Breaking Up Is Never Easy, I Know
Although, when I first walked away - he just let me go.
So arrogant was he that ‘I’d see the light’ in a few days and come back, that he didn’t even get up off the sofa to say goodbye and instead asked for one more look at my breasts…because he wasn’t sure how long I’d be gone.
Even at the point of walking away, the hold he had over me was still so strong, that I nearly lifted up my shirt after thinking that was quite a reasonable request. It’s hard now for me to admit how downgraded I had become, and that I felt my body was his to own.
We didn’t speak for a few days, which gave me the space to starting mourning the end of our relationship, and to come to terms with what I had just achieved.
Inevitably, I had to go back to the house in order to pick up more of my things, and as we had a mortgage together, I couldn’t avoid him forever.
So I found myself sitting back on my old sofa in my living room, with him on the other side in an arm chair.
He asks ‘Have you had you’re space, are you back now?’.
‘No, I’m not coming back’ was my response, whilst shaking my head in disbelief that he hadn’t understood that I had ended our relationship.
‘No? But we are a pair, we have always been together. I’ll change, I’ll do more, I’ll do better…’ Was his reply, as the begging started for me to reconsider.
But it was too little too late, and there was nothing more for me to say other than…
‘I’m done, I have nothing more to give’.
I felt this was my only opportunity to get out. If I didn’t leave now I never would. I’d started something, the wheels of my escape were in motion, and I had to keep being brave.
I’d already done the thing I had been dreading for years, which was to phone my parents one evening and tell them ‘I’m coming home’, thus admitting that my relationship was finally over.
They asked no questions, and became my rock for the year of torture that would continue.
You see after a relationship break up, it’s common for people to go through a similar phases to a loved one passing away.
First there’s the denial.
He refused to admit it was happening.
I recall another time when I went back to the house, knowing he was away for the evening, that he had made me a dinner and left a note explaining it was in the fridge.
Acting as if we were still together and I still lived there.
The denial continued for a long time. He refused to talk about our finances, or how we were to divide up our stuff.
But that was ok, I was still getting my head around it all myself, so for a while I did not push for a house sale.
Then came the anger.
He would continuously bombard me with angry text messages. And if we ever met, he would call me such things as a cold hearted bitch. He’d say it with such venom it was almost like I’d been hit.
Those three words, and that look of pure anger, stayed with me for many years, and perhaps even still to this day.
Then came the fake ‘moving on’.
He started dating.
He changed his WhatsApp picture to one with him with his arm around a girl.
And when I’d go round to clear my remaining things, I would regularly find he had left me something to discover.
Such as many packets of unused condoms in my old bedside table.
An act I’m sure that was done on purpose. As if to say ‘I’m doing so good without you, that I’m having sex with someone else on our old bed’.
Throughout our relationship the mind games were endless, so it did not surprise me one bit that they were continuing during our break up.
Then came the ‘poor me’ attitude.
I couldn’t stay at my parents forever, and I had to sell the house that he had remained living in. But he made it quite clear how he felt that I was ‘kicking him out onto the street’.
This was a complete fabrication as he had a good job and would be making money off the house sale.
He told me point blank that he’d make the house selling as difficult as possible.
And he did.
He refused to sign papers unless he saw me.
He refused to corporate with the solicitors and estate agents.
And even on the day of sale, I received a call saying he was still in the house!!
Then came the final phase.
After a good two years he reached the understanding phase of the break up.
I learnt he had got there after receiving a text from him where he apologised and hoped I was well.
I wish I could say that was the end of this chapter in my life.
However, for anyone who has been in a toxic relationship, you will know it takes a lot of self love, acceptance and time to truly get to the other side.
But we do get there…eventually.
