I have no clue if my entries are even posting to this site but it’s okay, I’ll continue to write anyway because it’s cathartic. And if someone is able to read them and relate, find solace (because of the downward comparison), or wants to leave a comment and offer feedback, then that’s great too!
So as promised, I’m getting into my relationships. My last post was basically giving a high level summary of this wild rollercoaster of a life I’ve had but I omitted a lot of details which I will get into with subsequent posts. This one is about “love” …the aged old lie our parents tell us to keep our species from going extinct. I kid. I’m really not that jaded or cynical… yet.
For starters, my first serious relationship was with a pretty amazing man. He was extremely intelligent, responsible, funny, kind, generous, easy to be around, but he was in capable of showing me love in the ways I needed him to. So to begin, I met this guy at a murder mystery party hosted by the Physics society at my undergradate institution. At the time I was the secretary of the physics society and my then boyfriend was the president (Yes, I was a physics major, 🤓). We all dressed up for the party and it was a lot of fun. We were put on different teams based on our costumes. My team was the “scientists” which I was super happy about that because I didn’t have to spend money on my costume. All I did was grab my lab coat and my goggles that I had from chem class and I was set. Anyway, My group consisted of a friend of mine and the new guy I have never met. I was really intrigued by this new guy and I remember laughing the entire time we were talking. I do remember thinking that he was quite handsome and remember thoroughly enjoying the time I was spending around him but I didn’t think much of it outside of that because I was dating someone else at the time who happened to also be at this party as well. To my surprise, when I left the party, my friend who’s was third person our group asked me if I was dating anyone. I said yeah and I asked him why. He told me that this “new to me” guy in our group, Jason, wanted to know because he really liked me. I remember feeling pretty giddy inside and actually really happy because usually when I have a similar dynamic with men where we engage in great conversation and have a good time talking, they always view me as a friend. Nevertheless, nothing immediately came of my interaction with Jason. I was still dating the other guy and I did continue to do so for the following nine or so months. I didn’t see Jason again until a few years later. Yes, years! I remember that I was hanging outside of my Bio class cramming for my final. I looked up for second to see Jason walking down the hallway. I was really surprised to see him and I honestly had forgotten that he existed. I exclaimed “ Heyyyy, how are you?” “I haven’t seen you in forever!” “ What do you use, an invisible cloak to get around?”. Jason informed me that he only came to campus for his classes and immediately went home. He was from the area and owned a house about 25 minutes away. He was pretty far removed from the whole college culture as he was many years older and came to school after serving in the Air Force. It was his last year at school and he had just taken the last final for his very last class and was graduating in a few weeks. I remember feeling a little sad when you told me that because I was so excited to see him again and I was hoping that we could pick up where we left off. Thankfully that’s exactly what happened. He stated to me that he’d be around all summer since he was from the area and that we should hang out. We exchange numbers and later that evening he texted me. We exchanged a series of message back-and-forth for several days and I was so excited to be able to talk to someone with so much ease since its really hard for me to relate to and connect with others. Long story short we began dating and I moved into his house about nine months into the relationship. Everything was great and I was beyond happy. We ultimately dated for three years but as time elapsed things got worse. The biggest issue is that Jason did not want to be physically intimate with me. He never called me pretty and told me that doing so made him feel uncomfortable. After awhile, this sort of treatment began to corode my already low self esteem. I felt worthless and so ugly that even my own boyfriend could tell me otherwise. I just felt that I was so lucky that anyone would date me. But I knew there was something missing and this wasn’t how a relationship was supposed to be. Despite our lack of intimacy, Jason was my best friend. He could still make my laugh to the point of my belly hurting and was there for when I needed him in other ways. Since he has already graduated and had a high paying job, he fully supported me. He paid for all my grocieries, didn’t make me pay rent, paid for major repairs to my car, 5k MRI that I needed get for my knee so he was by no means an all around awful person. He just didn’t want to be with me in that way and I just came to terms with it and began to think “ I don’t blame him”. Whenever I would ask him why, he claimed the reason was that he and a “low libido” and have never really been one for physical intimacy or for wearing his heart on his sleeve. However, I always knew this was a lie for multiple reasons, 1: We had really great sex for the first 5 months of our relationship until I revealed to him that I had never had an orgasm in my life and felt that I wasn’t incapable of having them. Apparently this made him feel that having sex with me was pointless. However, I always felt that if he found me attractive he would still want to be intimate anyway, especially since I was really open to it. 2: I found songs, and love letters that he had written to his ex girlfriend. He loved her so much and didn’t seem to have an issue displaying it. He called her beautiful and I’m sure she never had to question his love for her. These two things always made me feel horrible and worthless but I continued to put my feelings on the back burner. Jason would tell me that he shouldn’t have to tell me I’m beautiful and I should have enough confidence to not need to hear that from other people. He would turn it all around on me and make me feel that I was the