"It was a crippling thing, this sensation that a huge hole had been punched through my chest, excising my most vital organs and leaving ragged, unhealed gashes around the edges that continued to throb and bleed despite the passage of time. Rationally, I knew my lungs must still be intact, yet I gasped for air and my head spun like my efforts yielded me nothing. My heart must have been beating, too, but I couldn't hear the sound of my pulse in my ears; my hands felt blue with cold. I curled inward, hugging my ribs to hold myself together. I scrambled for my numbness, my denial, but it evaded me. And yet, I found I could survive. I was alert, I felt the pain—the aching loss that radiated out from my chest, sending wracking waves of hurt through my limbs and head—but it was manageable. I could live through it. It didn't feel like the pain had weakened over time, rather that I'd grown strong enough to bear it.
'It will be as if I'd never existed.' They were just words, soundless, like print on a page. Just words, but they ripped the hole wide open. I curled over, pressing my face against the steering wheel and trying to breathe without lungs. I wondered how long this could last. Maybe someday, years from now—if the pain would just decrease to the point where I could bear it—I would be able to look back on those few short months that would always be the best of my life. And, if it were possible that the pain would ever soften enough to allow me to do that, I was sure that I would feel grateful for as much time as he'd given me. More than I'd asked for, more than I'd deserved. Maybe someday I'd be able to see it that way. But what if this hole never got any better? If the raw edges never healed? If the damage was permanent and irreversible? I held myself tightly together. As if he'd never existed, I thought in despair. What a stupid and impossible promise to make! He could steal my pictures and reclaim his gifts, but that didn't put things back the way they'd been before I'd met him. The physical evidence was the most insignificant part of the equation. I was changed, my insides altered almost past the point of recognition."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
I spent last night curled up with a book. I was Halpert-less and in the mood to be alone. I've been doing a lot of inner soul searching lately; contemplating karma and how the implications of my actions will affect my near and distant future. I've been trying to pinpoint the origin of my feelings in search of the source controlling my recent behavior. And last night, in the midst of my reading, I found the answer glaring loudly off the page.
Suffering from heart break has been the worst thing I've ever had to go through in my 24 years on this earth. I know that I've been through worse experiences; the deaths of loved ones, dealing with the effects of family alcoholism, and building up a thick skin to withstand my home life but for some reason my break up with Dante is the most raw and painful experience I have ever had to endure.
He was my world. My everything. I've loved before but not in the same way I loved him. I thought I was going to marry him; honestly and truthfully, I thought I had found the one person I was meant to be with forever. Our relationship was beautiful and everything I have ever wanted. I was never so happy as I was when I was with him. When it came to an end, the break up and it's aftermath was torture. It took every fiber of my being not to fall apart at the seems. Just existing took exurbanite amounts of energy. It hurt to sit still. It hurt to move. It hurt to sleep. Nothing I could do could ease the feeling that my body was being torn apart from within.
I found someone new quickly, too quick. In hindsight, the new relationship was much like placing a band aid over a hemorrhaging limb. I forgot the stitches, the medicine, and most importantly the time it takes to heal. I was in such a rush to replace the pain with the excitement that comes with a new relationship that I ignored what I knew I should do; be alone and prove to myself that I can be strong on my own. I just wanted to be me again but I didn't realize that you can never find yourself in someone else. Time passed and of course, the new relationship came to an end. You cannot build a house on a ground plagued by fault lines that rumble and twist the foundation of the house. In the end when the band aid was torn off, I was faced with the same gaping hole. Only this time, I chose numbness. I chose NOT to feel.
I was tired of feeling heart broken. I was exhausted by the thought of feeling weak and vulnerable again. I became mean, heartless and unfeeling. Anyone that got too close, I violently pushed away. I slept with people I shouldn't have. I hurt people who didn't deserve it. And I shied away from those who wanted to help me. But I was tough. I didn't cry anymore. I didn't need anyone anymore. I didn't rely on one person and I was so happy to know that all I needed was me. I got sick, I took care of myself. I got scared of strange noises outside, I investigated it myself, relying only on a can of pepper spray. I needed help moving heavy things, I gritted my teeth and did it myself. I wanted to go to a nice dinner, I treated myself. I did everything I was terrified I could never do alone after Dante and Brandon left. The only problem was, I wasn't healing. I was numb. I didn't feel anything but my need to be strong.
I knew something within me was still very wrong because every time I entertained the idea of committing myself to someone in a relationship my heart raced. I would literally break into a sweat and my breathing would quicken at the thought of giving myself to someone again. To love is to be vulnerable, to trust, to give yourself up 100% to the other person believing with every fiber of yourself that the other person will do everything they can not to hurt you. Love is giving someone all the power to destroy you and trusting them that they won't. Up until last night, I refused to do that again.
No matter what, I couldn't, I wouldn't be left sitting alone and devastated on my couch with my Dad and Mom on each side of me staring at the ticking time bomb that was their daughter and waiting for her to crumble. I would not find myself curled up on the bathroom floor, after crying so badly that her body heaved enough to vomit. I would not be a shell of myself while trying to smile and convince those with concerned eyes that I was OK and my sallow eyes, and thin frame was only because of tiredness and not my inability to sleep or eat without my relationship. Those are the tangible things I remember. Those are the memories that surface every time I think of starting a new relationship. It can never be as if they never existed because no matter what, you ARE changed and those sickening memories of the pain and heart ache never fade. Last night, seeing my pain described perfectly in words brought everything I had buried for the past year up to the surface and for the first time in awhile, I cried.
Sobs racked my body harder than I've let them in so long. It was like I was catapulted back to that day in December when Dante left or that day in June when Brandon left. I was hurting all over again like my wound was reopened and raw. Nothing was protecting me anymore. Not sex, not a warm body, not the shallow attention of some random person. I was just me, alone and feeling my pain like I should have done months ago. I survived the pain then and I survived it last night. I will always survive it. I am strong. Everything I ever wanted to be, I am. My break ups have molded me into a far more capable person than I ever was before. Tremendous amounts of good came from my break ups and I can't ignore the positive any more.
Relationships and the love, loss, hurt, pain, happiness and all the things that come in-between help to mold who you are. It builds your character, your convictions, your strength. If I continue on my quest to protect myself from feeling this pain again, I'm inevitably shutting out the many good things that come with it. I've been stopping my own growth this entire time. Love may hurt, it may destroy me again but I'm no longer going to avoid the start of something beautiful just because I fear the end of it. I still am terrified at the thought of a relationship but after last night, I'm no longer going to push people away, or clamor for the company of those who make it OK for me to settle. Because someone out there wanted me to read this passage, to feel again and I can't ignore it anymore.
It's the holidays. My first holidays spent single. It's scary and lonely and hard but it's also exhilarating to know I can get through it and still enjoy every day with my friends and family. I will deal with my pain, my gaping wound, the right way. It will heal. I will heal. No more band aids. No more quick fixes. I want to be with someone some day, someone amazing, someone wonderful. He's out there. I know it. And until the day when I discover who he is, I'll be here. Existing. Living. On my own.
