Author: Flickeringdedications

Time is moving so slow, as I avoid the thoughts of you.

I ignore the end of my hall, and the memories that ensue.

I ignore the messages, and the tightness in my chest that follows.

I can’t sleep, I can’t eat. I’m on a tumultuous rollercoaster.

I just keep thinking.

How was I so stupid? How could I have been so blind?

How can a love so friendly,

cut the layers of identify so precisely?

How can a love so sweet?

turn so malicious with lashes of pain dealt in passion.

How can a love so affectionate?

become so vile and full of contempt?

How did our love

become so destitute of understanding and compassion,

that we became each others enemy.

My world view tilts. My head feels too heavy and like it’s about to fall off my little branch of a neck. The world seems a little too fuzzy but also too clear. I am trying desperately to be and feel numb. Last night the man I have been loving unconditionally and refusing to let go of, he placed me in a perpetual state of shock. The graviton ride throwing my stomach into disarray and reality spinning. Last night he came into my home returning a key after an awful argument. He had spent the day attempting to convince me I should be do something I had told him I was uncomfortable now doing. He came barraging into my home, intent set and rationality removed, he got himself amped up. Then it began. The yelling, calling me a slut and finally the pushing. The first push I was in shock, putting my hands up to his chest and attempting my own push. However there has always been a slight difference between the two of us, he is a large muscled man who goes to gym and during play fights, could push me with one hand to have me stumbling across the floor. I have tried in similar play fights to jump and push him with both hands, and he does not flinch nor move, in fact he laughs and states how it tickles.

He pushed me, I needed to take steps back.

I pushed him, he didn’t move a muscle.

He yelled that I was a slut.

I yelled for him to get out of my house.

He pushed me again. I needed step back.

He yelled again.

He pushed me again. I needed step back.

How on earth had we gotten ourselves here? He had made a promise he would never put his hands on me during an argument in any way. He told me he wouldn’t yell such cruel things at me again. He promised me a lot. He said a lot.

I believed it.

I, the fool, believed it.

I wake up each day from a fresh set of nightmares. Whether it’s of my past, my ex or taking my own life. Every morning I wake up from an imagined hell created in my dreams. I wish I could call him, tell him I miss him but also scream my frustrations about the both of us. My own mistakes fresh in my mind threatening to encapsulate the peace I’ve fought so hard to acquire. I wish I could hate him but I can’t. I simply can’t. I’m constantly assaulted by the thoughts of him and us. I know he hates me now though. It was a necessary evil, because I knew I would never leave him. I had to leave because he didn’t respect me.

I wish I could hate him, resent him even. I wish that I never wanted to see him again. The truth is I want something so simple, that it breaks my fucking heart. I just want him to love me. All of me. The good, the bad and the ugly. Just as I love him unconditionally, even when he hurts me. It’s stupid. He won’t. No matter how hard I try, it’s not moral or possible to force a person to love and respect each dimension of myself.

I just wish I could let him go.

I am grateful for the life I have been able to live. I feel a duty to love it.

But fuck, it’s hard.

I’ve needed to rewire and reprogram my brain. I began my journey, ungrateful. Devastated and entitled. I thought because my mum had died, because I was abused, because I suffered childhood trauma, that I deserved something. I had in my head that because I grew up with a mentally unwell father and a step mum that was under the pump so much, I at times felt left out of her love, that I deserved something. I was so caught up in my head, that I didn’t see my step mums struggle and how hard she worked BECAUSE she loved US all. She raised me BECAUSE she loved me, it was just really fucking hard. My dad, I know he loves me, and I’ve come to accept he does this in his own way. For years I felt like I was missing out, not having that close bond with him. But I know I can call him and just tell him I love him, and I know he’ll be there to say it back. I can see how he hard it is for him to reach out, when he’s facing what he’s facing each day.

I am blessed to have them both. For years, instead of looking at the positive love, I focused on the surface level behaviours, never actually understanding the struggle and suffering they both endured.

I am no longer wearing the guilt of not looking after my niece more. My mum is astounding and I’ve accepted this is her choice. If she needs my help she can ask, and it is within my right to say no. I am not the only person available. I am not my step mum, I look up to her so much, but I can’t wear the responsibility of her choice. What I can do though, is take her out to lunches, dinners and so on. Treat her like I never could when I was younger. My mum loves going out, I’m working on my budgeting skills, so I can do this more often. I think my mum prefers that, she declines my help with Athena, but she won’t decline a lunch invitation. I love watching her get exciting about the food and talking with her about life. She is incredible.

