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What it feels like…

So the last time I posted, I was in limbo about my relationship…my how time changes things. That “relationship” or whatever it was…is OVER. What I am struggling with is what I’m supposed to learn from this experience. Yes, I am one of those people. I believe EVERYTHING happens for a reason and therefore is a teachable moment. Trust me I never want to repeat this mistake again.

So I have been analyzing and dissecting the past year of my life looking for the moment where we went wrong. I still believe that I took the necessary precautions with him. I didn’t rush into anything to serious too fast. It took several months of long conversations and meetings to just “hang out” while my children were not around. I thought that we transitioned from friendship to relationship at a slow pace, so that neither of us would panic. I always thought of protecting the friendship that we built over the last 5 or 6 years as a priority. He made it seem like it was so important to him. So that was my first lesson, I always put HIS feelings first. I thought of HIS feelings before I even considered my own. I never spoke MY truth.

I sometimes think about the couple of times we hit rough patches and it was me who would give up and just quit, when we would go a few days with things strained between us I’d simply suggest that we end it. But he would always fight me on it. Always tell me how we were a team and we would be fine.

So when he said he needed space, I froze. I didn’t get it. What I have wanted to say was “FUCK YOU! How could you waste a year of my life with all types of empty promises?! How could you make me love you and now you can’t do it anymore?! Are you fucking kidding me?! Where do they, do that at?!!” but I didn’t and I still haven’t. There was a part of me that said “you should say something…speak up!” I couldn’t fight for us that day. I couldn’t let him know that I needed him THAT much. Or that I loved him in that way. I didn’t want to be weak.

But we couldn’t walk away. I tried to make communicating with me almost impossible. Something in me was telling me, there was more. I just couldn’t see it. So we decided to just step back. Not just be done with each other. Which brings me to my next lesson, I spent so much of our time asking him what he needed from me and never spoke up about the things I needed. I let him continue on like I was happy and I really wasn’t. I just accepted HIS feelings as OUR feelings. So if he was fine so was I.

But he had something big to tell me. It bothered me that I shared my secrets with him. I told him my fears. He knew more about me then my best friends. I turned to him when I was having a bad day and I was that to him. He cried to me, shared his failures as well as his desires to do better. We talked each other of the ledge as a couple. We were a unit as he had said to me so many times before.

And he had a “secret”. It couldn’t be good, what secrets really are? My mind went to a thousand different places. What it could be, what it might be and what it better not be.  I didn’t want to HATE him. He was one of my closest friends. He held me when I had nightmares, when I woke up screaming thinking someone was hurting me, he waited till I would let him touch me. I didn’t want to ruin that in my mind. I didn’t want to tarnish that. I was willing to accept that we didn’t work but if it turned out that he had done something unforgivable, I wasn’t sure how I would handle it.

What he gave me was a bullshit line about a terrible mistake he made. That it wasn’t what he planned, he wasn’t happy about it. And his biggest fear was losing me. He wasn’t being honest. Every fiber in my body rejected what he said to me.  You could smell it. His body language and how he spoke, all told a different story.  I couldn’t take it. And I still refuse to believe him.

As much as I respect honesty and truth, I hate for people to choose when they are going to use it and that is what he did. It’s comical. Only me! This man who would tell me he loved me and would never hurt me. I believed him, I trusted him and he completed smashed my already fragile world…. And I never saw it coming. And THAT is what angers me. There are millions of women who love to be lied too. There are websites that will help you find THOSE women. I am NOT one of them. I was comfortable in my loneliness. I had become use to my life as it was before us. And I was completely oblivious to my misery. I couldn’t miss what I didn’t have. Now I feel used and violated. I’ve been abused and it’s such a similar feeling. I feel …molested. Which was yet another lesson, I never looked beyond what was in front of me. I took him at his word which is fine but when there were things that should have been questioned, no matter how small I just didn’t ask. I don’t push, not because I don’t care. I just don’t see the point. I am 100% transparent in relationships, I always expected for people to be the same. I don’t crack under pressure or go crazy. I can handle the best of bad news. So I never see the point in lying to me.

And I think this is an issue that a lot of people struggle with. I’m trying to understand what people gain from misrepresenting themselves. And it doesn’t excuse women either. There are tons of women who use and mislead men. I’m just not one of those women either.

And how does that come into play when you date a friend? How do you respect and care for someone for YEARS and then as soon as you date them, you change? I’m stuck trying to figure out does this happen to all men or just the ones I choose? I’m hurt and I’m angry not because we failed but if he was dishonest the whole time then we never had a chance to begin with and he seriously betrayed my trust. And I didn’t have a lot to begin with!

The fact is I fell in love with him and US. They way we were together; I loved who he was as a person and a father. I even loved who I was with him. And no we were not perfect. But in my mind we worked and we were happy. But now he’s made choices that have changed that so drastically that I can’t even be on the same side of town as him without feeling sick. Now all his actions and words are negated. They carry no weight with me and they no longer have meaning. I am second guessing myself and my decisions. I feel like he set me back. And I know that is a lot to put on the shoulders of one man, but who am I suppose to hold responsible? Myself?

Yes, I have been able to step back and see where I should have done things different. But what chaps my ass is how people can decide when THEY get to check out of relationships. He had opportunities to walk away. Why didn’t he?

So now I’m stuck wondering when he stopped caring about my heart and decided destroying it was a better move for him. We would often joke about my lack of feelings towards love and relationships. How I acted like I didn’t need or want a man. Maybe he decided to teach me a lesson? And even though there are things that I can take away from this experience. Things that I can look out for or try to avoid in the future. It doesn’t change the emptiness I feel RIGHT NOW. I can’t just stop loving him. It doesn’t stop me from expecting him to call at the same times every day. Or to pull into my driveway on “our” night.

What I do know is it hurts, worst than anything I have ever felt in my life. I feel like someone died. No like I did. Like I passed away and I am floating around here watching everyone carry on while I’m stuck in purgatory. It’s embarrassing because I shouldn’t allow anyone to have this much power over my emotions. But isn’t this being honest? I can’t be the only person to feel this way when you’re heartbroken. HELL they call it HEART BROKEN for a reason right? My heart feels shattered, tattered and battered. Yeah that’s exactly what it feels like.

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