this is not everyone’s jam. She wanted to remain a mystery; she needed to remain hidden and I tried to create space for that. I think she would have preferred for me to remain a mystery, too. But hiding is not healthy for me.
It took me a bit to realize that what she actually wanted was a watered-down version of me. She wanted us to be Stepford Witches together - with her version remaining performative and mine being the “real” deal.
And her sideways-spewing self-shame made me feel like my thoughts, feelings, and needs didn’t matter to her.
I, embarrassingly, chipped off parts of myself to be what she wanted. I erroneously assumed that my concerns with her hot and cold behaviors were due to my own insecure/anxious attachment disorder and that something was wrong with me. I didn’t trust what I had learned in therapy and continued to get smaller and smaller - attempting to take up less and less space. I threw all my self-esteem-building-work out the window way too quickly. I was constantly walking on eggshells - worried that I would trigger her verbal lashes. And my desire to connect with another human overshadowed whether that human was [still] good for me.
There were things that felt good about the relationship. The companionship. The chemistry. The love of literature. It kept me engaged - until it wasn’t enough anymore and I realized I was starting to disappear. She wanted me to be more light and playful. Less intense. Less of a critical thinker. Less me.
Ultimately, her Jekyll and Hyde act, her consistent lies, her inability to maintain her performative act of empathy, her criticisms of who I was at my core, and her gaslighting and punitive ghosting - proved to be too much for me. Our pull was strong, but my desire for emotional health was stronger. And after two months of an intense roller coaster, our adventure ran its course. I would like to say it ended peacefully, but it didn’t. It was more peaceful than being burned at the stake, but, oddly enough, it was significantly less connecting.
I don’t regret our time together because there was an important lesson that I needed to learn: just because you were connected to someone in a past life, does not mean you are meant to be together in the present one. A sad, but real truth. And she gave me the opportunity to practice what I learned in therapy - learning how to listen to my gut and not allow myself to be consistently mistreated.
And I now know that I can’t prioritize a past connection over a present dysfunctional situation. My therapist calls that Radical Acceptance.
And, sometimes, healing hurts.
