I once loved a man who didn’t know how to love himself. So I loved him hard hoping it will help him heal. He was so abusive and dismissive of my feelings. He constantly tried to make light of my demand for him to seek help as me being too obsessed with him, and yeaa, I was, in a dumb sort of way. I felt caring for him was my responsibility, I thought it was my duty to make him see himself better and worthy of a healthy lifestyle. So I accepted his dismissive attitude, I let him treat me like trash and constantly make excuse for his bad attitude. I tell myself, all I needed to do was show him more, I needed to let him see me better for who I am, it doesn’t matter that he took another girl to a party he promised we would attend together and kept me dressed up all night waiting for him. Sadly enough, I didn’t even recognize his behavior as abusive, I never saw him as controlling. I thought I was the one who had too much expectation of him, to make up for that, I told myself to reduce my standard, to shrink myself, to act small around him and accept his shabby treatment of me.
When he chooses to starve me off communication, I suffered, yet kept hoping he would see me, notice me and be back again. Yes, he always does that, he comes back wanting nothing but sex, making me feel like he was fine just so he can be back to me for his salvation. So I look forward to his return, I make myself ready for his journey back to me, I had come to believe his philandering character was not so bad, so long as he keeps coming back to me to mend him. What I never knew was that mess is how he seeks me to abuse as same with every girls. He feeds into the emotional side of me seeking to help him. He displays self pity and emotionally blackmail me to accept him again and again. He would riddle me about his incline to suicide, how I’m the light he needs to recover from his darkness, he makes me feel like his breath is dependent upon my own misery and my wanting of him even when all I wanted to do was not be disturbed by him anymore. Like every empath, we love to see the good in others, we aim to please and work extra hard to sacrifice our happiness for people. So we glory in our suffering for love. We convince ourselves that our pain is for the greater good of our significant other. So we endure, and when we think we can no longer continue to affirm their pain, we get overwhelmed in shame and regret. We become too ashamed to seek help, our remorse is never enough to let us flee. We become so engulfed with the societal humiliation that we refuse to leave. It gets worse, he keeps humiliating us, now he has power over us, he knows we can’t leave, because we are too ashamed to leave. So we stay. We stay hoping that one day we will get the courage to leave. But you see, leaving is not the hard part, making sure we don’t go back to the past is the hardest, following through with our resolve not to go back is the toughest thing some of us have ever made.
I had to learn how to find my truth, teaching myself that I matter and finding ways to choose myself. I searched online for ways to cope and deal with pain from love. I wasn’t sure of what exactly I was looking for, I knew I wanted to end the relationship, but I wasn’t sure how to make sure it stays ended. I needed to be able to look this manipulator in the eye and tell him exactly what he was, I needed my resolve to reclaim my space, both physically and emotionally. It meant being firm when he shows up at my crib, it means not giving him audience when in public places where I run into him, it means finding zero interest in his affairs and not wanting to be his psychiatrist when he’s seeking who to vent to. It was hard, the journey was slow, but I was bent on crawling out of that hell hole, no matter how deep it felt. I knew I needed to breathe some fresh air, because the one I was inhaling was choking me. I needed my win salvation and I read all I could from people who had gone through the same thing like I did to get it. So I practiced shutting off the world, it helped me concentrate on my self, it taught me to listen to my need. I was able to teach my mind to accept my truth, that I’m loving and deserving of people who raise me and not pulling me down emotionally. I taught myself to accept that it’s the users fault that I fail at finding balance and not mine for not seeing through their antics. But I accepted the role I played in that too, for making my time available for users, for being easily accessible to them. So I learnt to fill my time with positive works and thoughts, I volunteered my time more, I made sure to be more useful to people who needed to be productive, the more I gave myself to young people, the easier it got for me learn to love me. In loving myself, I was able to learn to choose me.
You see, some of us get lucky, some not so lucky, a few people, hmn, they make it. I was one of those that made it. I followed through with my resolve to never walk back that dark lane ever again. So with each new day, it got better, with each communication, it got easier to let him go. As hours turns into days, and days into weeks. With weeks becoming months. Freedom was achieved. What was more exciting is that i don’t even hate him. He just look rather irritating to me, His antics to get back in my good books(bed) only got more puerile and offensive to my person. That’s when I knew I had heal. I couldn’t hate him, instead I felt repulsion, disgust for the trash I hung on to. Glad that I could be finally free from emotions for him. I don’t pity his loss, I don’t even care about it. I’m just glad I’m in a better place.
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