Recently, I went through a break-up with someone whom I loved very much… I think I honestly loved him more than I loved anyone prior. Regardless, the situation has taken a toll on me. While on one hand I am enjoying the freedom of no longer being brought down by this person, I still can’t help but occasionally miss the idea of who I thought he was. Yea, you read that right, the idea of this person; not actually the person themselves. For those of you who may see that as some sort of foreign concept allow me to explain…. A lot of us get caught up in the projection of what we want someone close to us to be, not whom and what they are in truth. That is very much the case here. This man, whom I loved dearly, was a fraud in all essence of the word and taught me a very valuable lesson; what I want out of life and love matters and I will not ever settle again for less than what I deserve.
When our relationship began almost 4 years ago, it wasn’t even a relationship at all really; not in any significant sense. We were distant friends, knew each other through an ex of mine, and we had both gone through a break up at the same time. Both us of had loved our then partners a great deal and neither of us had any interest in a relationship; therein began a 6 month “relationship” where I watched him self-destruct and fall off the wagon directly into a bottle to drown his pain. I was there for him when no one else was, and over a short amount of time I began to love him. In truth, it was hard not to when I could see how much he loved his daughter. That made me fall for him, him as a father and that dear sweet little girl whom I miss so much it hurts. When his drinking began to bring me down with him and hurt me to see, I walked away.
Fast forward to a year later, he’s sober and reaches out to me to apologize. I’ll never forget having landed in Denver for a business trip and upon turning on my phone I get a message from him. I had never expected to hear from him again, and it was at least 45 minutes before I could respond. I responded of course, made plans to see him upon my return, and from the moment I walked into the trap house he was staying in fresh out of rehab it was like we had just seen each other yesterday. Like I said, I really loved this man. This time, we decided it would be official. He met my family, they instantly loved him too and things were great in the beginning as they usually are in any relationship. What I found over time though is this man had never learned the necessary life skills to be a decent partner; he was a leech. He lived off of me, didn’t contribute his half, and all the while treated me like I was the problem for having any expectation of him pulling his weight. He would do things like purposefully keep a job making below minimum wage so he could try to get out of paying a reasonable amount of child support to his ex-wife (Yea I know, should have been a clue right there when I pay child support every month for my own two daughters) Within a month of us having our own place we split, again. But I still wasn’t over him, I still missed him, and knowing this I stupidly moved onto another relationship I thought could satisfy the emptiness he left behind when I threw him out. To put it in perspective, when I had 4 very painful biopsies done, the only person I wanted in the world with me was him and he was with his new girlfriend, and even knowing that he was still the only person I wanted there as the tears streamed down my face.
Less than 6 months later he reaches out to me again, misses me, and I tell him I’m taken. He tells me goodluck and won’t respond to my messages. I’m only of value to him when I can offer him something… again, another sign I ignored. A month and a half following that we reconnect again; neither of us are happy in our current relationships; I feel like a piece of ignored furniture in mine and he has managed to find someone less capable at life than he is that ironically enough was putting him through the same things he had previously done to me and he seemed to feel bad for what he’d put me through. Once again, we were back together and happier than we had been prior because it legitimately seemed as though he had grown up a bit. Sadly, seeing as I am writing this out, that wasn’t the case. We got our own place again and things seemed to things did go well for a time but as things like this always go, we fell right back into old patterns. This time we got engaged (in all honesty though, I feel like he only wanted to be engaged because his ex-wife was, god that sounds so sad when I say it and even worse when I realize I allowed it), yet he wasn’t pulling his weight again, I was drowning in the financial responsibilities and working 7 days a week between two jobs, all the while his mental health issues were getting worse. He refused to take his mental health seriously, would rather have cursed at me and called me horrific names and tell me to sleep with my ex’s than deal with his issues. During this time, I began to become depressed, more depressed than I have ever been in my life. I told him this and expressed that I needed him right now to be strong for me because for once in my life I couldn’t even be strong for myself… I had never said that to anyone before, I’ve always been strong for myself and for others and now I couldn’t be. Instead of being there for me, he cared only for himself and our fighting got worse. If any of you knew just how many lies I forgave, how many hurtful things he had said and done that I put in the back of my mind just to try to remember that he loved me… I mean he did love me, right?… nope, not at all. So once again, and for the last time, I ended it. Our fighting had gotten so out of control that one morning after he finally left for work my neighbor came to check me for bruises thinking he had assaulted me; he hadn’t, I will say that he never physically assaulted me. But the mental and emotional abuse he provided did more damage than any bruise he could have given me. How do you treat someone who loves you so much like nothing? How is that even possible? I really wish I knew that answer. The final straw had been him acting like I was making him choose me or his daughter… I need to be closer to my daughters which I had been very open about, and I guess I always knew in the back of my mind that he couldn’t be away from his; but to hear him talk about it to anyone he couldn’t wait to get out of Ohio, start fresh somewhere new and launch our business and live the life we wanted. My god, how badly I wanted to believe him and in him.
