Do I Respond? in New Beginnings

This is the email I just received from Erika.

“Welp, it’s taken me about a week to stop being angry so I wasn’t going to write anything until I calmed down. Hurt for a day, but then just angry after that. I don’t think it’s fair to not say anything, especially since nothing you said was an accurate analysis of ANYTHING I feel. So, I guess I just want to say thank you....

Thank you for not meaning anything you ever said to me. Well, until last Sunday. Last Sunday you finally told me the truth which is: I never meant anything to you, you never cared about me, you don’t value or respect me, and you think it’s ok to end things in an e-mail when you clearly told me otherwise back in December when I first started having doubts and asked if you’d ghost me if you just didn’t want to be with me anymore. You said you’d have a conversation with me if you didn’t want anything to do with me anymore, so thank you for not telling the truth about that either. Very nice of you. I do NOT have relational needs that can’t be met long distance. See, I don’t NEED anything. I don’t NEED to be with anyone. But if I CHOOSE to be with someone it’s not going to be someone who goes from writing me texts like “Good morning, my darling beautiful Erika, love of my life....” Etc..... To “how was your day” and who thinks that’s ok and still calls that a relationship. You think letting sweet, caring, thoughtful texts peter out when texts is literally the only thing we have is ok? Well, that’s HIGHLARIOUS to me. Especially when it is the exact opposite of the life you said you wanted to cultivate. You told me very early on that you wanted to cultivate a lifetime of romance and that’s even one of the reasons you don’t want kids…well, “how was your day” is not cultivating the life you said you wanted. And making me the man in the relationship isn’t either. I already told you I didn’t want to be the man in the relationship, but you continue to think it’s ok to be passive and to allow me to take the lead. Which, I wasn’t going to. So, there’s that.

What else would I like to thank you for? Already thanked you for not being a man of your word. Did I thank you for being passive? Well, if I didn’t, thank you. Thank you for not caring about me. Thank you for making up a story just to suit yourself when it had NOTHING to do with what I said or how I felt. In the moment, I did NOT regret kissing you or making out with you- I made those decisions of my own accord....BECAUSE I thought you were going to be my husband someday....BECAUSE of what you led me to believe you wanted. I never would’ve given you ANYTHING had I not believed that. So, I guess thank you for STEALING what belongs to another man- the man that God actually has created for me. That you think you’re entitled to all that you stole just because we were in a relationship makes me physically ill. No man in entitled to that. But that’s my fault. I gave it away because I loved you and because I saw a life with you and because I thought you were going to be my husband. You STOLE it KNOWING that you never wanted to be married to me, KNOWING that you were never going to make a commitment to me and because you never saw me as ANYTHING other than a piece of ass. You never cared about anything I had to offer except for my body. So, thank you for treating me like a whore. Really nice of you. Really appreciate it. Thanks. Thank you SO much for FINALLY showing me who you actually are. I am just so disappointed in myself for believing what I wanted to initially. I am so disappointed for giving you a chance and letting myself believe you were the man God has for me to spend my life with. I’m disappointed in myself for allowing myself waste my time on someone with no feelings and no desire to express their feelings and so completely dominated by thoughts and logic that aren’t even based in truth. Thanks for writing me a cold, analytical response to me pouring my heart out. So freaking thankful I’m not signing up for a life of having my feelings coldly analyzed based on what you think when you didn’t even hear a word I said. Also, thank you for treating me like a back up plan or an option. No person who actually loves me and cares about me and values me would EVER treat me like that. So, thank you for constantly communicating to me that I was an afterthought to you. Really neat. I just wish you hadn’t ever said anything to me. You know, people who woo women and DON’T continue to pursue them…you know what those people are, right? Well, if you don’t, congratulations! You’ve just joined the likes of Jay! Good for you! Men who woo woman and don’t pursue them aren’t men. They’re beings with Y chromosomes. They’re spineless, gutless, moral less, truth less....they lead us on with no regards to our feelings or our hearts or the fact that we’re taking them at face value and believe what they say. They are weak, passive, manipulative, and dishonest. They’re Jay. Good job, Rob! You’re just like Jay! Good for you! And Stephen! Wow- could anyone stoop lower than Stephen? Well, Rob did because at least Stephen dropped me after taking advantage of me once....you continued to KNOWING that you didn’t want anything to do with me.