one with the issue. But despite it all, I had the most love to this man. I poured my whole heart into love him. I had wanted to give love to something to my whole life and I was finally able to. My mom was always cold and callice and I never had a strong bond with my siblings who teased me mercilessly. So Jason got all my love and I got none of his in return. I would have probably stayed in this relationship and forced myself to be happy in this unhealthy “relationship” (basically friendship) until one day I came home to a little surprise. I was in grad school at the time and we lived in the middle of nowhere. We didn’t have Internet at the house because you had to pay per gigabyte which was exceedingly over price. Therefore we use our phones for everything. I just got back really late from studying for an exam and my cell phone instead. I remembered something that I forgot to do so I grab Jason cell phone so I could use it. I open up a cell phone and went to the Internet and couldn’t believe my eyes. A porn website flashed up and then disappeared and said you are now an incognito mode. I was really surprised and so many emotions rush through my body. I fell in that exact moment that I had saved a three-year-old mystery. It all made sense and I understand everything completely. My feelings of worthlessness were validated. Clearly this man did not have a low libido and actually had an issue with me all along. I felt so hurt and betrayed and sad that I didn’t know what to do. I remember going into bed and laying as far as I could away from him because I felt so crushed. The next morning he went to go kiss me before he left for work and haven’t sleeping a lick all night, I said, with tears coming down my face, the name of his beloved porn site to him. His face turned white. He was mortified and all he said is “ I am so so sorry. I can’t talk about this right now but I am so sorry”. That day when I would normally receive no response to my text to him, he called me 48 times. He also text me nearly 100 times. He knew he was in the wrong. However what his text revealed is that he had struggled with a porn addiction for the last five years. He told me that he watched it incessantly and wished he could stop. At this point I was really frustrated hurt sad and scared For the simple fact that I felt like I truly didn’t know the person I was dating for the last three years. My issue with it all wasn’t the act of watching it in the first place, that I could really care less about. The issue is that he knew our lack of intimacy was degrading my self esteem and making me feel unwanted and not good enough Over the last three years. But he never said anything. If he would’ve revealed his issue to me I would’ve realize that I wasn’t the problem and it would have helped a lot. I would’ve done everything in my power to support him and help him with this issue and let him know it wasn’t something he had to hide or be ashamed of. I would have been willing to watch it with him or re-enact his favorite scences. I would have literally tried anything to make it work because I loved him that much. But he never gave me that opportunity. Instead, he chose to hide this from me and let it tear us a part. I don’t think I ever really healed from this break up and that I truly ever got over it. I know there is a piece in my heart that will always love him even though it’s been 5 years since we broke up. Thankfully towards the end of our relationship, I developed a healthy obsession with diet and exercise. I lost 35 lbs in our last year of dating (always hoping he would notice or one day call me beautiful… it never happened). However, I started to like myself a little more each day and feel a little bit more comfortable in my own skin. I still never thought of myself as “pretty”. After the break up, I started hanging out with my friend Rich who had always had a thing for me. He was in the friend zone for the fact that I had been dating Jason but I had been getting what I lacked in my relationship with Jason from Rich all along. He always complimented me, said kind things, enocouraged me, was there for me. He was really good about not crossing boundaries while still showing me how much he cared. A few days after my break up with Jason was official, I recall feeling like my whole world was crashing in. The feelings of unrequited love crushed me and I was stressed about having to find a new place to live (even though Jason said I could stay st his house as long as I needed, I wanted to get out ASAP). & to top it all off, my 22nd Birthday was days away. I once again, felt really lonely. Thankfully, Rich was there to comfort me. On my birthday, I went to his house and I guess you can say we took our friendship to the next level. The night was amazing. He was such a passionate kisser and lover. He held me so tightly and called me beautiful the entire night. I for the first time, experienced what it was like to actually FEEL a type of love. Richard was absolutely infatuated with me and it was everything I needed. However, I just couldn’t seem to display the same feelings to him. I’m not sure if it was the fact that I had to view him as a friend for so long or if it was because the simple fact that he liked me. “Someone infiatuated with me? Must be something wrong with him. I must run for the hills” is literally how my brain is programmed. But honestly, I think the real issue was the fact that he lived in Florida (where he was getting his PhD) and I lived in Pennsylvania. My birthday is in late just so the following week he left PA (where he is from) to go back to school. Maintaining a connection over time and so much space didn’t seem worth it to me and that fissled out. “Seeing” Rich was a nice temporary distraction from my recent heart break but it was exactly that, temporary. However, I refused to be over come with feelings of sadness. I agreessovely looked for an apartment and found one with a really cool guy near my graduate school campus. I moved about a month after our break up. During that month of living with Jason, I distracted myself by online dating. I began to use apps like tinder and plenty of fish and for the first time in my life, I discovered that I was “attractive”. I could not believe all the attention I was receiving from men. It felt so great to