I used to look at life so pessimistically. I resented so much and pitied myself above all. Queen misery. Something had to change and quickly. It was a misery to hang out with me. It dawned on me, what are the qualities of the people I admire have? Compiling lists, attending therapy, changing the self talk in my head especially is fucking hard and mental health plans, so many mental health plans. Slowly, slowly I started seeing the changes, an excitement in the world and a discovery within myself. Learning slowly about my identity, and growing into the person I want to be. My favourite new trick is when I’m feeling sad or down about something, I try to sit and think about the many different lives I’ve come across. What would they do to have what I do? It doesn’t take long for the gratitude to begin flowing in. In saying that, I also sometimes just accept it’s a low day and cater to my needs for that day. That’s okay too. Moods are a rollercoaster, better to understand this and develop methods for approaching it, rather than constantly striving for a high.

I have built a wonderful life, through mistakes, perseverance and tenacity. From the grumpy teenager who locked herself in her room for two weeks, sobbing about life. Now being close to 30, sitting in my own beautiful apartment, listening to music, smelling a beautiful candle burning on a gorgeous day whilst on holidays. I can’t believe how lucky I am. There’s so many achievements and failures this year, and I not only accept them but love myself through each of them. The light and dark within me, I love both. My identity is created through them, my intention is of kindness and curiosity. I recognise each of the good, bad and ugly moments I have, and have created my identity which has shaped my life. I am grateful for my life, my self and my loved ones. There are goals and plans for the future, there is always something to improve, or develop. But that doesn’t mean I can’t stop and appreciate what I have and what I am.

When shit makes sense. Shit makes sense.

For so long I’ve felt this deep unending injustice after the way my ex acted and treated me. It rolled around in my mind, screaming how unfair it all was. I wanted to be with him, I wasn’t because he fucked it up. I had my role, but essentially his actions fucked us up. Instead of listening to me, he ignored me, I then of course became very depressed and in my own mind, I ruined our relationship because I was depressed and anxious. But I told him what I needed and what hurt me. It was a slow decline, so slow I didn’t notice it, but it happened, he ignored me bit by bit. It tore at me more and more. I’ve shredded myself to pieces over this, agonised over my actions and most importantly inactions. He came back, by doing something terrible. Then continued with action after action that didn’t make sense, after all he said, he loved me..

When he came back, through another serious of painful actions, I was so in drought of him, that I pretty much launched myself at him. Some unconscious opinion that after all this drama, tension, hate, sadness, depression, I still feel this love? But how could I, after all he did? I was torn instantly.

I didn’t want to be seen out.

I didn’t want him to call me love or babe.

I didn’t want him to hold me.

I didn’t want him to tell me he loved me.

I didn’t want to because I secretly I wanted him back. So fucking badly. I missed him. I shouldn’t. I should hate him. After the whole ordeal. I chose to leave, because I felt unloved. Here he is, I find myself in an impossible situation. I want the man I should want to run from. The one that put restricted rules on me, didn’t understand me, tore me to shreds, didn’t listen and most importantly told me how I should be loved. But then the other side, is how much I know he cared, what he would do when I was broken, how much we’d laugh, how much he understood me and most importantly the way I felt when I touched him. It was a balm. I hated it when I was conflicted and I hate it even more that he’d hurt me.

He left me like the all the rest did.

I know I can’t do this. I know I can’t put all of the pain from everyone else on him. But I told him all of it. He saw things I never let anyone to see. I told him things I’d never tell anyone. He was the one I thought I’d be with. But then he ignored me, left me, and disregarded me. I was second best to everything. He was too busy for me. He did what happened to me the last time, what I was afraid of putting the effort in, to be left with nothing in return. I put the effort in and he didn’t. I loved him. I didn’t feel it from him, he just kept saying he did. I should accept how he’s done it. He told me. That’s enough.

I just wanted to feel loved the way I chose.

