I grew up reading Shakespeare’s sonnets; sonnet 116 in particular always stuck with me: love does not alter when alteration finds. I was doomed.

Doomed because at fourteen years old I set an expectation that I could not settle for someone unless they felt this way about me. I went on to become enamored with the love stories in Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. The Modern Romances of Again, and The Good Parts, Say You’ll Remember Me. I thought, if this can be created from a writer’s mind, it can be created in real life.

That’s the hard part about being a writer: you’re given a gift of depth, imagination, and yearning, and sometimes life doesn’t always match that. Then you’re given the gift of feeling despair and disappointment and creating from that.

Last summer I met a guy (for privacy and this story’s sake), let’s call him Adam. During this time, I was having the time of my life. I had recently reconnected with an old girlfriend of mine, and we were both dating, going out, and just soaking in the California Summer. We took day trips to San Francisco, sat on the edge of cliffs and overlooked the views of the Golden Gate Bridge, and had drinks in a book and wine bar. We smoked hookah and danced on her patio. We swiped on Hinge together and debriefed after our dates.

After some time, we both decided to commit to one guy. In between our options and fun dates, we both had a “number one” choice. And mine was Adam.

Adam was handsome, slightly older, an established engineer and business owner who prided himself on being loyal and family-oriented. We had fun dates drinking champagne on the rooftop of the President’s Terrace and Italian food on University Ave in Palo Alto. I remember our second date sitting right under the full moon.

Our first getaway was the Ritz-Carlton at Half Moon Bay. We couldn’t get enough of the beach. After dinner on our first night, he drove us down the pitch-black highway to one of the lookouts. He carried me down the rocky path since I was in heels, and we stood for a moment in the dark, just listening to the waves while we held each other.

On the surface, it looked like I was getting everything I wanted. He was consistent, invested, and took time out of his busy schedule to teach me tennis and take me out on fun dates every week. He checked in with me and showed up when it mattered, like six in the morning for one of my races that he drove an hour away to take me.

But there was something nagging at me; something was missing.

One day, I asked him jokingly, “Do you like to be called babe or baby? What do you think of pet names?”

“I don’t care,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.

That one interaction spoke for a lot of our interactions when we were together. We were two people existing side by side each other doing fun date activities, and doing what you’re supposed to do when you’re in a relationship with someone.

But it didn’t feel like two puzzle pieces finally clicking together, like finally this is it. It didn’t feel like the relief after holding your breath date after date, hoping something will finally stick. It felt like I was holding my breath since the day we decided to be together, watching myself outside of my body, trying to figure out why something feels off.

Our conversations became routine occurrences, making sure we hit the important parts. How was your day? What did you eat? How was work? Our phone calls would abruptly end, and we just started connecting less and less.

The truth of our relationship seemed to surface more and more in these moments. We couldn’t bury the clouded uncertainty of us being together with champagne and trips anymore. We were catapulted into a busy life and unexpected hardships.

In this, I realized something about myself. I can’t do nonchalant love. I can’t do anything nonchalant. I love knowing how someone feels about me. And I love when it’s loud and proud.

A year later, when I started to regret my decision to leave a great guy, I met someone else. We would spend all day together; we gushed about how much fun we had, and we texted all day in between our dates because we had so much to talk about. He wrote journal entries after our dates that he let me read that described his excitement and introspective thoughts on our connection.

Unfortunately, we didn’t work out because of other incompatibility issues. But I learned something from this connection: what I want is out there.

It was a lesson I needed: to stop doubting myself and trust my initial instincts. Just because something is good on the surface doesn’t mean it’s right for me and what I truly want.

This isn’t a story about an ex-boyfriend who was a jerk to me. This is just a story about how sometimes even a good person can’t give us what we want. Sometimes a good person is not compatible with us. Sometimes it’s just not meant to be. And there’s no amount of dissecting, maneuvering, or contorting a situation or yourself to make something work.

Do you have a love story with someone who was a great person, just not a good fit for you? Let me know in the comments.

Xoxo,

Aamina

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When I tell people I’m writing a psychological thriller, the first question people ask me, “Where do you get your inspiration?”

While I get my inspiration from many things, including a lot of media like movies, podcasts, other books, and TV shows, a lot of my original inspiration came from my day job.

