Hello ,

I think it is a good thing to do at your pace and not stress out about the fact that you were away from them.
Your spirits have their life aside you know ; they watch you from afar and care about you from the sideline so i think everything will go alright and they will understand.

Now about what was said above , i want to say that i don't quite agree with not applying human emotions to spirits ; i will explain myself

For me spirits are dead but before they were alive and so had emotions . They still have emotions after their death , they have still humanity BUT they know their place , meaning that they will try (normally) to not get involved with their keeper life in a human way because they passed on .

For example about love relationship ; what happens with the keeper and the spirit is only through their limits , its consensual for both , and both need to be understood on their own terms.
A spirit or an entity cannot force themselves or their conditions to the Keeper , the keeper is the leader , the one who say what's wrong or not . Which is why rules exists among the Keep.

Also , it is true that our emotions can create a blockage and an interpretation can create a misunderstanding but for example Regholdain , if i can advise you something is to talk to your succubus.
Succubus' are known for being possessive and sometime jealous ; if it's the case you need to listen to her and to talk her out about the situation and tell that in your life you want your spirits to respect each other and you want them to respect the rules.

It's just an example and advise but i saw too much on this forum (explicit and not explicit) that keepers even expert treat them as something else than just human.
Everything is balancing within your conditions and rules.

Hi Nienna - I agree, balance and communication with the spirits are key. Especially concerning house rules and expectations. My point about human emotions was targeted more at the possibility of misinterpretation - mainly, they would not hate you for getting caught up in life and being away. They were likely aware that would happen before they came to be a companion and knew they might need to be around later.

It's off topic, but specifically about my succubus, I wanted to say I have talked with her and the issue is not jealousy, but rather one of respect. I was getting lax with my relationship with her and would focus my conversations to my Dullahan (since we were bonding), and in the end have placed our friendship on the back burner, including things my succubus and I talked about her being able to help me with (energy work, as an example).

While I tasked her now and then over the last few weeks with different things, I have otherwise forgotten to remember our companionship. And then, to make it worse, I would go to bed with an expectation of intimacy from her. She would be there, but nothing would happen and so I would wonder what the heck and get a cold shoulder. It has become clear over the last couple of days that it's not the new succubus that is bothering her, but the fact that I slipped into a pattern of not treating her as a friend. We talked at length last night and the issue is aired and settled for the moment. The bottom line was she's not just with me to be a bed-warmer.

To support your post, I would say this: It's easy to forget that these spirits are like humans in many ways and to remember that they are friends like any other friendship (even more special) cannot be overstated.

To clarify my comments on human emotion I would just add to balance your own emotional response against your intuited interaction with the spirit where possible. It took me a while to figure out the issue with my succubus was not actually jealousy, but at first that's really what it felt like.

Thank you all so much for your help, I really appreciate your advice. I still struggle most days with feeling depressed, like nothing is really worth doing but I am putting in effort. I will keep at it.

Be uplifted in the fact that you know you're not alone, that you have not only your spirit family behind you, but also friends here who are a shoulder to help you when you feel like you're not doing all you want to do in your spirit keeping journey.

If you haven't already, please seek some professional support with the depression, it's important to take care of yourself, because you are important & your life is precious