have the validation that I sought for so long ( sad, I know). I had so many potential suitors and it felt so good. It began to feel like this break up was the best thing that ever happened to me and I wasn’t finally going to get my fairytale romance. I went on about 5 dates that month and it really opened my eyes. After I had officially moved into my new apartment with my awesome new male roommate, I began to dive deeper into the dating scene with lessons about the inner working of the male brain from my roomie. I dated really causally and had so much fun. I learned so much about what I did and did not like about guys from this period. There are so many funny stories about my guys I dated that I will get into in later posts but this one we will focus on the “relationships” I had and their outcomes. FlashForward five years and Jason is now married. He’s been married for the last two years. He met purposed and was engaged to a girl all within six months of meeting her. This is the same guy who for three years told me that he didn’t believe in the notion of marriage because he had watched his parents get divorced. He said he never wanted to get married and had convinced me that if a person could stay in a relationship for multiple years without having the legality tie them down, then that actually meant more than being married because you woke up each day and were there because you wanted to be in that because you had to be. Actually convince myself that I agreed with the sentiment and begin to think that I never want to get married either because of dating him. Needless to say, finding out about this engagement broke my heart. The way I found out was quite funny to you but that’s for another post. Jason’s wife isn’t very attractive and this isn’t the bitterness talking. She is objectxiveltna downgrade in the looks department. This made me feel better and think that maybe my physical appearance was never really the problem and it was all in my head. This provided me with a little bit of closure. I interpreted this rushed marriage into ways: the first way is that Our break up was a cold reality check for Jason who realized that he didn’t want to be alone so the first person who came about he felt the need to tie the knot so he would never have to experience what happened to us again. The second interpretation is that this girls actually amazingly incredible and better than me in every way that matters. Whatever the reason is for it he seems pretty happy but I suppose I’m happy for him although I truly don’t understand why at the end of the day he was the one who deserve to find true love.
The next relationship I entered was with a guy I met on plenty of fish. His name was Sean. He actually looked a lot like Jason but I’m more attractive version. He was nice saw spoken quiet a little reserved not very funny but expressed an interest in my physical beauty. Our intimate connection was in a level beyond anything I had ever experienced. I had my first ever orgasm with him and I was completely smitten. Sean was more attractive, more passionate, and more of everything I needed but didn’t get from Jason. He wasn’t nearly as driven, motivated, career oriented, intelligent, responsible, or funny as Jason but was intriguing for other reasons. When Sean and I first started dating, I asked him why his last relationship failed. He was engaged (which is honestly a turn off and a red flag for me) but they broke it off. However, when he revealed the engagement and the reason for it ending, it was too late. I was in too deep. Are you ready for it? The reason his previous relations ended is because he “ had” a porn addiction. My jaw nearly dropped when he told me this and I couldn’t believe my ears. After being completely vulnerable and honest with me, he proceeded to ask why my last relationship ended LOL I responded with “because he had a porn addiction”. However, I refused to believe Sean had an addiction. He couldn’t have. He was way too affectionate to possibly have one. Those things ste your heart and soul! Sean revealed to me that his ex fiancé a little crazy and overly religious. She thought that watching porn in and of itself was disgusting and a sin so Sean would watch it out of spite. Whenever she would be crass or awful to him. He would watch it when she left the house. He never wanted to be intimate with her because they slowly developed a strong hatred for one another. When he explained this to me I decided that he didn’t have a problem. I decided that his ex fiancé was just a little off and had unrealistic expectations. I told him that even if he had the issue, the fact that he told me he meant that it was something that we could work on although I didn’t see it interfering with our relationship because we still had intimacy and he was very affectionate. Sean and I dated for nine months total. The first five months were absolute heaven. I didn’t think about Jason for single solitary day and I was blissfully happy. I actually think deep down in my soul that I loved Sean more. We listen to it all the same bands and just had a greater connection than I did with Jason. It was just so wonderful. And three months into relationship he brought me home to meet his entire family. They were so funny and I just really enjoyed being around them. However the issues began when he went to China to visit a friend. We had been dating for six months at this time. While in China Sean kissed another girl. He was being really distant during his trip and I hadn’t really heard from How much of that was strange. After much prodding I finally got it out of him what happened. I was so shocked and hurt by what he said and he was crying as he was telling me. I was completely enraged and I told him I never want to speak to them again. That night I went out to the bars with my friend and met the most beautiful man and immediately hooked up with him. I kept receiving calls and text from Sean while he was in China and I ignored them all.After a few days elapsed, and I couldn’t stop feeling so sad, I finally decided to pick up his call. I told him if you can forgive me for what I’ve done I could forgive him for what he had done. After all he was all the way over in China and really never had to tell me about what happen because I would’ve never found out at