I know I’m not perfect. I’m lucky to feel love in the first place. I felt lucky for him. Graced even by his presence. But surely the love I pour into him, the love he tells me that he feels, I should feel? I say what I want, he tells me,

“I’m easy, nothing like his last girlfriend”

I tell him ” No really, I’m high maintenance, I know”

Because I know, I need follow through. I need love and affection. I need attention. A sunflower, independent of growing in the immediate distance of someone, but completely necessary of love, affection and attention. Don’t believe me? Look at Harlow’s monkey experiment, or Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. I am not professing to be different, just in high need of these things. I explain and describe this. I know the consequence of what occurs if they don’t. I turn into where I was my most protected, in my teenage years. The rebellious, I don’t give a fuck to ruin it, stage. Drinking through the pain and ignoring the consequences. Trying anything to ignore the depth of pain that covers my skin, stabs my chest with intensity and holds my breathing with severity. I hate it. This crushing pain of abandonment, pain, unjustness, and feeling unloved. They walked away once. They’ll walk away again. They’ll blame me and ignore everyone they did to begin with. They’ll do this like they always do.

I couldn’t just singularly point him out there. Because the feeling was so familiar. This isn’t the first time I’ve felt injustice. Like somone’s hurt me, left me and they’ve been fine to come back and pick up where they left off. How dare they? How dare they come back and just ignore what they left? How is that fair?

How can they just leave? How is that because I reacted to their shit behaviour, that never got reprimanded EVER, I’m the one that gets punished? How is that? They hurt me and leave. I react, not even in an attack, just to show them they don’t have control over me, and then fuck, back they come and I’m THE ONE THAT’S FUCKED UP?

How is that fair in any fucking scenario?

What the fuck?

That’s not justice.

We both admit our wrong.

We both find a solution and talk.

You don’t get to hurt me so many fucking times over and over and over. To have me do something shit to you then to say it doesn’t matter. No, we are both in the wrong. we both work to fix this shit. Blaming me and expecting me to beg after the fucked up thing you never even fixed, is not something I’ll do. Working out a plan to both better ourselves and acknowledge the pain on both sides? That is fair. I had a fucking years worth of non stop bullshit that built and exploded in my face in the breakup. I hate myself for how my mental health took over and I was too depressed to save us. You did so much shit that was constantly fucked up, and never owned it or made up for it. Then the first opportunity to blame me for the fault and demise of our relationship, you take it. You blame me for it all. Telling me your free from all culpability. I still maintain what I did was wrong, you maintain you are clear of any guilt. I am all in the wrong. I tell you again I don’t deserve the shit you did. I don’t deserve to be yelled at as I’m sobbing on the floor. You tell me I do. I betrayed you. How could I. I tell you, again, we can talk, I don’t deserve to be treated like this and name called. You tell me I do. You have nothing to be blamed for.

We go over and over. I boil under the pressure. Feel the stems of my brain cells become cooked. I lose control. I message. I don’t message. I blame. I don’t blame. I take responsibility. I blame him.

He blames me. He blames me. He blames me.

He say’s I’m a burden. He say’s I need help. He tells me to grow up. He says this is why I’m too much for my friend. Me calls me dramatic. I agree with him. He keeps going saying how I’ve ruined this. I tell him again. I just want him to accept his responsibility, I’ll do the same.

It’s too late.

I’m the bad guy.

I’ve been casted and branded.

Too late to clear my name. I’m the bad guy.

My lines have been written. I’ve been condemned.

I’m the bad guy.

I keep pleading my case, they ignore the denials.

He’s the judge, jury executioner. I’ve been condemned.

I’m the bad guy.

I can’t tell my friends. I can’t tell my family. I can’t tell anyone. I can’t tell anyone what happened last night. I thought we were okay, finding a sort of comfort in our distanced communication. I thought we were finding a place of peace. He decimated it. He said he didn’t love me anymore and he’s trying to figure out if he even respects me. He told me I was a liar and that he wanted to look me in the face to see if I was lying. I had no idea what he was talking about. I was happy to discuss and find a solution. He was on the hunt to destroy though. I told him I’m not mentally well enough for that discussion. I started off strong, voicing my boundaries. Telling him I was not able to sit through an argument, but I could discuss anything. He told me that she would have. At least she was honest. At least his ex that replaced me told him what was going on, at least she regretted her past. Unlike me. At least she had some respect for herself. Unlike me. I told him to come over then, I’d face him.

I was beginning to spiral.

