Broken Heart Files - All Things Fade

there are too many parts that have comprised our demise to put into finite terms. i can't even begin, i don't know where to begin. i don't know where we begin and where we end. did we even end?

so many questions, so many detours, so many mistakes.

the part of me that knows better now, is the part writing to you tonight. from a place of great sadness, great remoteness and great mis-understanding of how we came into being, of how we were, of how we progressed, and how we are. we have gotten to the other side. the side i'd thought i'd never see. in the simplest of terms, the endearment and love and devotion she had for me has faded and it's been replaced by a guarded, jaded and resentful being. which she attributes to my mistakes and putting everything else in my life before the relationship. that is where she says it all stems back to. where all our problems began. i chose a job over her. i chose my friends. i chose my living arrangement. i never chose her. that led to resentment on her part and feeling unloved. and then we began to fight. me, too bitter and resentful of what she was trying to rob me of- her, too tired from trying to win my love and receiving nothing in return. her feeling like shit eventually led to her not wanting to take it anymore, and feeling like i never put her first. so she saw no other way than to end the relationship. and give herself the time and space she needs to refocus on other areas of her life that she neglected for me. but no longer. i am no longer a priority. i am no longer important. i am nothing.

i took for granted too long. i made too many mistakes. i thought she would never leave. i didn't think she was capable of leaving. i didn't think she would actually do it. didn't think she wanted to be without me. so i pushed and pushed. and here we are. i knew this was a possibility, yet i did nothing to prevent it. i actually encouraged it. i just don't know how.

these are the simple answers. and there are none. my reasons alone for how we got here could fill a book. for now, i am focusing on the part that she no longer wants to be with me because of my actions. i have to accept responsibility for them. claim them as my own. until i do that, i will be of no use to her or myself or our relationship, or any relationship. i recognize my mistakes. i wish i could take them back because they were foolish. but there are other things i don't apologize for. but there is no time for regrets and wasted wishes. we are where we are now. we can't go back. i cannot undo. i can only do better from now on.

no matter the reasons for being here, no matter what path we took to get here. i know we needed to get here. i know this is for the better. for both of us. i wanted out. i needed out. i couldn't waste any more time working at something i knew was doomed. but it still hurts like a fucking bitch to know that it could have been different, that if i hadn't done certain things, we would have survived. but would we have thrived? could we have ever thrived? i would have had to alter myself to an unknown degree, more than i already had. and remove parts of my soul in order to stay like we were. that would have been the price. i was already paying and it was killing me. the price to make us work would have been steep. and i don’t know if i should have paid it or not. i chose not to pay it. and now i am paying with a broken heart.

doesn't that mean we weren’t good for each other? we weren't meant to be together? how can you want to be with someone so badly, yet know that it is not right at the same time? how can you choose yourself over someone else who you love and loves you so truly, and so purely? how can you hurt them so bad when all they want is your love in return? because you know its not right? so you hurt them anyway? then you regret it. you hurt them because they love you too much? more than you're capable of loving? you want them to love you no matter what you do, and not have to answer to any rules but make them still love you anyway? what does it mean? when you pull your highest bet, your heart, off the table because you know it is not working in your favor, and you end up killing the relationship in the process.

if you know that you are probably both better off apart, yet how can you want to so badly to be with someone? you at one minute feel like you can change yourself to be with them, and do whatever it takes. the next minute, you feel resentful and thinking, get me out of this before i suffocate.

how is it possible to feel all these things at once?

we have swung a spectrum of emotions and colors from the beginning of our time together. and now here we are. in a million different places, and a million different pieces. scattered and tattered. worn out and worn in. opposites and the same at the same time. how did we get here?

that road is complicated, complex and convex. it doesn't stem from one emotion or single act. It’s a tangled nest of feelings and actions and reactions and resentments and trying to rebuild what was, or what never was. i've weaved a tangled mess around myself that even i, as the weaver, cannot fully understand. i understand it's ramifications and its consequences. but i don't fully understand it's reasons for being and existence in the first place. and its reasons for coming to fruition and building and growing and taking over. those reasons are still foggy to me. even though i built them, i can't fully grasp the reasons behind why.

it would be easier if this was cut and dry - the result of one act of infidelity or simply a lover 's loss of love for the other person. a person's affection's being drawn to another woman. a person's moving across the nation, or choosing career over family. a clash between living arrangements and babies. a falling out of love. those things are explainable. they are finite, they are definable and they make sense to the parties involved, and to the outside world. they paint a picture of typical love stories gone wrong. people understand them, they accept them as truth. not having to wonder why makes it easier to accept the truth and move on. even if it's a blanket lie told to shield the second party from the actual harshness of truth. when a person hears one of those statements from their soon-to-be ex, they may hate it. but eventually they will accept it. because those are considered valid reasons to end an otherwise good relationship.

what is the price for love? what price is too high? asking too much. how do you know when you've sacrificed too much of yourself or not enough of yourself for the other person? how do you know how much to compromise in order to be happy? love is a compromise, not a fairy tale. but how much is too much? how much of yourself do you have to give up in order to be with someone else? where is the limit? who sets the bar? who decides?

I don’t have these answers. It’s been nine months since we’ve parted and I still don’t have the answers. It’s all just memories now, and I’m still in the “I just broke up with someone” stage. How I move on from this, how I move forward from here, I still don’t have that answer. I don’t know if I will ever fully make sense of our relationship, or what how it started, what it became, how it ended so tragically, and how I carry the pain with me everyday. Of feeling like I failed the first person I ever loved. I haven’t figured out how to get over it yet, if I ever will. I need to be on my own for a while, remember how to be alone and be okay with it. I’ve relied on another person for two years, to have their support and to lift me up and make me feel loved and not so alone in this world. Now that is gone and I must find the strength to face the world again- alone, single, brave. I’ll never be the same person I was two years ago before all of this, but it will fade. as all things do.