My fascination with mental health and mental illness began with my interest in antisocial personality disorder and serial killers. I used to read dense and graphic books on serial killers and learn how their minds worked. I watched documentaries and listened to podcasts, and I became enamored with such a dark side of humanity.

From there, I started studying personality disorders, and became most interested in antisocial personality disorder, borderline and narcissistic personality disorder.

Since the summer of 2015, I’ve worked in several mental health facilities. I’ve worked with a range of people with very unique circumstances. Spanning from people suffering from drug addiction, the homeless population, adolescents, software engineers, healthcare workers, stay-at-home moms, and more.

I’ve worked with people who were experiencing their first psychotic episode, which is a very humbling experience to witness, watching someone completely lose their sense of reality right in front of you and having to help them put the pieces together and stabilize.

I’ve also worked with people who have even committed crimes, some intentional and some accidental, leading to mental health crises at the head of their consequences.

All of these different people and their stories have brought so many ideas to my overimaginative mind. I get inspiration constantly. I can have a conversation with a patient about their life, their family, friends and what brought them into the hospital and come up with a new story idea. (Of course, I would never retell in any shape or form a patient’s actual story.) It’s more of the themes, behaviors, personality, and relationship dynamics that I pay attention to when working with patients.

At one of the old facilities I worked at, there was a period of time when someone kept calling the nursing station and hanging up after a few choice words or moments of silence on the phone. They claimed to be an old patient of ours, though none of my coworkers or I could pinpoint who it was. It was creepy, but it also made me think: what a great premise for a story? A psychiatric nurse is starting her new job when she keeps getting calls from someone who claims to be an old patient of hers, but she doesn’t recognize the voice.

Currently, one of my favorite things to write about and explore is toxic female relationships. One of the personality disorders I’ve also been fascinated with is borderline personality disorder. I’ve always wondered, after my own personal experience (which I will share in another post), what a friendship would look like with someone with borderline personality disorder, for both the friend who doesn’t have it and the friend who does. And throw in a mystery, two morally ambiguous characters, and external family dynamics, and put them in a controlled environment, aka an inpatient psychiatric unit. It’s my bread and butter.

I’ve had to work with patients who act in ways that are not always aligned with ethical morals and values, but it’s my job to offer compassionate care. It is not my job to judge or form my own opinions towards a specific patient. I have to be objective, detached, and work with the goal of helping this person at the forefront of my mind.

In the book I’m writing now, one of my characters, Orina, has a long history of inpatient psychiatric admissions, poor impulse control, and is emotionally volatile. She befriends the protagonist of the story, Nadira, in high school who is the opposite of her; shy, emotionally reserved, responsible but drawn to her friend’s contrasting personality.

After four years of a complicated, intense but very close relationship something tragic happens that tears them apart. Ten years later they are reunited after Orina shows up unexpectedly to Nadira’s home and her older daughter dies in a tragic accident. Orina is admitted into the inpatient psychiatric facility that Nadira is a psychologist at, and metaphorically and psychologically holds Nadira captive as her psychologist due to their shared history and secret that can shatter Nadira’s new life that she’s built.

My story explores dark themes and the psychoanalysis of a morally gray character, Orina, while also exposing hidden depths of someone who wants to do the right thing, Nadira. When I write about their destructive decisions, it’s an objective creative process that keeps their motivations and goals at the forefront of my mind, rather than: this is bad choice, so now this character is bad, and the story will be in favor only of characters who make ethical choices. Or: I can’t write them this way, it’s not ethical.

I want to write a true character.

Nadira wants a new life separate from her childhood, and toxic estranged best friend. And Orina wants vindication from her misunderstood personality and mental health history.

Working in an inpatient unit with people with all different types of mental health illnesses has allowed me to stretch my compassion and understanding of the human experience and different types of people that brings real inspiration to my stories.

Xoxo,

Aamina

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I started dating intentionally about a year and a half ago. And what I mean by that, is I started actually paying attention to if the men I was going out with actually fit what I was looking for in a long-term partner, and communicating this to them. That seems like it might be common sense, but in my 20’s I did not date intentionally, and felt like I had all the time in the world to meet someone and settle down. I figured it would happen eventually, so in the meantime I just dated for fun. Chemistry, dates, trips, shared memories. I ignored red flags and incompatibility because it was temporary anyway.

