Breaking Up Isn't Personal

I've been single for maybe three weeks, I've learned our relationship for what it is and had been in the last months of our partnership as true friendship. The evolution of our relationship changed even when we were in it, which made it easier for us to realise that we're just friends now. In the first week of the breakup I said this, but I didn't really mean it. I didn't really mean it up until last night when I realised it's possible for me to be attracted to, to be taken aback by, to be enchanted by someone other than the man I used to love. And it's a funny thing. **

Do we ever really know what love is until we meet someone new? Or do we love many? These are questions no one has the answers to and it can be subject to perspective. I myself was in mourning, not for him but for myself. The "me" I became when we were together. But now I understand I took our separation very personal, like the majority of my peers. We cry and mourn for our loss in love for ourselves and not for how the other person is feeling when really, it's not personal. 

I know in a previous post I spoke of pain, loss and love. And I don't mean to say today that, this was not true. It is true, I love him. But in a way I did not before. I still devote my life to him in all the same ways, to better and respect him. I do miss him, I do long for his company. I just don't equate my life to him. I no longer feel intimacy toward him like I did a year ago. I see different futures, they still include him, just not as we originally intended when we made those promises. And I'm not saying this other person I've met is the new person I love, I hardly know the man. I'm saying I shocked myself in being enchanted by someone while claiming to be stuck in a slump of heartbreak not 24 hours before. 

I'm growing to understand myself in a way I haven't before. And I will tell you how.

Before this break up I felt my first pang of painful and heart wrenching loss by a man who I now know used me, manipulated me as well as two other women. Who led me on to the point of making sure I came to the hospital at times where his other women weren't there (he was in a car crash a month or so after we started interacting) I even spent time with his brother, witnessed him relearning to walk and helping him eat his food. Comas are not fun, but that was no excuse.

I said goodbye to that regardless of how long it took my heart, and I fell in love with my long term boyfriend; my recent break up. Three days after my break up, at my work, coma dude is there. And on that night I won. He admitted every wrong doing he ever did which included sending me anonymous hate mail all those years ago while also showering me with fake admiration on our hospital visits.

Coma dude has been hitting me up ever since and today I finally told him: "I'm not on your list. I've made my own." It took me years after his treatment toward me to realise I control the men in my life, who stays and the treatment I receive from them. The difference between our lists is that the people on my list will not be disrespected, because the only people on my list are good men, and good men deserve respect, as good men give it in generous doses. 

I haven't lost anything, and I'm not saying I'm going to delete tinder, swear myself to this guy I've seen literally only one time and devote myself to the good of love. I can't even say this guy will even want to see me again. I'm just learning what and who decent men are, understanding genuine people. Getting in touch with what I need, while also appreciating the beauty of good men when I come across them. Being able to recognise that the man I once called partner, the man I once called lover and the new man before me are so different and serve different needs. They have their own needs and it's up to all of us to figure out if we're willing to satisfy those needs or not. Physically, emotionally and figuratively finding our worth and feeding the worth of our counterparts. So for my readers out there, whether you read from me often or you're new to my words, whether you're heartbroken, in love, talking to someone who won't commit to you, ask yourself if those are things, if these are things you're willing to satisfy for the sake of others? Is the give and take weighing out at an equal favour? Who are you heartbroken for? 

**And before anyone feels personally offended that I decided to move on instead of lay down and die, understand that you weren't in my relationship, both of us are the only people who truly understand, we grew into friends which made it easier for me to move forward because we were already subconsciously moving forward before we broke up emotionally. 

*** A bunch of you have come forward and guessed the identity of coma guy as it seems he did the same thing he did to me, to some of you. While I'm totally entertained by your personal stories with him I'm not going to post his identity here. But I'm totally down for a good laugh at his expense in private.