Posted on by She Never Sleeps

Another Letter I’ll Not Send

I miss you.

Those are tiny words which do zero justice in describing the agonizing churning of my innards. I am incapable of faking joy and the general public has caught on that I’m Not Okay. I’m growing tired of the pep talks, the “You Made The Right Decision” speeches, the misguided attempts at cheering me up. I get through the social obligations only to hurriedly make my way home in order to escape all the Care and Concern.

I don’t want pity and I’m So Sorries. I want solitude. I want the comfort of my space so I can wail for hours into the night, alone and broken. I want The Hurt to FADE but it will not. It digs in its heels, grinding my heart beneath into pulpy slop. I want to fall asleep without tears, to wake up without dread.

I want to wake up Next To You.

I want you. I want your mouth on mine. I want your soft singing when you’re happy, your eyes gleaming with love. I want your hands gently roaming tender along my back. I want all the things we once had but without the bullshit which began tearing us down. I want to hear your voice, hold your hand, touch your face, have you close, FEEL YOU in any and all ways possible and my WANT for all of this is the worst kind of starvation my soul and spirit has ever suffered.

I stop myself again and again from reaching out because I’m told that is the wrong decision to make. It will just hurt you more. And I cannot do that, knowing how much pain has been caused as it is. I know my desire to speak to you is selfish. It is only for me, to quell the ache, lessen the melancholy. Or so I imagine. But then another wave hits and I am very much an angry petulant child who is not getting their way because I can never be what you need me to be and radical acceptance isn’t one of your personality traits. No amount of adult rationale or logic can minimize the paroxysm of my weeping and manic screams of IT ISN’T FAIR.

it isn’t fair.

I miss you. I still love you. None of this is fair.

Posted on by She Never Sleeps

A Letter I’ll Never Send

Everything here is a reminder and I can’t get away. Your art is on my walls. The necklace you gifted stares at me from where it dangles. Your mug is in the cupboard. Your toothbrush lays exactly where you left it. Your flannel, the odds and ends, the mix cd of music which I cannot bring myself to listen to… all needle pricks to the still bleeding bits of me which mourn your absence.

I changed the bed linen, tears trickling slow, my soul weighted with the memories of the last time we slept together. But I cannot erase you just by switching out old sheets for new. You still take up residency in my fractured heart and I just do not have the strength to boot you out.

I wish So Hard that it didn’t have to be this way. But I am the 24/7 train, going and going and going. Making stops here and there, picking up, dropping off, brief moments of respite for maintenance and diagnostic checks.

And you… were a passenger. Who rightfully grew tired of the long never-ending hours.

I lean on my friends who hold me steady. Reminding me of all the work I’ve done on myself, the progress I’ve made. Refreshing my memory in the knowledge that I am not responsible for someone else’s journey, only my own.

I sit in the silence and the image of your smiling eyes pops into my head and pierces me… it’s okay. I’m used to it. I cry off and on in between moments of keeping busy so that I don’t think of you. Still. You manage to appear. Sometimes, I let myself be slightly angry. You said you loved me. You said you didn’t want to change anything about me.

But after a while, it was those things which you supposedly did not want to change that drove you crazy.

The outrage is minimal and short-lived because I know that in your heart of hearts, you are just a wounded man who needed more than I could offer. A man who hasn’t recognized his true worth and value as of yet. And I’m not the one who can give it to you. You equate someone’s need for you as love. Your usefulness as worth. Your people-pleasing as value. But you are so much more and God, how I wish you could see and accept that. That I loved and still love the man you managed to become despite the fact that Life tried to tear you apart from the get go. You are so many things… and maybe one day I’ll have the chance to be with you again to celebrate them all. But if I’m not the one, I truly hope that someone else can and will be. That thought is it’s own special kind of heart-breaking.

I miss you. Terribly. Though I will not say so to you. That would be cruel. So I will cradle this pain and hold it tight to my chest. I will keep myself busy. I will cry in between making the kids lunch and washing dishes. Because … I am capable. It’s what I do. You loved and loathed that, though. Didn’t you.

Posted on by She Never Sleeps · 1 Comment

The Hope

It’s uncomfortable. This place I’m in.

It’s new and not necessarily good or wanted. But it’s a place I chose because I knew in my heart that it was the right thing to do, even if it broke me to do so.

Leaving someone out of love is not easy and yes, that is an exceptionally large understatement. I’ve left before out of resentment and anger. Out of hurt. Out of indifference. And people have left me for similar varying reasons. It’s always been a negative and bitter departure no matter who was walking out the door. Yet never in my life have I loved a person so much yet knew deep in my heart that Now Is Not The Time. Never have I had to force myself to walk away before it turned down the road of complete chaos.

Leaving out of love for myself. Out of love for him. Realizing that if I stayed, the problems would not recede, they would only accumulate. Understanding that he needed the time for himself to truly figure out and heal the things necessary in order for him to thrive in any future relationship, whether it’s with or without me.

And there’s the rub. I hold out the slimmest sliver of hope that we find our way back to each other. I am not an idealist. I know the chances of that are ridiculously low. I may as well buy a lottery ticket. But I am an optimist, though a pained one currently. I have the improbable dream that he and I will come together again down the road, with the same amount of love and want as we did when we first found each other. Yet, there’s always the chance that with time, he eventually comes to the conclusion that perhaps I really wasn’t The One. Just because I was the First doesn’t mean I am the Only. I know this because I’ve been there. Not every love is the same. And maybe that’s why I had the foresight to remove myself. Learning from my experiences, not wanting to make the same mistakes, not wanting to tarnish something which was truly beautiful with the things we couldn’t quite manage to see eye to eye. I wanted to keep that love intact. Hoping that at some point, we would once again fall asleep in each other’s arms.

A girl can dream.