I’ve been known for the phrase, “I’m running out of sweet.” All this somewhat enigmatic phrase means is, “I don’t feel like being nice anymore.” What I have noticed in this latest bout of being single is there is a coolness that has come on me now. It is the roux of hurt, suspicion, and doubt–and it has formed brick around my heart, and I can feel it. I fight it off, and sometimes that doesn’t always work out.

The thing that I confront, or try to confront at the end of relationships is the simple question of, “What happened?” I understand that the greater question is always this, but I ask it aloud. I understand that my problem is that when I am in love with someone, I want the best for them, and I want them to be cared for. I want them to be happy! I give and give until I cannot give anymore. And in that giving, I realize the reason I do this is because of doubt. That, and I don’t want the ghost of being considered a ‘bitter woman.’

You know the ones! The women that are the protagonists in Harlequin novels: tough as old bread, believing love is a lie and then she meets a bad boy with the same hurts. Then through the magic of time an circumstance, they have kismet sex on to run from each other. At the end they wind up together. Happily ever after in 200 pages–Nora Roberts is aces at this (no shade, she’s amazing).

But I have been wondering in this. Really wrestling with this, dear ones. I have been married and divorced and done it again. I have chosen to not drag either ex-husband through the gauntlet of the internet because they don’t need that. That is the last grace I can give–I can be a classy lady when needed.

But the thing now, after the end of this almost decade relationship is this, and I ask it aloud to all of you, and the angelic host:

“Do I have enough in me to do that again?”

What is the ‘again’ you ask? The dating, talking to people, trying to get to know them, and being serious about them–or they being serious about me. Do I really want to go through that again only to end up hurt again? What I have done is give my all to my romantic relationships so that IF/WHEN they end I can say that I did everything I can.

The question that still linger is, “Do I have enough in me to do it again?”