The death of a relationship, dissolution, I need to let go.

[Guest ErickWcurls]

This was an assignment that a therapist told me to do.  I don't know if this is poetry but it's all my pain. I don't t know how to let this go.  No one has seen this...

 

 

What do I not miss about the relationship?

 

    I don't miss the constant walking on eggshells. Afraid that some small thing I do , something I never thought of would make Melissa mad. Sometimes I'd burp kind of mindlessly and she would be disgusted and make a big production of rolling down the window, waving her hand.   

 

    I won't miss her mother.  Even when we were on good terms there was tension because Melissa felt on edge when she was at her home ,even if it was just her brother but especially when her mother was there.  I won't miss that she lives in a house with her mother and brother. 

   

    I won't miss feeling like I wasn't good enough for her, because as soon as I thought  we were good for a period of time something would always happen.  I'd always be telling myself , "be good, be good, be good, be mindful etc"

 

I won't miss always being on eggshells in public in case I get stuck mindlessly staring at a girl.  I couldn't relax and just people watch as one does.  

 

 I won't miss always feeling like I was trying to prove my trustworthiness.  I made a stupid mistake, was stuck in a kind of thrill seeking and obsession at looking at insta girls .  I never ever was tempted again , did anything like that.  

 

   I won't miss that she was weird about posting pictures of us together.   She made a big deal that she made her FB status as "in a relationship".  I didn't understand why she made such a comment about it.  Like she had some reputation as a single person or whatever.  She hadn't been with anyone in like five years.   If i had social media I would have put nothing but pictures of us.  

 

   I won't miss her rehashing things i don't do anymore or as bad.  I realized my father would do this.  Ask me in my 30's why I crashed a car when I was 16.  What's the point?   It's abusive.  I always felt like I was on uneven ground. 

 

I won't miss her weirdness in regards to sex.  When we first started we were like jack rabbits.  Everywhere, anytime.  Then out of the blue she's say something like ok we're good not having sex for two months. I'd be confused why all of a sudden she's say that.    The one time she told.me she didn't know if she wanted to have sex for a long time.  

 This would only last a week and then we'd have sex many times after that.  It was like she felt herself getting close and she had to yoyo away from me.  I told her i understand that I'm there to support her in anyway.. i was of course disappointed because she is the best lover i ever had.  So sexy and beautiful and it was just amazing.  

 

I won't miss how difficult it was for her to achieve orgasm.  She didn't tell me for a few weeks that she has difficulty having an orgasm.  The she told me that just once with a last partner.  I know every woman is different but she could with oral sex but it took 30-45 mins.  Or shed do a different thing where she would lay on top of me and tuck my penis like between her legs against her vagina and rub herself. Her legs tight.  It was pleasurable but it kind chafed.  The she started where yes either one of those ways she would have an orgasm and i would assume that now i can by having regular sex and then after words she said a few times , it's ok if only i come, you don't have to come every time.  Then she brought up that she didn't have orgasm the first few weeks we first started having sex.  Almost like she was trying to balance an iniquity of orgasms.    One time we were having sex her facing me and i was about to orgasm, she could tell and she kind of leaned got me out of her , i thought she was teasing me and i pulled her back down and came and she looked into my eyes with suck a strange look. Like sadness or betrayal or disappointment.  I asked her what happened. I told her I thought she was teasing me and she said, you don't always have to come inside me, it's messy or something like that.   

 

I won't miss her ridiculously low self esteem.  I made such an effort to make her feel special, was buying her flowers every three weeks but then she told me since i have it sent via thebouqs a flower subscription service that it didn't mean as much..  i always tried to write a meaningful or funny note with each order.  I picked what flowers for each delivery but yeah i made me feel like I was lame.

 

I won't miss how picky she was about everything.  I would usually always order the same drinks, like a dirty Tito's vodka martinis , etc.  She always had to order a drink from the restaurant cocktail menu and a lot of the time she was disappointed with the drink.  I'd tell her to return it and get something she likes but she wouldn't , she's finish it.  In the beginning she would take a very long time to order food from restaurants .   When we went for the first trip last year to Yucatan peninsula it was something that kinda was annoying me and i told her. Just order ,you don't have to have fomo (fear of missing out) in every goddamned thing you do.  She got upset and started crying.  It was her birthday.  She told me she always had a problem with that , with indecision ordering food.  When they were young her mother would always order each of her kids food, two girls ,two boys that way everyone would sample of each persons plate.  Maybe that's it I have no idea but I told her i was sorry that it is frustrating when one is hungry and you're taking thirty minutes to decide what food to order.   After that time she was much better and didn't really do it anymore.   It felt like we grew together because of that moment.