He told me it was about other boys. How could I behave like that when we had broken up. He said he thought I was lying all along about being a good person, that he doesn’t think I’m nice on the inside at all. I crumbled. I agreed. This is what I was scared of. Someone would see the horrible person I really am. That I’m just trying to be a good person, but that it’s actually fake. On the inside I’m just fighting a battle of good and evil, and losing consistently. I went into a really dark place. I entered self loathing mode. He came over fine at first, then he began to blame me. I took the blame. I don’t know why I did those things. I explained what I could, he called me a liar. He called me a hypocrite. He said the friend of his, that I thought had been a friend to me, it was just me being naïve. His friend was trying to get with me and took screenshots to send to the boys group chat. Apparently they were all saying horrible things about me too. How could I have been so dumb. I just thought this person saw it was a tough time and wanted to reach out to be nice. Stupid of me to think that. How could I re-add those people onto instagram. Why did I talk to that particular person after our break up? How could I sit next to him at a party? Why? Why? Why? He started saying I’m either just stupid or a shit person. I told him I was both.

I laid on the floor of my kitchen crying my heart out. Grieving for the person I thought I was becoming. Obviously not. He stood above me and just kept going. Kept yelling at me. Kept being mad. There was nothing else I could say. I took responsibility for all I could. I said sorry over and over. He kept on saying that I hadn’t even apologised. He told me I was the reason why our relationship failed. I’m the reason it didn’t work between us. It was this shit that destroyed us. I am what fucked us up. I treated him awfully when he came back into my life. He’s been nothing but kind and lovely. How could I do this to him? I didn’t know what he wanted anymore. I was broken. He tried to get me up and I couldn’t move anymore. I just wanted to stay on my floor. Find peace somehow, wish that it would open to swallow me whole.

He left only to come back. Started nicely, saying he couldn’t leave me like that because he’s a nice person (unlike the rest of us). He kept saying he had to come back to check up on me. At this stage, I didn’t want to see him at all. I wanted my safe space back. I didn’t want him to yell at me again though or say how I’m a coward for not letting him back. He said he’d looked for flowers to bring me, but couldn’t find any. He wanted instead to take me to dinner. I couldn’t even look at his face. I knew I wasn’t leaving my house, to hell or high water. At this stage I could barely open my eyes, they were so swollen. He made his way back to the topic of discussion though. Wondering what my friends even thought. When he heard they had supported me, he lost it again. Saying how shit of friends they were, that my home town was shit with everyone in it. He told me his friends would hate me if they knew what I had done. They would hate everything about me if they knew the truth. He didn’t tell them though, unlike me. I told everyone what an awful person he is. He didn’t tell anyone because at least he’s a decent person.

“How much worse is that?” he said.

“You fucked us up, you did all this shit things, then you went around telling everyone I was the bad guy” he kept going.

I sat the entire time, in a ball crying my heart out. Wishing this would be over. Wishing he’d just leave. He kept going though. He told me that he’d be fine, the rest of us wouldn’t be. He’d find success and do well. The rest of us wouldn’t. He would be so much better off than the rest of us. I just had shit friends. I asked in the only voice I had remaining for him to leave, to please leave. After a few more moments stating how much better he would do than my friends and I. He left.

I locked my door.

I sat crying.

Everything I was afraid of, he said.

For so long I’ve tried to be a good person. I’m not.

He’s right.

I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought I’d been honest. I thought I’d been embracing my freedom.

Obviously not.

I’m just a liar. I can’t hide from who I really am.

A person whose hurt too many other people.

I love him. I do. I’ve tried to avoid, run, deny and delay it as much as I can. But I do, I fucking love him. I love who he is. I love watching him grow. I see his potential and fuck it blows me away even now and I know he’s just working towards it. I know the man he’ll become. I could see his potential from the moment I met him. He’s larger than life.

I did not like how he treated me though.

For so long I’ve gotten the two confused. I love him, but I hate him for this or I can’t stand him, then I can’t stand to be away from him. This heady contradiction has been boggling my mind for months now. He’s been a delightfully insane mystery my mind can’t ignore. I’ve tried to run, hide, avoid and be distracted from him. It’s been one of the most unstable periods of my life. I thought our relationship was unstable. Being away from him was it’s own earthquake in the realm of instability. I love him; his brain, mind, compassion and intelligence. Watching him think and come up with solutions or the care he has for so many different people, blew me away. Watching his quirks, comical moments and passion enticed me. Watching him, all of him, good bad and ugly. I loved him.

Our relationship though, is a different story. The way I treated me. The way he treated me. Is a different story.

I set a sub-par standard of how to treat me. I dedicated myself to a lower standard class of citizen. I ignored my boundaries and ensured to blur the path for him. I don’t agree or condone his reactions. But I know where to trace the path of responsibility. I know he blames himself. But I know who started it. I designated the treatment, and when he followed through became furious with him. I set him up, then got mad at him for going through with it.

Fuuuuuuucked up. So. So. So fucked up.

