Down she goes
He’s with someone new.
I imagine he felt like this when he saw me with someone new back in 2016. The only difference is, he didn’t walk away. He made it his mission to get me back. To make me promises he knew he couldn’t keep, and make me choose.
My stomach has turned inside out. My brain is on an endless loop.
My integrity, however, unlike his was – says stay the *f away. And so I shall.
In late spring, 2023, he sent me a text that included a screenshot he had with a friend – and in that screenshot were “recently used emojis”. Those emoji’s included hearts, kissy lips, kissy faces. I hadn’t seen those emoji’s since the fall of 2021 when we were still together. My heart sunk.
I had told him, post break up, that if he ever decided to start dating, I wanted him to tell me because I didn’t want to have any part of it. His dating or engaging with women meant one of two things – that he lied about our breakup (he ultimately did not want to cohabitate or marry), or that he is lying to women the way he did with me, just to get the validation he so desperately craves.
I had suspected he was dating, and I would ask, but he always said he wasn’t interested or engaging with anyone. It was all a lie.
“I can’t talk to you anymore”, I texted.
“As you wish” he replied.
“Are you still going to do my labels?” he asked after a bit.
On what planet would I engage with my ex, who wants to be “friends”, purely to maintain the benefits of all that is me and all I had done for him? The audacity of this question still sends me reeling, over a year and a half later. No. Please find someone else to create your labels and pay for them, like a grown ass business owner.
(p.s. ladies, don’t give wifey benefits to a guy who hasn’t fully committed and giving you husband benefits.)
Even my smartwatch detected his bullshit. It is a spike I’ll not soon forget.
I went radio silent. The sting of the end of our 6 year relationship was fresh – and to have the confirmation of his hypocrisy and lies was more than I could bear. I was angry.
A few months later, he drunk texted that I lacked fortitude (really, 6 years of 17 on-again off-again reasons, excuses, begging and pleadings – and none from me, all to give him repeated opportunities to fully commit), he gave me “fair warning” that he was going to disconnect from me on “the socials” because if I couldn’t validate him and his posts, I didn’t deserve to be connected.
That’s fair.
I was hoping to give it some time and space and maybe see things differently after a while. However, I didn’t need a warning. If this was his nudge to get some kind of engagement, I was despondent.
I executed his plan without responding to his bullshit text.
Why couldn’t he have said “I’m sorry. I miss you. I’m an asshole”? Instead, I get attacked. Ambushed in spite.
Just another nail in the coffin.
We attempted to resolve our differences in the beginning of 2024. It was painful. So much damage had been done, it was well beyond over. We answered each others questions about how each of us processed the finality of our communication, attempted to start communicating again, and after a few more painful exchanges and e-mails, I just couldn’t find it in me to validate him anymore.
He didn’t just break my heart – he lost my trust, my respect, and my adoration. It was all gone. All I felt was anger toward him, even though all I wanted was peace.
Seeing him with someone new, well it was a combo gut punch, and also sort of amusing.
I was her. I believed him, I believed *in him. I trusted him. He said the same things to me. He looked the same in our selfies. I was the same doe-eyed girl fawning over his eloquent words and saturated attention. Social media love. So pure and innocent. This is the picture he painted of us, too.
Maybe she’s the one.
I certainly wasn’t.