I used to be good at this.  I used to be able to walk away from people and situations that my gut told me were not right.  In fact, that one ability, helped me see through the bullshit in my long contentious divorce, it allowed me to sit on the witness stand for a day and a half, and speak the truth.  It allowed me to see through my ex-husband’s profusion of lies, and advise my attorney what the truth was.  It was strong enough that the judge and the Supreme Court were able to see through him too.  I was never weak.  I always knew what I knew and could speak the truth.

It has served me at work, and with my choice of friends.

I don’t know what happened to my ability to know what the truth was when it came to S.  I have a friend who said I wanted to save him.  Did I?  My gut says no, even now.  The last 6 months with him, weren’t really with him.  I tried to break it off with him so many times.  Every time he drew me back in.  And then, he would come to me and tell me he decided he didn’t want a relationship, he wanted to be alone, and to figure out who he was.  I would always say, then go, do it.  I support you in that.  Always.  And two days later he would want to see me.  Just a couple weeks ago, he told me he thought he would always be a bachelor.  This was after Betty Boop showed up, and it made me believe that he didn’t want her either.

But my gut, when she first showed up “back in his life” told me she was back in his life for real.  I lost my mind, because I knew….  But then he came to me, and told me it wasn’t true, and all he wanted was my happiness, and I believed it.  In the face of my gut screaming at me that she was back in his life, that he was leaving me for her, I believed him.

I wanted to believe him.  There is no other excuse, for me to not listen to my gut.  For me to take apart the pieces I had put together telling me the truth, and to make a different picture.  One that didn’t include her.  His words…”I’m so disappointed that you would think I would jump back into that, after what she did to me.”

But he had.  And I knew it.  And I denied it.

Because I loved him so much.  I think I was addicted to loving him.  It was obviously unhealthy. We were never on an even keel.  And it was so incredibly one sided.  It was all about him, his pleasure, his happiness, what he wanted always came before us.  There was no us, really.  It was momentary.  Fleeting,  There were moments even days, sometimes a week or two. But it was still all about S.

Except after he fucked the prison whore, and I was seeing A, then he came to me and for about a week, maybe two, there was us.  The memory, the promise of that short time stayed with me, teasing me, telling me that he did care for me.  Then, I guess it was when his best friend died, he was so morose and depressed, and withdrew into himself again.  Whatever fledgling thing that had started between us, disappeared.  I could never get it back.

I could read him so well.  The day his friend died, I had not talked to him in a couple days, but that morning, I knew something was wrong, and messaged him, asking if he was ok.  He messaged back, funny you should ask, Gus died last night.

This kind of thing happened all the time with us.  He would call or text when I had my hand on the phone.  I’d be deep in thought about him, or something related to him, and he’d call.  I know he feels my pain now, but I also know he won’t call.  I may hear from him, when she’s gone home…asking if I’m ok.

Don’t, S, call me.  Don’t, S, ask.  I’m not ok.  You have your answer.  You don’t need any more.  Any interest you show is only to make you feel good about yourself.  To make you convince yourself you are not a monster.  It would do nothing but cause me more pain.

So…my gut tells me, I need to block him.  I need to set myself up so I don’t ever hear his voice, or his name.  That I need to try to erase as much as I can of him from my life.  I need to allow the love I have for him to sink into the deep recesses of my soul, where it can sleep undisturbed, and without disturbing me.

My ego won’t let me do that yet.  I’m working on it.  I need to cut the cords, over and over.  I need to break that connection with him.  If our souls have some connection, which I have always believed, they will meet again when this life is over.  When it won’t hurt me any more.  Til then, I need to get as much distance between he and I and our non-relationship as possible.

I’m so grateful I will be going to my niece’s wedding in VA in a couple weeks.  It will be so wonderful to be with my warm family, loving family, to be with people who have, as the basis from which they live, unconditional love.  I wish I could go and stay there.  I am so glad that I have in place a plan to leave this area.  Now more than ever.  The driving force has always been that I can’t retire and stay in Connecticut, it is just too expensive to live here.  Moving to Florida will allow me to own a home with no mortgage and have enough money to live without working.  Now, equally as strong a driving force as that, and maybe even more powerful, more urgent, is the desire to get as far away from S as I can.

He was going to come stay with me there, I had talked about coming up here in the summer and staying with him.

Another dream, another plan, another hope, washed away with the tsunami of “She’s back in my life.”

Why I ever ever allowed him to make believe that it wasn’t true, I’ll never know.  My gut screamed it.  My friends said, “how do you know it’s true?” when I lost my mind when she first showed up.  “I just know….I just know.  I can’t explain it, I just know.”  I was so sure, I convinced them.  Then I listened to him, and took him back into my heart, and let myself love him without limit, again, and here I am, 4 weeks later, looking at what I knew was true in the first place.  Emptier now than I was then, and not only do I have to deal with the loss of him, but with the pain of knowing I was played by someone I loved so much.  That he bold-faced lied to me.

It’s like a kick in stomach, a knife in the back, and a hard left to my temple. I am so beat up and bruised.  The scars will run deep, there will be tender spots there for long into the forseeable future.  I keep wanting someone to wake me up, and tell me it’s just a nightmare.  That he’s not really waking up with her this morning, taking her to breakfast, loving her the way he could never love me.  And I know, in my gut, that I loved him better than she ever will, or is even capable of.

It’s hard, to give someone your all, and be rejected.  To give them your all and find out it was just a plaything for them, that it never meant anything of any substance.  It feels like a waste, a waste of precious love.  Even though, I know to love is never a waste, but really, there shouldn’t be so much pain attached to it.  It seems so unfair, to hurt so much when all you did was love too much.

He wasn’t the one.  The universe has been pointing me away from him for months, trying to spare me this pain.  Finally, I had to get to a place where the road closed behind me, the bridge burned as I crossed it.  It was the only way I could gain my freedom to love someone who could share that glorious experience with me.

I’ll be smarter next time.  I’ll be wiser.  I’ll be harder.  But some man, at some time will break through that, and relish my ability to love him.  I believe he’s out there.

First, I will have to learn to trust my gut again.  And to walk away from anyone it screams no to.

The journey continues.  But it’s hard today, unfairly hard.