Now I sit here, away from him. Mad at him. Untrusting of him. For what I unconsciously instructed him to do. If I didn’t tell him how not to do it, I certainly didn’t guide him of to do it. I didn’t warn him of what made me mad, or what triggered me. I only sat feeling and ignoring each of them. Playing blind to the emotions inside me, I sat blind to the demise of my relationship. I didn’t communicate clearly.

I just sat expectant. I sat thinking that he would know me well enough of how to save us.

Fuck.

I have no idea what my next step is. I’ve been better so many times I’ve lost count. I’ve been worse even more times. I’ve been working on it, getting help, this times different, all of it. The constant roller coaster and backwards stepping hasn’t ceased though. Each time I find something new, I’m convinced this time I’ll be better. I don’t even convince myself anymore.

Maybe it will be better.

Maybe I’ll be the exact same.

Maybe one day I stand a chance at getting better.

I am the reason my relationships failed.

There, I said it. The truth of the whole thing. I sent the trap for both relationships, and watched as they fell into my failures. I weigh them down with so much baggage, and expect them to fix it. In my warped sense of reality in my head, I took their baggage and worked on fixing it, why couldn’t they do the same for me? Fucked. Absolutely fucked up. I have no idea how to fix me. I have no idea how to calm the storm of emotions, how to ease the exploding pain that radiates from within me. I have no idea how to not act irrationally. I have no fucking idea. Sometimes it feels like I’m in control, and I’m the happiest person ever. Other times, it’s like I’m in the back seat, without any control of my behaviour but also weirdly unable to see the disastrous nature of my actions, words and attitude. Not till I’m pulled from the wreckage I’ve caused and finally can reflect with clarity. I’m terrified of this side of me. This is the side that is willing to watch my whole world be destroyed. The one that doesn’t want me to be happy, doesn’t think I or anyone else deserves happiness. The dementor within me. It’s almost as if, if I fuck everything up, destroy it all, then I don’t have to try anymore. I can finally give up on everything, and go to the ocean in peace with the idea I can take my life. Rest in the non-existence.

That is the most chaotic, fucked up, destructive line of thinking. If I destroy my life, I don’t have to try with breathing. What the actual fuck.

Imagine loving someone that thinks like that from time to time? How do you help her? Especially with my ex who was a problem solver. He loved to help people, and I not only made it impossible, I expected him to do the impossible. When he didn’t and he pulled away, I would lose my mind. I would unconsciously punish him for not helping me, fixing me, making me better. I’m a grown woman. I’m an adult. Yet here I was, just as a child would, expect the adult to take care of me. In those moments though, I am wiped of the memory that I could be that adult. I conveniently forget that I not only have the power, but the responsibility to do so. I’m not a child anymore. Mum and dad weren’t able to help me when I was a child. But now? Now I can do it. I should be doing it. Instead I put this mammoth responsibility on the weight of those I love and respond as a dejected toddler or trashy teenager.

To add to this, I don’t communicate what I’m feeling. Most of the time, I’m not sure of what I’m feeling. Other times I think they should just know. They know me, they should know that I’m mad or upset. Then I’ll hide myself away, and refuse to come out till I can feel sunshine within myself again. I would have times where I would spend a whole day in bed sobbing uncontrollably and unable to stop. I sent my first boyfriend away, not wanting him to see me like that, just being pathetic. I was not just ashamed, I was scared of his reaction. My second boyfriend, I would try to send him away and he would never go. He’d stay and hold my hand or my head on his chest. He let me cry my heart out, witnessing the depth of my feelings. Once he knew I’d exhausted my tears, he’d pull me from bed, held me close and danced. Slowly, holding me, because I was too weak to stand without him. He’d sing softly and slowly in my ear, telling me how much he loved me. He was such a special human being. Watching our mutual destruction was torturous. He’s the only one that has seen me like that. He’s the only one that’s seen me cry so many tears, that my face swells and my body can’t stand. He’s the only one that has seen me at my most vulnerable and loved me through all of it.

Losing him. Losing the first person who has seen me at my weakest, most vulnerable and still held me through it. Even when we broke up, he just held me. He held me till I shoved his hands away. I bulldozed him out of my life. We weren’t perfect. Our relationship was tumultuous. We were mutually destructive. But all the things I thought he did to hurt me. He was in pain. Just like me, he didn’t know how to cope. When he held me together, I tore him apart.

I don’t know how to accept myself knowing I did that. That I did that to him of all people.