Exactly three times in my life I have been emotionally devastated like I am now. This feeling of absolute "WTF!? How did this happen?! How did I get here?!" Followed by a long run of "poor me". Let me explain what is so unique (one could even say 'special') about these occurrences.
All 3 times, I was involved with a guy who had some affiliation with a particular branch of the military. All of them, the same branch. One was a lifer, one just did a few years, and the other went to the academy but mysteriously did not continue into a career.
All 3 times, the guy was physically closest to what one could describe as a "roughneck". Not very tall, but physically imposing, big, and strong. Nobody would look at any of these guys and decide to mess with them. Two out of the three were also bikers with significant ink.
All 3 times, these guys had larger-than-life personalities. Especially with a few drinks under their belts. They were funny, charismatic, loud. Bombastic. And tons of fun. When sober, and caught at a good moment, they were teddy bears. Gentle, sweet, loving...extremely fond of children and animals, all 3 of them.
All 3 times, I entered into an exciting, roller-coaster style relationship that had just enough high points to keep me coming back, but extreme lows that frequently left me devastated and ultimately, led to me ending it.
You read that right. These 3 relationships that I allowed to devastate me, I pulled the plug on. Even though it was for seemingly different reasons, they all had one thing in common: I knew that I could not survive as a happy and complete person with the kind of treatment I was receiving from them. So as a survival tactic, I ended it. Pulled the rug right out from under my own feet to avoid a worse spill later.
And then I mourned. And mourned, and mourned. And strangely, felt like a victim. It was only my analysis of this extremely uncomfortable victim-colored coat I kept donning that has forced me to see the commonalities in these 3 relationships and spurred me to examine what happened, and why do I react this way? Injured, even though I'm the one that walked away each time?
The first one happened when I was very young - 20. We were in college, and he was fresh out of the military, a year older than me, and looking for trouble. Ultimately, he cheated on me and got a girl pregnant. To say that was a shock would be the understatement of the year. Once the truth of the situation was revealed to me, I realized I wanted nothing to do with this situation, and as much as it broke my heart, I told him to leave me alone. I let it devastate me for an entire summer. Lost about 20 lbs. Couldn't eat. Cried daily. I took it personally. I felt like the other woman must surely have something I didn't - why else would he have made that pitstop at her place when I was waiting for him at home? My young, insecure mind couldn't stop wracking itself with comparisons to her. And seeing her was even more devastating - she wasn't anything special. Horsey-faced, even. And THIS is what he preferred over ME? Devastating. He realized too late that he had really fucked up a good thing and would show up, usually drunk, making loud, insufficient overtures as to how much he actually loved me and it was his fear of that which had made him act out. He caught me at the wrong moment once, and having had way more than enough, I (drunkenly) lashed out and broke his nose. That seemed to get the message through, and he dissolved into the background, forever tainting my memories of my final years in college. (The coda here is that 20 years later, thanks to social networking, we have been reconnected as friends, quite good ones actually, and finally deciding to release the anger I held towards him for two decades was an amazing, uplifting experience. And hearing him talk about how he knew that I understood him better than he understood himself, and how that unnerved him and freaked him out, and he didn't know how to deal with it, is extremely validating.)
The second one happened about 10 years later, as I was entering my 30's. He was a co-worker (learned THAT lesson the hard way) who hadn't necessarily caught my eye as much as my ear. His personality and intelligence were off the chart amazing, and once you fall for somebody's personality, everything about them becomes beautiful. Everyone we worked with thought he was the best. A real good-time Charlie, always buying rounds of drinks for everybody, making the best toasts. Things were good until I moved from Pittsburgh to DC (where he lived). Unbeknownst to me, he had a best friend who was very jealous of our relationship and was working against me. My boyfriend had promised me that I'd finally have the New Year's Eve of my dreams, he'd see to it. Come late November, he suddenly mentioned that his friend had invited HIM (and only HIM) to the island in the Bahamas that his parents owned for New Year's. He jabbered some excuses about there being "only one single bed" available and his friend's parents "frowning upon" me potentially being there with him when I knitted my brow at the news. He stammered and backpedaled and avoided eye contact. I was furious. Disappointed, and hurt. He denied ever having said he would spend New Year's with me, which only served to insult my intelligence. That was the final straw for me. I said, "_____, you cannot treat me like this and expect that you can still call me your girlfriend. Goodbye." And I walked out. (Actually, I had to call my BFF and have her and her husband drive 40 minutes to come rescue my stranded ass, but that's beside the point. I ended it right then and there, in the beautiful foyer of his parents' house, next to the baby grand piano. I spent those 40 minutes behind a locked guestroom door, sobbing quietly into my freshly re-packed overnight bag.) I mourned that for MONTHS. Lost 30 lbs this time. I just couldn't understand it. Again, I let it devastate me. I'm sure I was quite intolerable during this period of time, and I still appreciate the few friends who managed to tolerate me and reach out to me during that time and make sure I was ok.
This last time, now in my 40's, I wasn't looking for anything at all much less something serious, but all I can really say about it here is that he was a friend/acquaintance - somebody I had always liked and admired, so I felt 'safe' with him. He was in my safe zone. And within that safe zone, I allowed myself to get sucked in by something with the force of a turbine engine and spit out the other side so quickly that I never did quite figure out what exactly happened, why it was so intense, nor why it had to end so suddenly. Although I know damn well why it had to end. Once again, I realized that I was having some unhappy moments that were so unacceptable to me, they outweighed the amazing highs we had together. I knew it was not a sustainable model. We had never talked about exclusivity or commitment, yet I felt (apparently incorrectly) like we were there. When I started seeing and hearing evidence (some very real, some circumstantial) that he was still juggling someone else into the mix, I had to bring it up even though I knew that conversation was verboten and wouldn't end well. How could he be looking deeply and intensely into my eyes, yet blowing me off on alternate weekends to spend time with her?! Doesn't make sense, and I can't live like that - on hold, on call, waiting to be picked as the favored girl that weekend instead of being relegated to the afterthought of a weekday. I am not, and have never been, a second choice. A runner-up. I take the ribbon, or nothing at all. And I won't chase it. I'll work or fight for something I believe in, but I won't beg. So again, even though it hurt my heart and my ego, and I wasn't strong enough to do it sober, I yanked the plug out of the wall and walked away before it got worse.
And here I am, three weeks later, still overanalyzing the whole thing, but with a reason. I'm not trying to pick my scabs or beat a dead horse, I'm trying to LEARN. To grow, to improve, to not repeat the mistake I seem to make on a 10-year cycle. And to tell myself, "stop sulking, asshole, he didn't end it with you. YOU ended it with him." You'd think that little pep talk would cheer me up, but of course I just look at the reasons I perceive that he (all 3 of them ) didn't make me his top priority or first option. I'd like to get to the point where instead of feeling sorry for myself for not making the cut, that I feel proud about walking away with my head held high (eventually), and not accepting less-than-stellar treatment from a guy. Because I see a lot of women who DO choose to stay in relationships like that. They cling to these men in a veritable ballet of dysfunction, on again, off again, tears, smiles, tears, smiles...I just can't do it. And I guess somewhere inside me, I know my limits. And I know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em.
With all that learning under my belt, I guess what I need to do now is just enjoy my 40's, and come 50, keep on the lookout for an ex-military tatted up roughneck on a motorcycle - and run like hell when I see him.
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