 

I won't miss not being able to be myself.  I would use certain phrases from time to time and she would be annoyed I said it.  Like for example, I'd see like a taco half eaten on the sidewalk and I'd be like ooh a free taco want some?   Just dumb joke.  Or a shoe or whatever.  She told me she didn't like that. That is was boring silly and why wild she want some used or bitten piece of food.  I'm told her it's just a dumb joke.  Never understood that but i made me feel lesser .

I won't miss her comments that were still getting to know each other that's what this time is for (one year, year and half , almost two years). If we aren't compatible then it's I'm nothing bad will happen.  After saying say belong together, that we were made for eachother ,that she belonged to me and i belonged to her.  Countless time if saying all the ways there I love you.  Theres like even more in Spanish, "te quiero" which means i want you literally but it also mean i love you.  Then there is te amo which is like a deeper very romantic love.  She told me these things countless times.   That she Appreciated me on and on.  The. Next week shed be a little distant and tell me she felt i was smothering her sometimes.  Everything had to be on her terms.  She's be cold in the car because i always have the ac on, i get hot. So i got a blanket it was always i the car..  she always has a runny nose from allergies, she doesn't believe in taking pills, so she's always looking for.kleenex. She kept making for of me not having napkins in the car or Kleenex.  Go i got a bunch of the little Kleenex packets.  

 

I won't miss the hoarding level weirdness about holding onto empty jam jars and plastic containers from food.  Even bottles.  They had their entire washing machine full of that stuff, two big drawers a kitchen cabinet.  I'd throw something away like a normal person and she'd be "oooh why you throw that away?".  Because you literally have more containers that you could ever possibly use.   She'd kinda be annoyed and laugh.  Straight up famine mentality like one day these stupid containers will be valuable one day.  The funny thing is she is she's not into Taking pills and drinking filtered water and stuff , i told her that using containers like that literally put plastic in your bloodstream and gut.  But what do I know always reading about science? 

 

I won't miss feeling strange pressure in the kitchen to not drip water in the floor when I wash my hands or use "too many " paper towels.  Or shed make little comments like, "why do you use so.much toothpaste?".  "Why do you need two towels to dry off after a shower. "

 

She told me once , "i don't know if we can have sex anymore you've gained some weight and .my hips can't take it". One time she told me, "all my past boyfriends have been thin ofr fit, you are the most overweight boyfriend I've had". 

 

She asked me " Why do you walk that way? It's like you're in pain or you're so lazy you barely move enough to make your way,. In Spanish it's even more annoying.  She told me about this, "it exasperates me how you walk like you're ultra lazy". 

 

I'd tell her that just how i walk. I don't feel pain, just sometimes in my knees but i don't walk that way because of that.  The shed say" omg when we're old together I don't want to be with an invalid. " 

 

When I later told her that this was very hurtful that she was making fun of me she then says, i thought you were hurt i was seeing if something was wrong.  Her narcissistic tendencies coming out.

 

I'd tell her if she was hurt when we were older I'd take care of her and wipe her ass if need be.  

 

Everything was for her convenience.

 

I didn't like when she was "working" selling jewelry on the boardwalk in ocean beach . I'd say good bye or just grab her hug her and kiss her and she's make like she was trying to get away and say, "not in front of my fans". I was totally confused by this.  She said it several times and finally i said "fuck your fans, in your biggest fan"

 

Found it weird she'd want to get up almost right away after sex to either pee or clean herself like she was soiled after.  She had a lot of weird hangups about sex.  She would only want me to do certain things if she was freshly showered.  I'd do it anyways and she'd jokingly call.me an animal or savage in Spanish. It'd made me laugh.

 

I won't miss her complaining if I go over a speed bump to fast.   Or if i did something on my phone while driving then of course when she was driving her messing on her phone was fine.