all. This made me think that he was actually a good person and had a conscience and was telling the truth about how this girl kissed him and he was the recipient of her miss guided assessment that he was hitting on her. He asked me what I did and I told him. I think this hit him like a Mack truck and he was so distraught. He said to me “ please tell me you’re joking?” “ I know you wouldn’t do that, are you joking”. To his dismay it was not a joke. He told me he would have to think about if he would ever be able to move past it. I was really pissed about that because he’s the one who betrayed me in the first place. Our relationship is perfect and two he decided to screw it up. I viewed what I did as similar to what he did but what he did was worse because there was no impetus however I was just reacting to his behavior. I didn’t think that what we did was qualitatively THAT different. However he views kissing and intercourse on two totally different levels. I personally think cheating is cheating however I didn’t cheat because of the time we were actually broken up as I have ended it with him the second he told me what he did. I didn’t believe I was in the wrong and I was really frustursted that he felt like he was the one who had thinking to do. He was lucky I was even thinking of taking him back after what he did to me! Needless to say we got back together. However those last three months of our relationship, were nothing like the first six. Apparently the reason Sean was able to be so loving and great was because he actually hadn’t watched porn in over a year. However, he relapsed when he told me about his indefdelity and I had ended things with him. He felt like he ruined the only thing in his life and the depressions and stress of messing up our relationship cause he to slip into his old habits. So this time when we were together, it was like in a dating Jason all over again. He exhibited really stand off and distant behavior. His texted because more infrequent, his calls became shorter, the tone he used to speak to me changed and so did the tone of our relationship. Things had taken a turn for the worst! It got so bad that one Friday he told he wouldn’t be coming to visit me. We had s long distance relationship and he lived 1hr35 min away. The only time we got to see each other was on the weekends. He told me he couldn’t come because he had too much school work to do. I found this peculiar because we always do our school work together. This was no different from any other weekend so I didn’t understand why he couldn’t come. Something seemed suspicious. So I got my car and drove almost 2 hours to surprise him. I suspected something was up and I wanted to get to the bottom of it. I saw his car parked outside and the lights in his apartment on so I was happy you hadn’t driven all that way for nothing. I knocked on his door several times and he didn’t answer which I thought was really really bizarre. So, he left me no choice but to climb through his apartment window. His apartment window was actually quite far from the ground and I’m not sure how I mustered up the superhuman strength to pull myself off there but I guess anger can make people do Pretty amazing things. On the other side of the window his dog greeted me. Her tail was wagging and such excitement so she certainly is no good guard dog. Again to the apartment and I noticed that his 60 inch screen TV is removed from his living room. I get super paranoid thinking about another woman is there and that he’s cheating on me again. I start walking to the back of the apartment looking for him and he whips around the corner. The first thing he says is “what are you doing here?”. He seemed frantic. I asked him why that was his response to me driving all the way to see him. I knew something was up! I asked him why he didn’t answer the door when I was knocking and he said because he was taking a shower. However we are standing for his bathroom and there was no fog on the windows or sign of his hair being wet so I knew he was lying. I immediately because I began to do a full sweep of the house. I didn’t know what or who I could expect to find but I knew something wasn’t right. I opened his guest room and to my horror I discovered what my boyfriend had been blown me off for on a Friday night. The room was filled with sex toys. Flesh lights, dolls, you name it! This is the same guy who would rarely splurge and buy me Chipotle when we went on dates but he was purchasing $90 flesh lights. I wasn’t completely sickened. However, I knew what I was getting into when I started dating him so I promised him that I wouldn’t give up on us. The next day he came back with me to my apartment and we talked at length about what our next steps would be. I wanted to help and I wanted to be there for him And I was going to do everything I could. I shared the most compassion, sympathy, empathy, and was eyes unjudgemental as possible. We tried to make the most of our time together that weekend but when he Went back home on Monday, he was once again distant and I received radio silence to my text and calls. This time I was no longer a mystery and I was well aware why, he was preoccupied… after a few weeks of this repeatedly happening, we finally called it quits. I was really distraught about this. I was really sad that I couldn’t fix him and that he had chose girls had never met over what we had. Fast forward for years and he too is happily married. He found a girl who lived in his town. Invite Girl I mean a woman who is 10 years older than him. She isn’t very attractive but I assume she makes him very happy. She’s able to offer him something that evidentally was not. She is not in the least bit attractive but I think what she offers them is security and a safe space. He seems really happy and I guess I’m happy for him. But what I don’t understand is why I, the person who actually got got screwed over, doesn’t end up winning in the end. Am I madly in love with anyone? No. Can I be expecting an engagement ring anytime soon? No.
Life isn’t fair. But with that, i remind myself of this quote : “ I know that if you think life’s a vending machine where you put in virtue and take out happiness then you’re going to be disappointed.”
Therefore, c’est la vie!
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