Tag: dating sucks

Quarantine & Cake

Road to Relovery the podcast is BACK!

Octavia Reese Road to Relovery Podcast Tavinda Media

I was struggling with the vision for this show – rather, I had the vision, but the delivery wasn’t giving me that “this is right” gut feeling.

So I put a pin in it.

Since we’ve been instructed to practice social distancing and take self-isolation seriously, I’ve found great comfort in “going live” on my Facebook and Instagram feeds with a series simply called “Open Studio.” During this time, I would paint, play my cello, dance, do [adult] MadLibs – anything to keep things interesting and connected.

And then I decided, this feels good. This is that gut feeling I was looking for. It’s time to bring back Road to Relovery.

Today’s episode is called Quarantine & Cake and it began with me spiraling about my singleness. Long story short, I have been intentionally single and not-looking since 2017. I didn’t want to be bothered, distracted… or heartbroken anymore. So I gave it up!

And just when I decided to jump back in the ring, two things happened: someone I was finally interested in told me they weren’t ready to be in a relationship. Fine, I thought, we can just have fun. But when I checked in on them, hoping to plan some quality time together, they told me, “So… I’m seeing someone.”

Axe to my heart. Again.

But it was laughable really. And I decided to have fun with it. I wasn’t mad. I was definitely hurt and disappointed, but I wasn’t mad. All I want for everyone is their happiness. And if they met the person that can make them take the leap from “not being ready” to suddenly being “all-in,” then hell yeah! I’m celebrating their connection. This person and I still chat every now and then and I hope we continue to indulge a mutual enjoyment of each other’s company, with respect to, of course the new significant other.

Meanwhile, I’m still single. Groan.

And now there’s a Shelter In Place order, double groan, which eliminates all my bar-hopping, eyes-making contact with the public (only on my kid-free weekends).

And joking about it. I know. People find me attractive and impressive, but I’m still not datable. Maybe it’s because I’m too intimidating and I would take too much work, communication and planning. Maybe I’m just too difficult to date. Or maybe it’s the kids. Go back and listen to my first episode for my tirade on that one. Or maybe because I’m so comfortable with the people I’m interested in, my security may be mistaken for coldness – I don’t really do that false-intimacy infatuation thing. My jam consists of passionate flirting, open communication and emphatic reciprocation. Or maybe someone just doesn’t feel the magnetism I feel – which is perfectly acceptable, too. Whatever the reason, I’m laughing at my rejection to get through the misery.

And truly, it has been a blast.

Until I spiraled.

My friend asked a blanket question on social media checking in on the singles out there. I said, “Forgotten and neglected, but what else is new!”

Heh heh. Triple groan.

And then they said, “I don’t get it, it’s like no one wanting cake at a party.”

Quadruple groan. I’m lonely cake at the party of the century and no one wants to try me.

To hear the conclusion and resolution of my brief spiral, and my prayer for this global pandemic, listen to Episode 2: Quarantine & Cake on Tavinda Media.

And join me on my new Facebook and IG live recordings of the Road to Relovery podcast every Thursday night at 10pm CST.

Don’t Recover. Adapt.

Follow me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and TikTok: @octaviaaivatco | @roadtorelovery

Xoxo, OR

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Episode 001 Pure Lies

Tavinda Media Road to Relovery


“No one will ever want you – you have three kids.”

Yes, that’s an actual quote from an actual human on the topic of me leaving my husband. I felt cursed. I felt like I was damaged goods. I felt like this person was right. Until I started dating again and I found out that they were very wrong. I could get a date! I was desirable – I was attractive – I was wanted! But then, I started to have doubts.

When I got ghosted the first time… and then the second time… and then the third time… all of them saying, “YOU’VE GOT THREE KIDS!”

Yeah, homie, I know. I was there.

The next time it came up, it was a two-fer. This person said the same for him and for his friend – yes I was romantically involved with friends – not at the same time; years apart; the first gave his blessing. But anyway… this person told me for him and his friend precisely why I was fun, but not a keeper.