And I guess I just also want to thank you for feeling so good about wanting another man to have me. I’m glad it makes you so happy to imagine another man ravishing me and devouring my body. I hope the thought of me making love to another man once I’m married and giving him everything I wanted to and thought I would give to you every day of my life makes you happy for the rest of yours. I’m just heartbroken that I have to face him and tell him that I’ve given ANOTHER part of myself away to someone that didn’t deserve it and wasn’t him. But, I know he will forgive me. Because the man God has for me will forgive me and love me as Christ loves the church. And that man will not take anything that’s not his to take until he has made a commitment to me. Because a true man wouldn’t steal anything that isn’t his, and he wouldn’t think he’s entitled to something he hasn’t made a commitment to. Whoever that man is wouldn’t ever give a single thought to letting another man have me, so....

Oh, also, just PS....when someone texts you and asks you to pray for God to give them a reason to be alive, the correct response isn’t “will do.” I swear, part of me feels like you’re heartless on purpose and the other part of me knows that you’re not....you’re just completely incapable of being in a relationship or caring about a woman. SO, I really have no right to be angry, even though I am. I’m more angry at myself though. Angry for wasting my time on someone who was so ashamed of me, thought so lowly of me, thought it was ok to repeatedly lie to me and string me along, and someone who thinks its ok to end a relationship through an e-mail because he doesn’t even have the nerve or the guts to pick up the phone. That you presumed everything was fine means you don’t know what a relationship is, and it also means you don’t care to ever know what a relationship is. Please do yourself and every woman in the world a huge favor and don’t waste anyone’s time. You have needs that can ONLY be met in solitude and based on how completely over it you looked nearly the entire time you were here, that just tells me you hate people, you hate me, and that you feel like any human interaction is a complete bore and waste of your time. SO, thank you for that too.

I promised I would never communicate in anger, but I only keep my promises to people who don’t lie to me, lead me on, and hurt me. When I’m hurt, I act in anger because that’s just how immature and pathetic I am. So, whatever. I’ll own it. I’m just so angry I wasted any time on someone who doesn’t see what’s right in front of his face…because I’ve already done that and made that mistake 9 years ago. I hate that I made it again.

And you know what? Just so we’re clear....no, I’m not more special than I know....I’m more special than YOU know. and THAT is why we’re not together and why I could never be with someone like you.

and really? Warm regards? What, is that your southern way of telling me to go to hell or to go eff myself? Because you literally couldn’t have said anything colder or crueler. Warm regards? Really? Am I a business interaction? I guess I really did mean nothing to you. Especially if you think asking for a “token” of our time together is acceptable. That’s just really sick. A token of our time together? Really, how about I am SICK that I WASTED the last 6 months of my life together. I don’t want any remembrance of it or of you ever. If I could get a partial lobotomy and remove you from my mind and memory, I would. It’s really sick to hold onto something that reminds you of something you consider a piece of shit. And since that’s what you consider me, I just really think it’s sick that you asked for those pictures. The fact that you don’t already have them tells me everything I need to know in the first place....you never cared. So, thank you for being so clear about that.

Would you like me to say “have a nice life” now? I don’t know what the Midwestern salutation for “thanks for never caring about me” is so, I’ll just say goodbye.

Bye.”

I really want to voice my disagreement, but would doing so lead to anything productive? I want to point out that you can’t ghost on someone who bails on a relationship before you do. Immediately after she sent me that email last week, I went to her Facebook profile to see if anything had happened, and I noticed that she already deleted our pictures together from Thanksgiving. She deleted our photos before she sent me that email. That told me a lot; specifically, that email wasn’t designed to foster a mutual discussion about whether we should remain together; it was designed to make me officially break up with her, so she wouldn’t have to be the bad guy. She had already bailed. Also, the fact that I didn’t have those photos already saved says that I expected they would be posted forever. At least, that was my thinking.

Secondly, as for my texting, the point of my asking about her day is to foster conversation. I ask, she’s supposed to share something meaningful, maybe ask about mine, we go back and forth, and that exchange fosters feelings of closeness. Instead, I’d ask, she would say it was fine, and that would be it. Furthermore, texting isn’t the only thing we had, the other being phone conversations. The very last one we had was great. I don’t follow how a day after that, texting is suddenly all we have. I also don’t follow how my other points of my life resuming its normal rhythm leaving less time for phone calls during the week and our shared so much of our life stories leaving less to talk about aren’t accurate. Also, if I had sent her a good morning text every day declaring my affections for her, wouldn’t that have eventually become stale? No matter how many times I reworded it, wouldn’t 300th time I sent it seemed like I was on autopilot, just copying and pasting the same text every morning? I don’t see anything I could have done would have prevented this complaint.

