Julia 38 year old professional

by Katia Loisel-Furey
(Melbourne, Australia)

Julia is a successful woman, and had accomplished a lot in her 38 years.

She was a well paid account manager, attractive and always looking to improve herself.

To ask her, she would say she is completely satisfied in her life, but friends close to her know that is not quite the case.

Julia deep down wants what most human beings want - someone to love her for her and share her life, someone to fill that need in her life, someone who will allow her to be herself, to feel vulnerable at times, to live her joys and celebrate her life.

She regrets the passage of time that has lead her to this point. She has had relationships, but as she looks back, she realises she has spent more time actually analysing them.

Sometimes she laments not opening up enough at times, or at least putting herself out there more.

Truth be known, whilst developing a career where the 'sky was the limit', she spends most Saturday nights either with her mum, or at a married friends house watching videos.

One day, talking to her friends, she asks - 'how did this happen?'

It's not as though guys don't find her attractive, on the contrary, she is very feminine, despite succeeding in a masculine world at the office.

As she chats at length with her girlfriends about her plight, the other women can't help but notice that deep down, she starts to blame men and the outside world for her situation.

The underlying theme appears to be frustration, yet they don't understand how someone so confident in the business world, finds it so hard to find a good man.

Thing is, this is not the first time this conversation has taken place. In one form or another, it has occurred numerous times, and still her friends don't know what the answer is.

After many years like this, Julia does find a small answer to her problems while talking to her life coach.

She is asked a key question - 'what advice would you give yourself to find a man?'

She blurts out laughing - 'Don't stay at home on Saturday nights!'

She heard herself say this, and although it was nothing new to her ears, this was new to her. In this context, somehow she knew she had to do something this time or it would be no family, no babies, no soul mate.

The rest of that meeting was spent mapping out a plan to first get out more, then secondly to catch her man.

In hind sight, it was actually the first part which ended up being the hardest.

Julia had to first accept the fact she did not go out anymore.

Was it apathy? Staying in her comfort zone? or didn't she feel as attractive or desirable as she used to?

In her case, she knew the real reason, as her teenage memories of sexual abuse were always underlying her behavior.

She had not lacked guys interested in her, but she knew she put up the barriers when it came to taking things further.

The thing is, the older she gets, the more barriers she seemed to put up, frustrating guys who date her and wanted to start a relationship.

Julia decided to put first things first, and work on her self worth as a priority.

Without this, nothing else was possible in terms of having a wonderful relationship where she could give the other person what they needed as well.

She had to love herself first, quite simply.

After a few months of coaching, she made a clear distinction. That the memory of her teenage years of sexual abuse were in fact memories now, and her replays of them in her mind were re-enforcing the monster in her mind.

Like an action replay, the more she pressed 'play', she knew she relived the moment and the stronger the images and feeling became. This was feeding the monster, the bad feelings she experienced.

Simply put, she had to re-focus her mind, and re-program her brain, something that would take time.

She began reading books on Oprah, getting views on sexual abuse. She looked for role models, positive mentors to show her a world than could exist.

Julia found the whole process quite exhilarating, as she found out women who had been through a lot more than her and came out successful in their own lives.

In fact, her goal of finding a man became secondary, as she constantly felt a sense of relief that she was indeed human and not alone.

It's funny, but by the end of her coaching sessions she thanked her life coach, albeit without a man in her life.

She felt liberated, and knew she had moved forward, more so than anytime she can remember.

She knew know that the man who found her was going to be a lucky man, and for the right reasons.