Fuck This!

If you told me I would be sitting in a Starbucks trying to explain the heartbreak and anger I feel over being played and ghosted, I would have laughed at your fucking face. Surely not; I’m the strong alpha female that is happy in her unconventional stable life. Oh, how wrong I was.

My marriage is ending, and I could care less. I miss a man I didn’t even truly know, and I hate myself for it. I'm stuck in a weird limbo while things outside of my control settle out. It doesn't make the heartache any less. None of this changes my plan. I’m still going to travel full-time and embrace my new life. But growing pains are a bitch.

I found a peace I didn’t know I was able to have. Sitting out on that deck wrapped up in blankets near a fire, just looking out over the mountain range. I reveled in that peace and solitude. Both things I thought would break me. I was so scared to be alone and sit still. I know it sounds strange, but it wasn’t a conscious fear. It was just something I was avoiding at all costs. Making exceptions and excuses in my life to ensure I wouldn’t end up right where I eventually found my peace.

We can’t help who we love and who we love changes throughout our lives. But how did he come running into my life and cause such a rift after his short stay? It’s bothered me for weeks. I couldn't wrap my head around it. But then I realized it was because I thought he loved me as fiercely as I loved him. He gave me a safe place to finally take off my armor and curl up in his arms. I’ve been fighting for myself and mine since I was a child. I thought I had to. For myself, for my family, and for women everywhere. I could be the strong shining example of a boss-ass bitch. And I still can, but I need to be able to come home and be broken sometimes. Finding someone who respects your strength but will take that burden off your shoulders is more important than I realized. I have never had someone that protects me the way I protect others.

My ex is a good man, and I love him. But he doesn't love me the way I need. That’s been such a hard hurdle to overcome. Growing up being told you are unlovable, the fact someone is willing to try seems like a miracle. My family took every opportunity to remind me how lucky I was, how no one else could put up with me, and how I didn’t deserve him. So every time reality would slap me in the face that we might not be compatible, I would push it down. There are things that still bother me to this day. Things that would have broken a weaker person.

Two of his friends thought I was a gold digger when we were younger. If I look at it objectively, I can see they were just trying to protect him. But if either of them had used an ounce of their brain, they would have quickly realized that was not the case. The daughter of a lawyer and big city exec doesn't fall for the son of a social worker and fisherman in hopes of striking it rich. I was still in college at the time we bought our first house. I had money saved away for college I didn’t need now that I was working for the school, and he had some stocks that had done well. We evenly paid the down payment, and my family helped where they could to get us started. But to his friends, I was a greedy woman making him buy me a house. It started with snide comments when he left the room. They progressively got worse till I just instinctually left the room with him. Which I’m sure did not help the situation. The crazy girlfriend that follows this poor unsuspecting man everywhere. I told him about the comments, and he said he would correct them if he ever heard it, which they would never do. We had a rule that I would protect him from my family and friends, and he would do the same for me. My family can be vicious, and I wouldn’t ever throw someone to those wolves. On the flip side, I don’t know how to react to mild slights. I learned early to hurt someone so viciously that they never try to hurt you again. I knew I couldn’t be like that to his family and friends, so he would correct them in a way he saw fit.

Anyway, back to the story. The tension between the two friends and me worsened as time progressed. It all came to a head at dinner with all our friends. It was 8 of us jammed into a booth at our local watering hole. I can’t remember what caused me to flick water at him with my straw; I’m sure it was some jokey snide comment. I thought I was being cheeky, picked up my straw, and splashed a bit of water on him in protest. Before I could even get my straw back into my water, half a beer was dumped on me. He had thrown his half-finished beer across the table directly onto me. Shocked, I whipped the beer from my eye and stared at him and my ex.

He turns to his friend, my partner of 5 years at this point, and asks,

“We good, bro?"

He looks at him and replies

“No, we're not.”

And that was it. I’m sitting soaked, smelling like a frat house in front of our closest friends. I have to ask everyone to get up so I can slide out of the booth and go to the bathroom. I tried to clean up and dry off as best as I could. I slapped on a fake smile, returned to the table, and made a joke along the lines of:

'you couldn’t even throw a good beer on me, domestic, really?’

I played the fun-loving, happy person for the rest of the dinner, and all hell broke loose when we got home. This wasn’t the first time he didn’t openly defend me, but this was the worst. Looking back, I realize this was never truly settled. I screamed and cried. He apologized, promised to do better (again), and we buried it. If I ever brought it up again, he would become upset. He would accuse me of not letting it go, holding it over him forever. I was terrified to be my mother, who was notorious for holding a grudge with the best of them, no matter how trivial it was. I told myself I couldn’t be mad. We had “passed it.”

Fuck that!

I would have been over the table swinging the minute the beer left the glass. I would have put my friend in their place; I would have walked away from that friendship (the irony is that gentleman and I are now good friends, but still). How can you let someone you love sit there covered in stale draft beer and do nothing? Not help me get clean, offer to take me home to change, nothing.

This is the man I begged to marry me, TWICE! Because I thought I didn’t deserve better. Don’t get me wrong, he's a good man and deserves all the happiness in the world. But he doesn't deserve me. It took me nearly 14 years to figure this out. But now that I have, I can’t unsee it. I want a protector, a provider, an “alpha” man. I want someone that can protect our family and me when I’m too tired and broken to do so.