I also don’t follow how I wasn’t pursuing her. I was the one in this relationship expending the most personal resources for it. I was the one who would cook for her (granted she cooked me a pancake dinner that last night), I was the one who would pay for us to go out, I was the only one who gave the other a Christmas gift, and I was the one who was going to sacrifice his job and his home for us to be together. She boasted about having a lot to offer, but so much of what she has to offer comes from the efforts of those around her. It’s her father who takes us out for a movie. It’s her mother who treats us to dinner. If not them, then it’s her friends filling that role. It must be nice to be able to sit back, do nothing, and evaluate if a man’s efforts are worthy of her affection while submitting the efforts of others as her reciprocation. The most she was going to have to give up was a section of her basement for me to use as an office.

By the way, how does someone making $30,000 a year afford a 2,700 square foot house valued at $350,000 (I looked it up on Zillow)? Either she’s buried in debt, meaning she lied about how responsible she is with money, or her father covered the down payment, which means she’s used to having someone else support lifestyle she can’t afford on her own, which is just another example of not being responsible with money.

I also don’t understand her referencing how “completely over it [I] looked nearly the entire time [I was there].” I was there for 12 days. If I looked perpetually miserable, wouldn’t she have said something? Wouldn’t she have said, “you look unhappy, is something wrong?” Aside from that party she hosted, which turned into a bunch of loud, boisterous women socializing together of which I was trapped in the middle, I don’t recall ever conveying any unhappiness. There were a few social gatherings in which I became quiet as the night went on, but she knew I was deep introvert before hand. The fact that she’s just now submitting this grievance suggests that she’s letting her current emotional state color those memories.

Furthermore, she faults me for logically and clinically responding to her previous email to me. If I had responded to her hurt feelings with my own hurt, would that have resolved anything? I’d expect doing so to cause an even greater blow up then what we’re having right now. When emotions are high, someone needs to be even tempered. I also don’t comprehend how my critical analysis isn’t based in truth. She didn’t support anything she said with examples or logic. She just hurled a bunch of insults and accusations as induced by her emotions. Feelings are irrelevant in determining facts. Letting one’s feelings influence his or her perception of the facts is the very definition of bias. Her reaction and perspective is just that, biased by your personal feelings. It doesn’t mean that her pain isn’t real or that she isn’t deserving of comfort, but neither should her perspective of what happened be considered accurate.

Also, I should probably comment on her “when someone texts you and asks you to pray for God to give them a reason to be alive, the correct response isn’t ‘will do’” remark. Erika struggles with clinical depression. Some days she wakes with no motivation and a heavy sadness hanging over her. That’s what was going on Tuesday. First off, when someone asks me to pray for him or her, I presumed the correct response is to pray for that person and let him or her know that I’m doing so. Secondly, I had to go to work sick from Monday through Wednesday because I didn’t have anyone to fill in for my classes. She calls me heartless, yet I’m teachings classes and preparing lessons while sore, lethargic, congested, and feverish. In addition to all that, I’m expected to take however long necessary to write her a letter of encouragement? How much of your depression takes priority over anyone dealing with his own duress? All I can think to say is that I’m sorry that I fell short of her standards while working three days while physically ill.

There’s more I could say, but should I? Someone once explained to me that when a relationship ends, there’s usually a conversation in which both parties unload on the other every perceived infraction the other made. He said that we usually ignore those comments to spare our own esteem, but revisiting those comments later when the feelings have cooled is a good way to grow as a person. I’d like to say that’s the reason I’d like to respond, but honestly I’m more sick at the idea that she’ll take my lack of response as an admission of guilt and vindication that she’s 100% right. Also, if someone calls me a spineless coward, I’m not inclined to say nothing. Realistically, I expect that anything I did send to her would be misinterpreted as insults or deemed as lies the instant she reads them to be permanently dismissed. If I do nothing, we’ll she eventually cool off and realize she was at least partially mistaken? I’m really at a loss for how to proceed.

Last updated January 27, 2019