Lost in my Guy world

Today has not been a good day.

Dawn and I have been fighting today.  I hate fighting.  I hate getting angry.  I hate people being angry with me.  When things like this I happen I start to shut down.  I know people will tell you that it's the wrong thing to do but if I don't then I become my mother.  I tend to say things that I know will hurt the most and I don't like being that way.  Especially after being on the receiving end from my mother for years.  That is the main reason that I keep such a tight hold on my temper.  I don't even want to talk about what started the fight.

I find myself in an odd situation.  I am still friends and talk to everyone I have ever dated except for Melissa and that's really no big loss.  You might be saying that it's a good thing that I am still friends with all of them.  This is the problem.  Everything I have ever done in my life (that I can remember thanks to a head injury) and every place that I have been was with Mel.  I've know her for over 30 years and we were together for almost 22 years.  Apparently I use her name too much when I'm talking about my past.  Dawn tells me that it hurts her to hear her name.  Her suggestion was that I say "we" instead of "Mel and I".  This is the part I don't understand......SHE STILL KNOWS WHO I'M TALKING ABOUT!!!!!!  I said I would try not to use her name so much.  To me the only other option I have is to not talk about my past prior to my trip to Boston.  I just don't understand.

I don't understand.  It doesn't bother me when she talks about her ex's (which I think she does more than she realizes).  This is why.....They are ex's.  If any of them were what she wanted then she wouldn't be with me now, she would be with them.  They also have helped shape the person she is now.  They have helped make her into the person that I love.  I don't want her to be anything else than what she is.  Their lose is my gain.  I don't feel threatened by any of them (mostly).  Sometimes I do feel like I have to pay for the way they treated her.  I haven't lied to her or cheated on her or hurt her physically like some of them have but I have to beat all of that away until the insecurities built by them have been torn down and there is only me left.

Just as those ex's have made her who she is, so have mine.  Mel is a big part of the person I am today.  She taught me many things.  My love of reading, the world of musicals.  She shared my love of history.  She taught me the 3 pat answers for Trivial Pursuit if you don't know the answer - Brooke Shields, Elizabeth Taylor and rollerfucking.  Dawn asks why I have to be so extreme.  I don't know how else to handle it.  I don't understand, I don't understand, I don't understand.

There was a time I would've said nothing is worth this and went back to being single.  But not now.  I love her and I want to spend my life with her.  I just wish I knew what to do.