 

I was letting her use my other car, a nice 2017 Accord coupe.  I noticed that under the driver door handle, there paint like on The rest of door and it had faint scratches.  It's from her shoving her hand into the loop under the door handle and lightly scratching the paint.  I told her quite gently that hey be careful when you open the door not to run your nails on the pain in the inside.   She said oh ok didn't know that was happening.   The fun y thing is this, i stopped telling her things that kind of bothered me because she's say ok then either immediately or a day later make fun of what bothered me or whatever i requested.   A couple days later she said, maybe it's neighborhood cats that are scratching that one small part of the car that there is no way a cat could scratch.   I told her that's why I don't tell her when I want her to stop doing something or something bothers of annoys me.  The she says "it's just a car".  😕

 

Yeah so about that.   She was always annoyed that i shut car doors "too hard".  Especially if it was her car she used to have or her work van.  Shed say something like the door will fall off something like that in Spanish..  I guess i should have said it's just a car.

 

In the first times u would help them set up and put stuff way when they'd go to boardwalk or farmers market . They have these two like 8 food plastic tables that the legs fold up.  I was helping by moving the heaviest stuff and i dragged one table just a short distance and her sister kind of yelled low, "no don't do that!" Then Melissa said more gently please don't drag the tables they've lasted for whatever amount of years because we take care of them …cute.  When I ask just for one thing not to do to my car that I'm letting her use it's a joke..

 

It's funny i would tell her she was the pickiest girl I've ever been with a d she'd say sometime like, "i just like things a certain way". But she'd call me picky.  For similar things and be like whatever yeah I'm picky with some stuff.

 

I won't miss  the feeling that she almost always seemed like she was half in half out of the relationship. Afraid to love, afraid to let go and just enjoy .  One time she was telling me about some abuse from her childhood and she was crying but not fully weeping.  I held her close and told her to let it all out. That is wasn't her fault, she didn't deserve that.  What that person was wrong, she wouldn't pull away but she would then kind of stop crying.  I expected her to let go and just bawl .  That what i would do in the same situation.  She was afraid of commitment . 

 

We talk about having a wedding I the first , barefoot and having children having a house with a workshop where we could make stuff together.  But the when I would make something at her house she'd comment i was so messy and spread my tools everywhere.  It's as though she enjoyed the fantasy of taking about these things but when we would get more serious or whatever she'd pull back. Like it was getting too real.  I was working hard studying hard for the NMLS mortgage broker test. Exhausted every day for weeks from doing all this.  Telling her I'm in track. Was going to take the test In a month and the the two weeks before she broke up with me she started acting very distant in texts , the only way I'd see her is if i can to visit when they were selling jewelry.   One Saturday or Sunday i drive to Escondido to a Oaxacan restaurant that makes the best horchata(according to her). I got to large horchatas and drove from Escondido to ocean beach and brought them to her and her sister.  As i got it if the car with the drinks she just sat there and kind of smiled she was doing something that was not if importance and i handed her the tray holding the two drinks and she said aw thanks.  But didn't get up to hug or kiss me until I'd been there a while.  It felt like I was just any guy.  Not the love of her life like she'd told me so many times.  

 

  I just thought she was dealing with heavy things from doing coda.  Like she had a lot on her mind , the abuse she's suffered from her mother. Realizing she did certain things.  So tried to be patient, i thought it was another one if her random dry spells.  

 

She told me that she didn't break up with me in those two weeks because she didn't want to hurt me and didn't want to lose me.  Well wtf she didn't have to do either.  

 

I won't miss her compartmentalizing her feelings where she tells me these things and she looks upset but she isn't crying.  She told me that inside she was sad and crying that she wasn't letting herself cry because what good would that do? It made her seem like she didn't care like she was a sociopath.

 

At least I'd know she cared , that she's not a cold sociopath or something.  It made me feel that everything we shared meant nothing in an instant.  All the plans meant nothing.  That her saying she loved me in so many countless ways were each one of them lies.

 

It's why I've been so sad for the last six weeks.  Because i felt true love for the first time for her.  That she fascinated me. I had never loved someone so.much. Been so attracted to someone.  We had so much fun and liked many of the same things. She's the only one that made me want to have children.  I won't miss feeling that it was all bullshit. A cruel joke.

 

What lessons I've learned in this break up processs.