Then came this one wildly attractive guy that I had a crush on – now, let it be known, I have crushes on many people, frequently. People are attractive, and for me, 98% of the time, I’d rather silently admire someone from afar than actually try to get to know them. I think it’s important to acknowledge attraction as a normal and natural thing – and a thing that can exist within itself as only that – a crush. People, especially people we are attracted to, don’t need to be owned and kept. Why are we so incapable of acknowledging beauty without trying to own it? Anyway, that’s another show. THIS show, is about the crush that jumped the entire gun to break up with me before we even talked about having a date because I already have kids and that’s something he wants to experience for the first time together with someone else.

Road to Relovery Tavinda Media

And finally, most recently, I was just told, “You’re like the perfect woman! But you’re divorced and have three kids. I want to have kids. If we have kids together, my first kids won’t be your first kids.” 

Yep, I’ll say that one again – my first kids won’t be your first kids.

Now, let it be known, I would rather be single and happy than feel guilt or shame for having three delightful children with a man I very much loved at the time. Those boys were made from love and they are the very epitome of it.

And we are a package deal. It hurts my heart to think some men would rather abandon the treasure of loving me because it means they’d also have to love my children. It makes me ache to know that they’re missing out on three of the best children in the world. That is entirely their loss – times four – and if they don’t want to find out how awesome my kids are, they don’t deserve me either.

I’d also like to point out pointedly point out – that as a pansexual – only cis-het men have expressed this concept of sperm-egotism; women and non-binary people I have dated couldn’t care less – they embrace me and my little darlings.

My personal opinion, I am pretty fucking awesome and I have no doubt that if and when these men find their life partners, they will always wonder about me – they will always wonder, what if I had given Octavia a try.

And you know why? Because kids grow up. Children are temporary fleeting treasures that are here for a few moments and then off on their own to adult in the wild. When the children are gone, what’s left but the two adults that raised them and whatever partnership they have is fully exposed. Children are neither bandaids nor baggage. They can’t save a relationship up against the ropes and they certainly shouldn’t be a barrier between two hearts that desperately desire each other.

Since I have been prematurely rejected more than five times with this – but you already have kids – response, I decided to take this strange perspective to the socials and to ask for others’ ideas on the topic.

Tavinda Media Road to Relovery

Many of the responses were confirmation bias – trashy insult; they’re intimidated by you and this is a neg to make you feel small; it’s just an excuse for being noncommittal; this is fragile masculinity afraid to parent a child he didn’t produce; immaturity avoiding responsibility… but then there were a few I hadn’t heard before, something on the topic of purity. This is the angle I want to explore and then destroy…

Follow @RoadtoRelovery on instagram and Facebook.

Or email me, Octavia Reese at roadtorelovery@gmail.com or octavia@tavindamedia.com

Head over to Road to Relovery the Podcast to listen, or search “Tavinda Media” in your favorite podcast app and subscribe!

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i will not be first runner up

Awwwwwwwwwwwww haaaaaaaaaaaale nawww

I WILL NOT BE BACKBURNERED!

Backburnered. Is that word? Well it is now.

Let me start over. I have //whispers under breath// psychic tendencies. Since I’ve voluntarily committed myself to this online exposé, I might as well reveal that too. Yeah, I know, wth. No I can’t/won’t read your palm. No I can’t pick winning lottery numbers. No, I can’t tell you lottery numbers. No, I’m not a prophet or a fortune teller or Miss Cleo.

Cue the twilight zone theme...nahnahnahnah nahnahnahnah
Cue the twilight zone theme…nahnahnahnah nahnahnahnah

I don’t talk about it much. It’s weird. It’s one of those things that people just don’t understand. Heck, I barely do either. But what I do know is sometimes I know things. I just know things. I know when some things are going to happen. I get intense FEELINGS. I know how some things are going to happen. It’s hard to describe. It’s not like a clear face, time, place, type of knowing. It’s just a sensing. And sometimes, it almost feels like something from the past that you can’t remember in detail – like a foggy memory, but it just hasn’t happened yet. I have a slight obsession with metaphors, so I’ll try to illustrate it like this:

Like if you wake up in the morning and you smell bacon. You know its bacon; you recognize it. You know it is being cooked; you can feel the heat of the grease on the wafting scent. You know it’s coming from the kitchen because, well, duh, where else would it be cooking? You know someone is preparing it; bacon can’t cook itself. You can’t see the bacon; you can’t touch the bacon, you just know there is some bacon somewhere, probably the kitchen, being cooked by someone, probably whomever you live with. And you love bacon. Your mouth starts watering because you can’t wait to eat it. And you know what it tastes like; you remember.