Anyone who actually knows me knows that this isn’t true, that I could never and would never ask someone to pick me over their child; I love my daughters too much to ever even consider making that request of another person because I KNOW beyond any doubt what it feels like to not see them every day. But to hear him tell it now, I was an evil monster who controlled his every move and was going to make him pick me over his only daughter. It’s always one hell of a blow when you can no longer rationalize someone into the person you know they have the potential to be; when you get smacked in the face by a metal chair with the reality of who they are. I can’t say it’s a bad thing though, I needed to learn this lesson to finally be free of what I felt for him. But, I do feel the need to clear the air this time and not lessen what he put me through in the interest of appearing strong and not bothered by the end; make no mistakes, I cared about him very much.
I guess what I hope to gain here is anyone’s understanding of what I just went through with this person; having been emotionally and physically abused most of my life I didn’t want to repeat the past, no matter how much I loved this man. I mean Jesus, I can’t even call him a man with any kind of conviction. Must be nice to be able to destroy other decent people who love you without any kind of remorse… oh wait, that’s right… he’s mentally ill. He’ll never see his actions as wrong, he’ll continue to think that he was a great partner and never did anything wrong; that it’s me that’s cold and heartless and not worthy of him, rather than the other way around. Part of me hopes that one of you are petty enough to share this with him so he can see exactly what he lost; but the other part knows that even if he were smart enough to realize it, he would never be worthy of my love again anyway. You can’t damage a person that much and still think they would love and trust you. I’ve been burned by him too many times. I guess that is my flaw… I don’t know how to give up on people until it hurts me so bad that I’d rather break my own heart than live with a person who breaks it for me daily. That’s probably the best way to describe our end…. I reached a point that I would rather break my own heart by making him leave than to continue to allow him to break it for me. I deserve more, and my daughters deserve more. I couldn’t let them see him talk to me the way he was, how do you explain to your young daughters that someone loves you and didn’t mean it right after he’s thrown a fit like a child and called you a cunt and told you that you’re nothing more than a whore. You can’t rationalize that to an 11 year old or 9 year old… and my god, if you thought I loved him, my daughters loved him much more than that. I couldn’t let him break their hearts like that too.
Don’t worry, there’s a bright side to all of this. I’m free. I’m free of him, free of the love I had for him, and finally free to realize that I deserve so much more than I had been allowing myself to have. Even if it means I’m alone for the rest of my life he at least taught me to never again settle and be fooled by what I think someone could be and live in the reality of who someone is. That can’t be too bad of a lesson, can it? At least I don’t think it is anyway. If any of you wish to believe what he has had to say about the situation and myself, do me the favor of removing yourself from my life.
So, there you have it, my version of the situation; how I feel, how I’ve felt, and why I ended it for the final time. I know he’s hurting right now, I was uncharacteristically mean to him this time around; but I need him to hate me. I can’t have him thinking in 6 months (like he usually does) that he can come walking back into my life like nothing ever happened and I don’t trust myself enough to not respond when that day comes. At this point, all I can do is hope that he now hates me enough to curse my name for the rest of his life while I’m busy living my life the way I want to, and maybe if I’m lucky with someone who actually deserves my love. For the time being, I will be focusing on myself and what I want and what makes me happy so I hope none of you take offense to the more selfish person I am becoming. I think after everything I have endured I’ve earned a little selfishness after so much selflessness. If you’ve read this through the end, thank you for at least humoring me enough to do so, what you’ve just read wasn’t easy for me to write by any means.
TransientDemeter 