It is finally 2011! I can’t believe how fast time flies when you get older. So far, my new year has been great. I’m a little tired but that is a norm for me. New Year’s Eve was a blast. There were a lot of laughs and plenty of ammo I can use later against my friends if needed. It DOES pay to be the only sober one at the party! I hope your new year is off to a great start. Even though it is a new year and a new start, I wanted to take the time to go back to past. I wholeheartedly believe you should never live in the past but at the same time it is what shapes the person you are right now.
A relationship, it is the one thing I am absolutely terrible at getting right! It is no wonder why I have so many issues with it at this point in my life. So let’s go back to reasons why. I am only going to focus on three relationships. There were other guys in between but no one worth mentioning. So the first guy was my high school boyfriend. We dated my senior of high school. He and I had been friends since I was 14. He was a really good guy and still is but our relationship was not a typical high school relationship. We both had walls up and never let each other in. If it wasn’t one thing, it was another. We let friends get in the way and dictate our relationship. We were never alone and when we were, it was awkward. My senior year was not the best year of my life either. My grandpa died in November, my mom was not dealing well, everyone was dreading Christmas, and there was so much pressure on me to be everything to everyone. I wanted to be the perfect girlfriend and be attentive and affectionate but I couldn’t. My depression took a new turn during this time and I felt bored and distant from everyone and everything. So I ended the relationship. I couldn’t deal and I broke his heart. I felt awful but I just couldn’t sort my own feelings out and I didn’t want to deal with his. One thing for sure was I was not in “love” with him. I loved him and a part of me always will. We are still friends and I care for him deeply. But it wasn’t “love.” I was only 17 and I was a mess even then. It was hard because we had a close knit group of friends and it tore some things apart. A part of me does regret it but at the same time, maybe it was for the best. I found out quickly who were my real friends.
The next guy is the hardest to talk about and he causes the most pain. He and I were off and on since I was 19. We met when I was 18. There were many warning signs but I missed them all. I met him at work and he just had me hooked from the first look. I can’t explain what it was but I knew I had to be with him. I was really bummed he had a fiancé and was planning on getting married. I am not a home wrecker so instead we became friends. He made me laugh and we liked a lot of the same things. He was so different from all the guys I was usually around. He and I talked about everything. Our interests were the same and we got each other’s sense of humor. It just worked. I was relieved when I heard he and his fiancé broke up. However, I never once thought he would be interested in me. He was. I was still extremely shy and would never have made the first move. When things started to change, I was in denial. I always felt less than worthy. I felt ugly and like always, only saw my flaws. I will never forget the way he asked me out the first time. We were at work and he was so casual about it. He came up to me and said “So when are we going on a date” and then it all fell into place. We did the dance of dating but not dating but it always came back to him. Unfortunately, time was running out. He enlisted in the air force and was off to boot camp. At the time, saying goodbye was the hardest thing. I knew then that I loved him. I knew his reasons for going and respected his decision. He wanted a better life and who was I to deny him of that? He wrote me some of the sweetest letters while he was in boot camp and he called as much as he could after it was over. It was finally time for his first leave and we were going to be together again. I was elated. I started picturing my life with him and it looked great. However, I did not plan on him getting back into drugs and hanging with his loser friends the entire time. He blew me off and treated me horribly the last couple of weeks. He wouldn’t call me and he wouldn’t answer for me either. At the time, I didn’t know what went wrong. On his last night in Vegas, he ended things. His reasoning was he was off the England and then Iraq in a month. He thought it would be best. He broke my heart and there was nothing I could do. We didn’t speak again until 5-6 months later.
During those months, I started having feelings for someone else. He was so different than me. He was the ultimate bad boy/ heartbreaker according to my friends and family. I didn’t care. He had the weirdest sense of humor, his taste in music sucked, and he watched the stupidest movies but I loved every moment of it. He was so alive and reckless. I was still the girl who did what her parents asked of her and stayed out of trouble. He had tattoos and piercings where guy 1 and 2 only had a few piercings (that later changed.) We were so mismatched and my best friends hated him. They couldn’t stand each other. Things weren’t great though. He was a druggie. He seemed to do it all. X, pain pills, shrooms, and then meth. I stuck around anyway even though I knew I was not okay with it. It was bad enough I for some reason always ended up with smokers but this was new territory for me. I just couldn’t make myself walk away and I can’t even explain why. Maybe it is the whole opposites attract theory. It wasn’t only the drugs that affected things. He always found a way to put me down. Whether it was what I was wearing, how I wore my hair, and how little sexual experience I had compared to other girls my age. I never met anyone until then that made me feel like I was a freak for wanting sex to mean something and not be some random hook up. I wasn’t looking for the fairytale and I am not a prude. I just didn’t want to go down the same path as my friends. He and I were always one step forward, then three steps back. It was a push and shove thing (not literally). I was on an emotional rollercoaster. I was up and down. My weight was up and down. I should have walked away before things got worse but I guess I was a glutton for punishment.