It’s like that. Hopefully that did something for you.

Or, how about this; it’s like an intense dream you had that vanishes just as you wake up and try to remember the details. Yes, like that.

Whatever, I’m moving on.

So I knew KNEW Sir Crickets, introduced here and seen again here was going to reach out to me again. I knew I’d hear from him before the end of 2014. I knew it would be a holiday, although I wasn’t certain which one. Thanksgiving, maybe, but that had passed. I thought it would be New Years, but I couldn’t tell. Well, it was Christmas. Christmas morning, I get a text saying Merry Christmas beautiful…

So I’m all, I KNEW IT. No surprise here. So I reply, aww same to you, yadda yadda, nothing much more or less.

So The Professor introduced here and I are talking about past relationships over dinner one night, and he tells me about some weird noncommittal thing he recently went through, and I tell him about Sir Crickets. He is baffled by that whole drama, and asks to see a picture (which, I think is a man thing. Men like to see their –dare I say it—competition. They want names and faces. Me on the other hand, I don’t want to know. If you’re not all about me, good luck, don’t care.).

If you’re not all about me, good luck, don’t care.

So I pull up Sir Crickets on the ol FB, which I hadn’t seen in months after he stopped talking to me and I unfriended him to spare my sanity of all the ooo babe and you’re so sexy and we’re such a great pair comments by other women on his wall and photos (ok ok ok, now that I write that and read it, I know, I really REALLY should have known better, but until someone I’m seeing tells me I have something to worry about, I don’t worry about it.), and lo and behold, he is public relationship FB official with someone and has been since he went crickets on me! GASP! And also, LIGHTBULB.

Well, I’m like, cool good for him.

And then I’m like WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIT. If he’s had an official ladyfriend for two months then WHYNAHALE is he texting ME on Christmas morning?!

I WILL NOT BE BACKBURNERED!

I will not be the second choice! I will not be the back-up girl if Option A just doesn’t work out. Wow. I just…wow. He’s totally trying to keep me in his back pocket. No thanks.

Although, I have to admit feeling victorious that he misses me… It’s the little things…sneer/snicker

But all that stuff I said before about once you’re in you’re in, yeah, no. He out.

My spidey senses tell me that I’ll see him once more or hear from him once more, too. But that was before I wrote this and I’m not certain anymore. He might read this and change his mind.

Side note: that’s another thing with my “visions,” they can always be altered. People change their minds. And the visions change. That’s why it’s like…foggy…

I might still be struggling with my own self worth, but I do know that I’m better than the back burner. And I don’t need to be psychic to know that there is someone out there that is so so mindblowingly and obscenely perfect for me, that I just flat out will not accept anything less.

Right, I don’t NEED to be. But it helps. I’m holding out for a hero… of sorts. I’m already my own hero, but having a co-hero would be great.

He’s coming soon. Not sure who/when/where, or whether or not we’ve already met and just need to remeet. But he’s on his way. I can smell the bacon. And I’m so excited.

~OR

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thankful fuh what?!

((It is required to read the title of this in your best Lil Jon voice.))

THANK FUL FUH WHAT?!

I have a few friends that hate HAAYTE this time of year. The overwhelming good cheer and emphasis on family magnifies their loneliness.

So this is for them. It’s ok to pout. It’s ok to stay home. It’s ok to turn off the TV. It’s ok to just wait it out. Like a raging level 5 turkey storm.

But know this, unless you are a masochist, every year will not suck. It will not. And one day you will find yourself warm, cozy, and grinning ear to ear because the holidays aren’t quite so miserable anymore.
Wait for it.

IMG_7537.JPG

~OR

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