Betrayal (2005)

I keep asking myself, what the HELL just happened? I know things weren’t going very smoothly and I could tell there was something going on, something wasn’t right. But every time I broke up with him he’d send an email or ask to come over or show up at my door asking to be taken back and telling me he really cared, he was just afraid to say it.

He wrote me poems…not very good ones, but just the fact that he wrote them, just the fact that he cried when we’d talk… Maybe it was the hurt over Liz more than me, maybe my loss was reminding him of the loss of Liz and he just couldn’t take being alone… I can’t even guess because he never told me the truth about any of it, not a word. Everything he ever said was a lie. At least I’m trying to convince my heart of the fact.

There were so many ‘first times’ with him. I never opened up to another single human being, bared so much of myself to a single man as I did with him. That was probably my mistake, just trusting the wrong man.

I always followed my instincts, and since I hadn’t been in a long term relationship for years I thought perhaps I was being too picky… Perhaps I wasn’t giving them a fair shake, didn’t trust them because of Brent… I always worried about carrying baggage from one relationship to another and I always thought about what I was doing and saying to make sure. What a bag I have to carry now because of it.

So I still feel the hurt and betrayal, it wouldn’t have been so bad if he would have told me to my face he was going to try to make it work with Liz. I could accept that. Instead he told me how he would send me money to come visit him, how he would visit me, how he wanted to see my dad’s cabin... He cried when he said he really cared about me, how he felt so bad about what he’d done. It was all a giant slap in the face…he didn’t even have the balls to tell me he’d made his choice and it was to patch things up with his ex.

I think I know why… She was more than likely a weaker person, not as sharp. He admitted that I intimidated him and I guess I was pretty aggressive. I can see how it would be hard to accept with the size of his ego. They obviously lasted two years before for a reason… I only wished he’d been honest, that was all I ever asked of him. Even at the end he lied his ass off.

Still, even now, I can’t help but wonder if he will try to contact me… How could a person lie when saying the things he’d said? Of course he had a history of cheating on girlfriends in the past; his excuse as to why he couldn’t say ‘I love you’, which was also a lie. He couldn’t say ‘I love you’ because he still loved Liz. He could say it about her but he couldn’t say it about me.

So now I have to try to move on, move past it without letting it taint any of my future relationships. Knowing me I will get over it, but I think it will be a while before I can work through the anger and hurt, it will be worse than with Brent because I knew Brent really loved me. Brian never did, he only led me to believe he did and that’s a bitter pill to swallow especially considering what I put into the relationship…

But life will go on, hearts will mend, memories will fade and I will fall in love with someone again. I will look back and remember, but I will look back with more wisdom than I have now. I will be stronger and smarter and hopefully a better person for having experienced this pain. Perhaps I needed to feel it to understand what love is all about.

What Is Love About

This was an epiphany I had during one of our off periods. I let him walk out the door because he couldn’t tell me he cared. I was so mad, so upset, so hurt that he couldn’t even say that much. It was during that time that I heard the song, ‘Heart of the Matter’ and it all became clear to me.

You can’t make someone love you, but there’s nothing wrong with loving them all the same. There’s nothing wrong with giving someone your heart as long as it isn’t an obsessive destructive relationship. You just have to know what’s at stake and be willing to take the risk and understand the consequences…

When you give someone your heart you can’t blame them for the way they treat it because it was you who offered it. They will do what they will do and if they mistreat it you must know that the pain you feel never would have happened if you hadn’t believed and trusted them. You can’t love without doing both.

The Lesson

So now I’ve gained some wisdom, wisdom in pain, wisdom in loss, wisdom in betrayal. Now I know what it feels to be so completely and utterly deceived, I know the warning signs (specific signs, not just feelings).

Years from now I will look back and have a story to tell. A story about a girl who probably lost control for the first time and wore her heart on her sleeve until it was tossed away. I would be lying if I said I wasn’t just a little bit of the psycho girlfriend. I would also be lying in addition to being too hard on myself if I said I didn’t have a damn good reason for it. Had he said it was over and wasn’t interested in me anymore I would have had to accept it. As it was I had to hear it from the police officer he called when I showed up at his house the second night after he told me he wasn’t getting back together with her.

My only solace is that I know eventually he will regret me. He will think of me and what I offered him and he will regret. Maybe not to the point of actually calling me, but he will break his own heart thinking about what he threw away. I know my worth so I know that it will come back on him, his behavior will have consequences and it will be him who has to live with them.