#MentalHealthMonday - Moving On One Day at a Time

The amount of love and support I received for my article last Monday overwhelmed me. Thank you all so much - you don’t know how much it means to me.

I am still in incredible amounts of pain which is to be expected. I guess I can’t expect to quickly get over a 2.5 year relationship where you planned to move in together and he confessed he would one day ask your father’s permission for your hand in marriage. I’ve been in shitty situations before so I know I can do this. But knowing I can do this and feeling that way is a different story.

I spoke to him a few times more in order to get some semblance of closure. He said all the “right” things that someone should say in this sort of situation - that he was sorry, he felt bad, that I deserved better, and that he didn’t want to cut me out of his life completely even though it would be difficult. At the time, it didn’t make me feel much better though I suppose it’s better than indifference. But being able to cathartically release my own bitter thoughts made me feel better. I was able to tell him that he looked like a different person from the man I once knew, that I couldn’t possibly understand what changed in the span of practically a week, and that he should never do this to any future girlfriend of his. I would have been able to handle a break-up or a confession of how his feelings had faded… but to have your best friend go behind your back and invite another woman into his room… and then hear about it from that woman instead of him? That’s a betrayal that I’m not sure I will be able to forgive and I am certain that I will never forget. It makes me question the honesty of any statement that any future significant other will say to me.

Some days are much better than others though which is a relief. One day I will question how I can continue to live through something like this and the next, I will feel a slight excitement about my future or relief that things ended when they did (and not after we tied the knot or had a kid or something). I increased the dosage of my antidepressants which will hopefully help aid in the regulation of my emotions. I think getting back into therapy is another good idea but it is just too expensive and I can’t afford it, and I don’t want to have to ask my family to pay for that consistently. It’s not fair to anyone. I could rant about the inaccessibility of mental health resources but that’s a whole separate can of worms that I don’t feel like getting into right now.

I am also hesitant to admit that I contacted the crisis hotline for the first time in my life. Thankfully they have a text option because my social anxiety prohibits phone calls. It was a short conversation that helped slightly and it’s reassuring to know that I can text them again if I fall into a dark spell.

One of the hardest things to get used to is the change in my daily life and schedule - I used to message him all day, every day. In fact, he was the only person I really contacted for a long time so being able to leave my phone behind without expecting a message is… interesting to say the least. And very lonely. He was my best friend… I mourn the loss of our friendship almost more than I do the loss of our romantic relationship.

He says he feels bad and I would believe him immediately, I want to believe him… if he hadn’t lied to me in the first place. I think he is a good person because 2.5 years of getting to know someone is hard to forget. But one day of betrayal is enough to change your perspective of a person because the man I knew would never even think of doing something like that. So it’s hard for me to reconcile the idea of the man I loved for so long being the same man as the one who betrayed me. But I already said my piece, everything I needed to say, and we ended on fairly good terms. Civil but slightly strained. I’m fairly optimistic though. Our last conversation ended well - I felt that his apology was sincere. That’s really all I wanted.

For now, I’ve been attempting to use a method of therapy that I learned long ago… when I begin to think of all the negative things and feel those hurt feelings, I imagine a large, bright red stop sign and physically tell myself to stop. My therapist said this method is a way to break a pessimistic line of thought and retrain your brain. Sometimes it feels like I am ignoring my feelings and trying to cover them up, but then again I think it is better for me not to wallow. It will also be easier to process things after some time has gone by.

I am also trying to focus on myself. Making myself a better person and making goals for my future that do not depend on another person. It’s strange because I haven’t done so in a very long time… even since before I began dating him. Even back then I struggled with depression and a general “complacency” in life as my older, more abusive ex lover would say (yeah, I’ve had bad luck with guys). So to be focusing on bettering myself through both depression and heartbreak? It’s difficult to say the least. But I’ve made the beginning of a five year plan last Friday and I’m determined that I’m not going to sit here anymore.

I plan on getting a small heart tattoo in his honor. I already have a small heart on the side of my right hand ring finger in remembrance of my previous boyfriend- not because I was remotely sentimental about the narcissistic, abusive, felon asshole but because it was a way for me to accept that I loved him at one time and that it was okay to move on. So now I feel the need to get a heart on the other side of the same finger for this boyfriend… as a reminder that the time we spent together was a good experience, not a bad one. This one means more anyways.

I’ll be okay. Repeat after me.

I’ll be okay.

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Photo from Pexels and used under the CC0 license.

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