Now that I’m 33 years old and want to eventually settle down and have a family, I wish I had more time. Because going on date after date after date has become exhausting.

When I started dating a year and a half ago, I was so excited. I had just come out of a long-term relationship with someone I thought I was going to marry. I took a year off to go through therapy, coaching, write a romance novel (basically manifesting the type of love I wanted in my life), and connect with friends and build a social media platform. Coming out of my year-long dating hiatus, I felt excited and eager because I knew what I wanted; I lost twenty pounds, and I had a better sense of self.

The first man I started dating was an engineer from New York City who lived in San Francisco with a view of the Golden Gate Bridge from his apartment. We had an immediate intellectual connection. His brain worked in ways mine didn’t, but he also had an appreciation for the arts and literature. We talked for hours about books and our interests. Our second date was the symphony, and we started reading The Holographic Universe together after a week of meeting.

I had strict rules going into the dating scene again. Part of it was because I had never dated online; most of the men I dated were from my social circle. They were vetted, and there was a sense of security. So the new dating version of me was: I didn’t kiss anyone, no hand-holding, and no sleepovers or going to anyone’s house until a committed relationship was established. He was understanding, never pushed me, and always made his intentions clear. He Ubered me back and forth from my house to San Francisco for our dates—even though I had a car. He was always thoughtful with our dates, making several reservations in one night, as he didn’t want to mess anything up; he took me to Rose Gardens and the Filoli House, and talked about a future we would have together. I’ll give you whatever you want, he told me. I thought—wow! This is how dating should be! I am having the time of my life!

Unfortunately, as we got to know each other more, I found out something I could not overlook—as much as I wanted to, since I really, really liked him. And so I went back out into the dating world. I was excited, though! I was reminded just how many men like him were out there! I had much more exciting experiences to look forward to, and I couldn’t wait to have a similar experience except with someone more compatible with me.

I had so much energy inside of me; I wanted to go out and meet men, have fun, and I just knew I was closer to meeting my soulmate. Only to end up with some amazing dates and some disappointing ones. It was hard to go from being ubered to thoughtful dates by someone I had an amazing intellectual and physical connection with—to that bar not always being met. Why did I have to remind men to make reservations? Why did I have to tell them I liked the door opened for me? Why are they so eager to get me to their place three dates in? Ugh!

I let each disappointment land heavy on me. I was starting to audit my dating approach. I was getting feedback. I was too emotionally reserved. So I kissed on the second date! I was open about why I was dating! And I flirted, flirted, and flirted a lot. I really tried to put myself out there. I let men hold my hand, and I stayed on the first initial dates longer, thinking this had to be a real connection! Only to find something about them or their character on date two or three that I just wish I could have figured out up front because it was starting to feel like I was wasting so much of my time and energy.

After going out with fifty men (literally), I don’t know what else to do other than keep going. I have phone calls before meeting men that used to feel like fun vibe checks where we flirt and talk about our interests. Now I feel like I’m doing interview screenings and checking off boxes. Do you want marriage? Do you want children? When was your last serious relationship?

All of it so I don’t waste time. All of it to avoid getting caught up in a connection I’m excited about only to find out we’re not compatible because I didn’t “screen” hard enough. And all of it—takes so much time! I’m writing a book, I have friends, I’m part of a movie club and a book club! I have a full-time job. Dating is really starting to feel like my second job and not something that I can sit back and have fun with anymore.

It’s become a sequence of: Phone call>date>mandatory compatibility questions>how many siblings do you have?>shit, I forgot if you told me that or my date from last night did>just realized we aren’t compatible after three dates, and seven hours of flirting and building a connection>back to square one>phone call.

I still go out on fun dates; I still ask for what I want. But it’s gotten to the point where even on a fun date I can’t help but think, I wish I was doing this with my person, and I don’t know if you’re my person yet.

But I know the only way for me to get to that point is to actually keep going on dates; that’s the only solution to this. And I know people will think–live in the moment! Have fun, don’t worry if he’s the one or not. Yes, I know all of this. But there’s a lot of pressure as a woman in her thirties who wants a family. We actually don’t have all the time in the world (like meeting someone, getting to know them, marrying them, and starting a family) to keep “going with the flow.” At a certain point, I do want a connection to actually work out.

Speaking of—I have a phone call tonight. Wish me luck!

xoxo,

Aamina

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