To my surprise, guy #2 contacted me during the craziness of guy #3. He asked me to marry him. He didn’t go to Iraq right away but was leaving very soon. I was confused. I loved him but I was not ready for marriage especially since he tossed me away so easily months before. Sometimes I still regret that decision because maybe I would have been spared some of the pain to come but there’s no going back. I told him no and it was a few months before I heard from him again. In the meantime, guy 3 and I were still a chaotic mess. I started a new job and he took on a second job. One Friday, we finally took the time to really spend time together and that was the night, my heart was broken again. Towards the end of the night, he told me had been sleeping with his manager at the 2nd job and she is the one who got him started on the meth. She couldn’t wait to rub my face in it. Worst of all, she was old enough to be his mom. She was a cougar alright. It would be a year before I would speak to him again. That was the only time in my life when I was violently sick because of a guy. It didn’t help that during our time together was when I started to cut myself and stay out all night and come home just in time to get to my first class in the morning. My mom hated it and tried to force more rules on me. I think she was relieved when I found out he was sleeping around. She knew I wouldn’t stick around.
Well, leave it to guy 2 to come back around. We started a tentative friendship again. Well time had passed and I found I was more in love than ever before. He seemed to have grown up and although the constant distant was hard, we made it work. He was in England and the phone bills were outrageous but I seemed to be momentarily happy again. I stopped cutting myself and felt more relaxed. Another warning sign came and it was letting guys dictate how I feel about myself. Things were going really well until one day, they weren’t. I know he was going through personal issues with his family back home and I was trying to be patient. He never sent my Christmas gift he supposedly got me and never called on Valentine’s Day. March came and I rarely heard from him. I was in a car accident and it took a couple of days to even respond to my message. He barely asked if I was ok. The “I love yous” stopped and the next thing I know, it was over. He ended it again when I gave him the out. I told him how I felt and it was up to him if were to stay together or be apart and he chose the latter. I wanted him to choose me and he didn’t. This time, I barely cried. I closed off completely the next day. I didn’t cry a single tear until guy 3 came back around.
He caught me on the rebound and I was swept up again. Things seemed to be different. He kicked the meth habit and wasn’t sleeping with his manager anymore. He was staying away from drugs and it almost looked like he was getting his life together. Boy was I wrong. Apparently, once again, I was not enough for him because it withheld information from me and thanks to MySpace, I found out the truth. He had a girlfriend. I called him out on it and swore they were just friends. I had doubts but I was starting to waiver until the girlfriend contacted me. That was a “fun” conversation. She was younger and immature and apparently saw it fit to call me the bitch. It seemed she missed the part about him being the liar and the cheater. I was a wreck. I cried and cried and asked God “what was wrong with me?” My family tried to console me but it was like I hit the breaking point. I know they eventually ended things but he and I would not speak again. He did however send me an email a year later apologizing for his actions. We aren’t really friends but I don’t hate him anymore. I want the best for him. It stung a little when I found out about his getting married and having two kids but I know now that wasn’t what God had planned for me.
So to make a long story even longer, guy 2 came back, again. He said he regretted his decision and was sorry. I told him I was moving to Phoenix and started a new chapter. A few months later, he was married. Now that hurt. One minute he is telling how much I mean to him and the next thing I know he is married to a girl from Vegas. Nice. Well I started a new job and moved to a new city. I was in transition. I carried around all the pain that occurred over the years. I was becoming more reclusive and didn’t trust anyone. I didn’t want to get hurt again. A part of me was running from the past but it always finds you. I heard from him again right before Christmas. He and his wife were separated and he said he thought about me all the time. He made a mistake with her and wanted to come see me. I told him I didn’t think it would be right if he was still married. We agreed to talk about it once it got back into the states in a few days. I never heard from him again. I wrote him once. No response. Later, I found out from a mutual friend he did get a divorce and was remarried and now has two kids. She is really young. Barely 20.
Are you kidding me? They put through hell and they get the happy ending? I am not a girl obsessed with the fairytale but what happened to karma? Why do they get to be happy when I have been through hell? I carry around a lot of that anger. His wife is young and already has two kids. I am down to one ovary and there is not guarantee I will be able to have kids. Seriously. Life is definitely not fair. If you are asking why I let him hurt me so much, I can’t really explain it. It is like the movie Brokeback Mountain where one of the characters says “I can’t quit you.” Well I am not a guy and I am not gay but it works. There was just something that drew me in and kept me there. I sometimes wonder if I would make the same mistake again if he came back into my life. I HATE him with every fiber in my being and I blame him and myself for making me so weak. I am terrified of feeling like that again. I am terrified of starting a new relationship because I feel like my heart never really healed. So this is where the hesitance comes in and why I let my insecurities get the best of me. They beat me down emotionally. I was made to feel like I was not ever going to be worthy of someone’s love. I feel the pressure of being alone weigh down on me every day. It haunts me.
It doesn’t help that most relationships I have seen/experienced in my life have been dysfunctional. I do not want my parent’s marriage. Separate rooms? No thank you! My sister has been divorced three times, my brother is divorced and doing only God knows what, and both are very negative about the institution of marriage. However, I have hope. I was inspired to write this blog by witnessing 4 separate relationships. They make me believe that maybe, just maybe, it could work. I see these couples at all different stages in their relationship and they all seem so in love. I want that. I don’t know what God has planned for me but I have to have hope that finding love will be a part of it.
Well, this took longer than I anticipated but it was like a mini therapy session. I understand why my therapist suggested it. LOL. Happy New Year!
~L
