Permission to Celebrate Gaining Time With Co-Habitation

An unexpected perk of falling in love and taking the plunge

Last night as I walked with my beloved to an Italian restaurant on the marina for a romantic dinner, and our first date with a kid-free house, I celebrated the end of a cycle. I celebrated my perseverance, determination and willingness to learn how to be a partner and to meet “Mr. Right.” We all have the dating stories, whether they were in your twenties or your fifties. I’ve been on horrific dates (blamed for the cost of an Uber to get there, asked if I am okay with guns, berated because of my past with abuse), and stayed in relationships that should have ended at the first date but went on for eight months (basically they liked me, and they seemed like they could be fun enough.) Each and every turn spent with a person taught me something about myself, my value and who I ultimately wanted to partner with. I recall being with a person who couldn’t pull the trigger to buy a house, and annoyed with how long he had dragged his feet decided I was going to go buy my own damn mother fucking house. And I did.

I was also judgmental, making notes of a man being uncomfortably co-dependent with his adult daughter, and another man so ashamed of where he lived, he wouldn’t take me there (it was an old boat, and friends believe he was having an affair, so there is that…). I watched and I learned and watched and learned, and cried and yelled and evolved. Over and over.

It went on for twelve years, and even though there were times I thought, “Being alone is definitely okay, even if it’s from the rest of my life,” I didn’t give up on love.

And to be honest, it wasn’t even learning to love because we know how to love. Children, pets, friends, ourselves, co-workers, celebrities, singers. But to partner with another human being if you were never given a healthy model to watch, or didn’t believe you were inherently worthy, is a whole other up level.

Year after year, I took on the task, and found myself obsessed, depressed, elated, hyper sexualized, pissed off, and always talking to my girlfriends and my therapists about what was wrong with me. I was astounded over the treatment I accepted, or how I didn’t stand up for myself and leave quicker when it wasn’t a fit. In 2023 I wrote an LA Times article about writing love letters to men, after my 9th grade high school boyfriend appeared in Covid, and confessed the letters I wrote were still in his parents’ attic in Connecticut. He turned out to be self righteous in his soon-to-be-divorced state, but it was an eye opener to realize I have always been looking for love.

That song “Looking for Love in All The Wrong Places,” was never more appropriate.

“Lookin' for love in too many faces
Searchin' their eyes
Lookin' for traces of what I'm dreaming of
Hoping to find a friend and a lover
I'll bless the day I discover another heart
Lookin' for love.”

Then over two years ago, I met the love of my life (don’t give up even when you are bleary eyed from the dating app swipe!) and after many adventures, deep hard conversations and sleep overs, we evolved naturally into the joy of moving in together. I feel like I hit the jack pot. We didn’t get married (which originally was my hope) but I get to enjoy that coming around next. And if I am perfectly honest, I am not sure my nervous system could have handled moving in and getting married at the same time. I am learning I get to bask in every phase and experience.

The basking I am doing in this phase is one I didn’t expect - the understanding that the search is over, we live together, and I suddenly have back all this time.

I am not saying now that we are moved in I let off the gas of being spontaneous, a good partner, appreciative, etc, but I am returning to myself a quantifiable amount of time in my nervous system that comes with moving in with someone.

For at least a year prior to moving in together, I spent many hours of the week planning our back and forth to each other’s houses, so we could see each other at least four days, if not more of the week. We wanted to be around each other all the time, but lived in different parts of LA with a big highway ride in between. I had a kid co-parenting schedule and he was in school. I had an office I could go to, he had a co-working space. Each week, we navigated our Google calendars, where he would pack a bag and come to me, and on weeks I didn’t have my daughter, I would pack a bag and come to him. Soon, we left stuff at each other’s houses, but as some weeks I went to church, or had a client session, or we were going to an event, clothes, books, logistics would change. So it was a constant re-thinking of where to be, when and with what stuff. I had a full size bed and we would cram into it, knowing one day we would buy a bed together but many nights were a touch more than “cozy.” Just the amount of hours driving up the 110 freeway at 9 AM to leave his house, or the hour there some nights was a commute added up to a lot of time. When I was single, or we were first dating, my time was spent almost always writing or working. I didn’t give time up for the actual act of falling in love and investing time in a relationship.

When I met my partner, I invested a lot of time getting to know him because I knew he was the one, and all the years of investigating and looking had landed. I wasn't going to squander this time.

What I didn’t realize was when we landed together, finally waking up in the morning every day in our bed, and coming home after a date to OUR HOUSE, was that I would get all that logistical time back.

Suddenly, finally, I could be in relationship with the love of my life AND spend the time I have free now not rushing around to figure out how to see each other in our respective houses to become who I want to be as a writer and a creative in the 5-5. (see column from Wednesday about this)

The daunting fact I had no idea what to do with that newly free time came over me and instead of throwing panicked solutions at it, I just sat still with wonder. I had changed so much over the two years. I had grown up exponentially in this relationship. We had stared each other and ourselves down deeply, in our parenting, our adulting, our careers. Now I was able to become who I wanted to be for the next bunch of years of my life.

I felt radically unqualified to figure it out, but was determined gimmicks were not the answer. I didn’t need an on line course to chart my next career move, or a soul search retreat to go after my next financial push from a spiritual direction, or even podcasts to “figure myself out.” I needed to sit still in the celebration that I had finished a cycle of finding my life partner and be in the joy and excitement and wonder of that experience realize. I got to let my nervous system adjust and my brain to understand it has the room to now be a wild creator.

Pat on the back. Good work Kim. You put in the time, and didn’t give up. You found love and you are in a secure, happy place on Venice Beach.

Now I get to spend the new amounts of time writing and books.

Cue me hurling in the alley.

I recently connected this epiphany of celebrating partnership and co-habitation to the cessation of my mind chatter over the last two weeks. I realized my mind has been filled with incessant thoughts for God knows how long in the process of finding a partner. I really really wanted to meet someone I could grow my life with, and down to my bones, knew that with the right person, I would go to next levels professionally and creatively in my life. Someone who was there to live with, not take for granted, and to love. But someone who I could feel like I could be my most focused wildest self with and not become a workaholic.

So with my mind borderline blank (it’s so weird but it’s true) I am now wondering as I live on the ocean, and rise to make coffee and smoothies with my love what will fill my brain next in that new amount of time.

So basically I am uncomfortable on a few levels. One, my brain is quiet. Two, I have found love. And Three, I have enough money set aside to lean into what is next.

And so panic attacks and all (and yes, my body is still a minefield of emotional terror despite a quiet mind - not sure how that works), I am writing my column now twice a week, for you readers, but also for my survival because my whole life I have written my way to understanding.

Those twelve years finding love I filled 30 journals. I had a notebook I wrote in every day for a year to “the love of my life.” Talk about hard core manifestation.

Now I need to take a cue from that and apply the same determination, the same actions, the same lessons to publishing best selling books.

Where did you succeed after a lot of work and time, and can apply that to the next area that is your biggest and best next up-level?

Okay, so since I am writing my column now two days a week (Wednesday and Friday) I would love if you could become an annual member. The cost is only $30. It is that perfect boost for me to keep going and knowing I have dedicated fans who love and adore me enough to spend the cost at Chick Fil-A for a six pack tenders and cottage fries meal for a few hungry teens.