 

That it doesn't matter how much you love someone, how hard you try to make them feel special if they are so damaged that they don't even know what they want to order from a restaurant let alone if they want to grow old with you.  That i need to work in my boundaries, that relationships need set boundaries for all sorts of things.  That i shouldn't set aside my own needs for the girl i love.  That as much as it hurts , my broken heart that you won't die from it.  No matter how much you want to. That your suffering won't matter to her.  That I'll be very sensitive to codependent behavior.  I've read so much about narcissists and codependents .  

   To be leery of whomever I'm dating's parents.  To ask how they get along with their family.  I should have seen a red flag when she told me her family doesn't talk out things with each other, that her mom is a.scumbag manipulative narcissist cunt.  But if i say one bad thing in agreement she might get mad or upset. That not having my own place and being much better with my money and debt puts a strain on a relationship.  That I need to be more clear and firm if ever someone I love is going to meet my parents.  Maybe she will never meet my father.  He's a narcissist too.  He's a total asshole and doesn't care who he hurts .

 

I'm learned that many things were just not my fault. I can't constantly try and head off problems that i don't know are problems. Walking on eggshells feeling is fucked up and a result of abuse.

 

I learned that i can feel pretty much unconditional love.  That i almost get obsessed.  That i like short petite girls with beautiful dark or tan tan skin. 

 

I totally dropped whatever armor I had for her.  Because in the past I was aloof or afraid of commitment. 

 

That extreme pickiness and feeling you have to constantly jump through hoops is a sign of a codependent neurosis or narcissist.

 

I learned a lot of the behaviors of a codependent and narcissist.

 

I learned my friends love me and want the best for me.  But also they only have so.much patience for my wallowing.  I don't blame them. This relationship was so intense in every aspect.  She was naturally love bombing me then pulling away and it drive me crazy in a good way and very bad way. 

 

That life goes on that life doesn't care how much you're suffering, you have to deal with it and keep going.

 

That every time she told me she loved me oh so much, that we were made for eachother was a lie.  I trusted her completely and i shouldn't have.

 

How is this break up happening for me?

 

I didn't want it.  I just wanted things to be better between us but I'm couldn't get her to go to counseling or even that we both are codependent.  

The two weeks before she broke up with me I was worried i did something or that she was feet and and i wanted to help her.  Even just to listen to her and hold her.  I didn't expect her to break up with me especially after just telling her that.   She told me she was breaking up with me that she doesn't have the mind to be in a relationship 

 

  Every time she told me she loved me was a lie.   All our shared dreams a lie.   Every tender moment is a lie.  Every kind word and pet name, all lies. Every time we made love it was just fucking.    I miss her so much.  I miss everything about her except the nitpicking and flightyness ,the negative stuff.  If i could i would sell my soul to be with her again.  This hurts the most I've ever felt.  I was so totally committed to her. It's six weeks later and I'm still crying my eyes out. I wish God would just take me.  I am not happy.  I go to yoga everyday  and suffer and sweat and when it's over I start crying again.  I wrote that letter, stuck it to her van and although intellectually I thought she wouldn't respond I hoped with all my heart I'd hear something.   Today I removed her from my Instagram account and unfollowed her.  I also cancelled the two person Spotify account so she'll have to pay for it on her own on 9/25. I'm so tempted to text her that all she did was lie to me. Gave me false hopes.  Every pet name , every time she told me she loved me so much was a lie.  I feel tricked.  I feel like a fool.  

 

 

 

I deserve a great relationship because..

 

I don't.  I'm a good person but I don't even deserve the love from an abusive person.   I was romantic and loving and it didn't matter. I screw everything up.  Aside from that stupid stuff I was doing on Instagram I never was tempted to do anything like that again.  I was loyal.  Several times girls were fully flirting with me and I never asked for a number or flirted back.  Now I wish I had  tucked those numbers away.  Love seems like a fairy tale.  I was so sure we were going to have a life together.  How can someone talk about marriage,kids having a home and then walk away.  Just throw me away like nothing.  I would have supported her anyway I could as she did her Codependents anonymous and I'd do therapy and Coda.  What does it mean that she loved me up to her capacity?  It was all lies.   I don't deserve anything.

 

[Verbose Validator]

This kind of introspection is difficult and exhausting. It's rare to find such honesty in a piece of writing, even if it is therapeutic. Thank you so much for sharing.