When we hit that 3 year mark and I, for the first time, questioned everything – I remember my initial feeling: complete panic. I looked around and thought – how can I undo all of this? Our lives were so intertwined. Everything was him. Pictures, friends, family, routines…all of it was him. He took up so much space in my life, I couldn’t breathe when I thought about the idea of undoing all of that. The idea of separating my entire life from his…was unimaginable. And it was clear. I wasn’t ready.
At the time I thought my unreadiness was a sign that I still wanted to be in, that I was still in love with him. It might have been, or it might have been that my fear was winning out the truth in my heart. Maybe I just wasn’t strong enough to face the music. Maybe I knew I should, but I didn’t want to admit it. I don’t know completely, all I know is that I wasn’t ready. And knowing that meant that if I was going to stay, I better be all in.
I never told him what I was thinking that summer. It was probably the first time I had ever withheld any of my feelings from him at all. I told him I wasn’t happy with how we were, but I never went so far as to say that I had thought about leaving or that I had even planned how and when I would break up with him (that just seemed like salt in an open wound). So he moved along unassuming, as he should have. And I moved right along with him.
He never did anything wrong. I don’t think he ever did, really. Yes, he frustrated me and we had arguments from time to time, but only the kind that comes naturally from sharing your life so intimately with another person. There were things that bothered me that I would tell him time and again, but ultimately those were not the reasons that caused me to leave. The reasons I left were separate from the reasons we weren’t perfect.
I was never sure, and I’m still not, how much he knows that or believes that – that truly there was nothing he could have done to change the outcome of our relationship. It was just that we had run our course. We loved each other well for a good long while. And for me, that’s as far as we were meant to go. Maybe it was already written in the stars, maybe it was set to be that way.
The 7 years that followed my initial questioning were filled with a lot of people. People that really made me think about the kinds of relationships I wanted to have in my life – romantic, friendships, and family. Although I probably knew this somewhere in my heart for my entire life, I wasn’t someone who could handle smalltalk – I was a “get into the meat of it” kind of girl. Dive in deep, get to know a person, and enjoy the ride. The people that I kept in my life throughout those 7 years I really knew. No repeat surface conversations. No Disney-perfect lives. We knew each other’s ugly and we loved each other anyway. And through those relationships I realized something very important…my relationship with him looked nothing like that.
I talked, a lot. I shared everything that was on my mind, exhaustively. It was like I had a lifetime of thoughts to get out and “now” was the time. He listened, really, really well – sort of. He let me talk, tirelessly. He didn’t necessary retain all of what I said (not that I blame him), but he was a definite sounding board. I knew I needed that, being the middle-child that comes with the territory. But what I wanted was more than that. I wanted an equal sharer. I wanted someone who would bare their soul right back with me. I wanted the kind of open, raw honesty I had with my friends and family to show up in my relationship. But it just wasn’t.
And it wasn’t his fault, that’s not who he was, and it’s certainly not what he signed up for. He was hired to be the sounding board, he was good at being the sounding board, he liked being the sounding board…but I went ahead and changed the job description. Solid, stable sounding board no longer required. Heart-centered empath willing to bare it all inquire within. Yikes. I was finally realizing that the person who was filling the position wasn’t meeting any of the requirements. He was showing up every day to the wrong office and giving his best. And yet I was completely unfulfilled.
I felt awful. How unfair, for both of us. He was being himself, and I wasn’t. When I was myself, he couldn’t reach me. It wasn’t that we were suddenly ships passing in the night, it was a complete and utter change in trajectory that neither of us saw coming. And I was the only one who noticed. He might have stayed forever, but I knew I couldn’t. I knew that he would spend his entire life trying to be the heart-centered empath willing to bare it all if I told him that’s what I needed him to be, but he would never be able to be that person. I knew that I could have him as my kind, stable sounding bored forever. But this time, when I looked around, I didn’t feel panic. I felt like I was finally calm and stable all on my own. I knew that who we were for each other would matter forever, but who we were going to be next would be even greater. I knew, with no uncertainty, that it was time to go.
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