I made a mistake, and I’m probably not alone. I paid too much attention to Trump. It was fun to laugh at him. I was proud to get on my soapbox about him. And, if I needed a drama/adrenaline boost I could count on him to push my buttons. He was a captivating character who made me curious and also terrified. No matter how I tried I could not wrap my head around how this man got as far as he did on a campaign the pretty much divided many groups of people by making them feel like the “other” that they already felt so well.

My mistake in one way makes sense. It is a reasonable response for those of us who care about our country to pay attention to the candidates. But, Trump was no regular candidate as most of us know, and what really captured my attention was something far more unconscious and yet, oh, so familiar. I was entering into another toxic relationship with someone who is emotionally unavailable.

In order to discover this I had to endure the crushing blow of our break up last night and not for the reasons you might think. As I sat down for the long election night the anxiety set in. Florida. Florida. Florida. I needed some licorice to chew on. I wished I could knit. I wanted to go back to smoking cigarettes. I was not emotionally regulated. Then California was called and Hillary took the lead. I could breathe. No longer did I wish to knit and eat licorice.

Then Florida was called. He won it, and it looked like he would win many other key states. I imploded and when I go on emotional overload, I shut down— all the way down. Now I was numb. Numbness helped me take the final blow when Hill conceded. Then, the fear hit like a five-ton truck. Goodbye women’s right to choose. Goodbye Planned Parenthood. Goodbye Universal Health Care and Free college tuition. Goodbye Earth. Goodbye rainbow lit white house. Goodbye diversity in politics. All of what is progress going, going, gone. If this weren’t enough, then fear showed me the violence that could come upon my multi-racial family.

Three hours of sleep later, I was resigned. Bitter. Depressed. But, Hillary spoke and then spoke right to me and my daughter as we both sat there and listened. She opened up my woman soul and it hurt. It hurt so bad. I felt slammed by the patriarchal structure. Then Wolf Blitzer went in for the kill and said, “Hillary Clinton: Very, very emotional speech. You saw her holding back, choking back those tears. She is, uh, well known for being very, very emotional at these kinds of moments. Clearly, a sad moment for her.” I grieved. Why don’t we understand and care for the female soul?

So, now what?

For one, I have broken up with Trump, officially. I have decided I will not watch the inauguration. I will not watch any state of the union. I have deleted my news apps. I will turn down the volume when I hear his voice on the radio or turn the channel when I see his face. I won’t add President in front of his name. And, I won’t worry about my patriotism in regard to any of these choices.

Here’s what I also won’t do anymore because of these actions— take care of him emotionally or be his moral center. Why did I take this on?  Because I sensed he had no emotional IQ or moral center so I assumed the role as many women do and made up for it within my own self. I became his moral center. I took on his lack of emotional depth and fed him mine, even if it was hate and anger. Trump didn’t care what emotion I gave him because he fed off it. It invigorated him. Considering the results we know it wasn’t just my energy and emotion that invigorated him. Many of us gave him our energy and emotion and right now it is all he has. Without it, he fades into the darkness. We, my women, and I’m sure men, have kept him in the light. And, this is extremely unhealthy for us and essentially for him.

We do this with our fathers as young girls. We do this with our husbands as young women. We do this with our children, I am sure especially our sons, but I can’t truly speak to that because I have daughters. We take care of the emotions people can’t take care of for themselves. We give morals and character, even if we just hope for it or bitch about it, to people that don’t seem to have them. It’s deep.

I kept our union going by resisting his ways. By bitching about his lack of emotional depth. By feeling hate and anger for him and fear of him. And, here’s what made this union even more toxic— the man is unstable. He is unpredictable. He is insecure. Oh, what hell for women when we find this in a partner. What hell for a nation when we elect this kind of president. But, it could not be helped. DT is “their” Barack. He’s their change master, the Savior. And, we know how powerful that is.

But guess what’s going to happen, in my opinion? His people are going to abandon him, just like I feel I did, and probably countless others did, to Barack once we elected him. I went to bed on those two election nights with a smile on my face and a happy tear in my eye and woke up the next morning and did my safe, secure life.

Trump will also be abandoned by many others who didn’t want him as the president, who like me won’t give him that title. The big T will be left all alone. Alone with everything and everyone that is our nation and he will do this alone with not only little, to no experience in our political establishment, but also without sound character, emotional stability and mental fortitude. Holy. Friggin.’ Cow. At least Barack, where he lacked in experience, he more than made up for with character, stability, fortitude and a healthy dose of grace and cool.

I am grateful, though, that I invested in this relationship with Trump. It has changed me for the better. It has made me care more for the poorly called “others” that were brutally brought to attention by his campaign. It has clarified what I really want for our nation, for our earth. And, it has brought me back to a core learning: never emotionally engage with an unstable, unpredictable, insensitive, insecure person.

If any of you are feeling “crazy” consider you did what I did. Consider you made it your job to give him what he doesn’t have. Consider you protected him emotionally by giving him your emotions. Consider you got too emotionally involved and attached. It happens to the best of us. In fact, I think it only happens to the best of us because we want so much for people and we expect so much from ourselves. Now expect yourself to get free of it, and not just with Trump, but in any or all relationships where this is occurring.

We too easily become emotional surrogates for others, often without knowing. It will and does drag us down. I think many of us became Trump’s emotional surrogates. I really do. We took care of what he couldn’t. Now, let’s not do it for him as President. He wanted this and now like good old tough love (and right now I use the word love lightly) it’s time to let him go and see what he can do with the power and the shoes he wanted to fill. There’s no excuse with a Republican majority.

Now, we can breathe better. We have space in our souls. We aren’t taking this on anymore. We can self-care and start to heal and mend. As we feel stronger we will get back to the business at hand, whatever that is for us and what we care about. As long as we remember we are not here to take care of anyone emotionally. We are not here to protect grown people from their lack of character and integrity. We are here to do our part, run our race. We get back to our core, our center because this helps everyone, even those inept emotionally. And when we lose perspective and get drained by this news and whatever is to come, we might step outside and look at the stars or feel the sun on our face and know we are a part of something larger than what goes on down here. As much as what happens here matters, its a blip on the totality of what is the Universe. When we touch back down to earth and then to our country, in this case, the United States, and we realize this presidential decision did in fact happen, we can realize it is a part of a larger framework that we are a part of, but that we don’t fully control.

The only thing we are in charge of is our mind. This is our domain, and responsibility to do the upkeep inside this domain is ours alone. We must work to keep it as clean and clear as possible and this is NOT an easy task. But, the rewards are plentiful. A clear mind is an open mind and we need this now. An open mind gives a clear pathway to our heart and we crave this connection now. With this connection we see with both heart and mind and come to understand this is the only protection we need, especially from forming toxic, unhealthy relationships. And we need protection now.

A clean, clear, open mind and an awakened heart is our only direction, and we need direction now— so let’s get moving.

Nikki.