I bought this mug for an ex-boyfriend. It was supposed to be the beginning of a new Christmas tradition. One for me and one for him. We’d start collecting them, add a new one every year until we’d move in together and our kids would start to break them because they’d use them for cereal and knock them off the kitchen bar.
I loved that man.
Or at least I thought I did, but thinking that makes me feel iffy, so I’ll stick with it: I loved that man. I loved him as best as I could with who I was, with the tools I had to love another human. Or maybe, with the tools I had to love myself.
I gave it to him as a gift. Along with some other stuff worth 400 bucks, which wouldn’t matter except, I would never spend that much money on a gift. But I did for him because, get ready, I thought I had to show him that I can, that by spending this much on him, maybe he’ll think I’m worth more too, worth it to play in his league. You will not be shocked to hear that I was wrong.
He loved the mug. He loved the idea of making that a tradition. I’d like to think that he loved me. As best he could with what he had. But, there’s a line in one of my poems that goes:
“But I never saw you love yourself, so I should’ve known.”
I should’ve known. I was so in love with the could, that I very much ignored the should. In fact, I remember a very strong and distinct gut feeling just before that very Christmas that I bulldozed over, but it was there, it was not a whipser, it was a megaphone and it said: This will not end well.
He was away, in some other snowy mountain town in Switzerland with his family, unable to tell me when we’ll see each other. During Christmas. As a couple.
And so it began.
And I held on. Oh boy did I hold on - to the dream, to the illusion, to the hope, to the fairy tale that was never gonna be one. I wanted that successful man who drove a sportscar, was funny and had real estate in the south of France, not for any of that - I wanted him because, get ready, he wanted me.
Or so I thought. And he probably thought it too.
He said all the right things, he did all the right things, for a while. Long enough for me to keep finding excuses for him, for me to start digging that hole for myself not knowing how deeply I’d fall into it. God’s honest truth is: I kept seeing that future with him long after I have started to wipe away my own tears. Cognitive dissonance, I think they call it.
So when is it you saw him last? - they started to ask, and the shame that’s been cooking started to bubble up when I would say, it’s been a few weeks. But you’re still together right? - they’d continue. The voice in my head would answer, honestly I don’t know but then I’d hear myself say, yes, yes, things are just really rough for him right now. And that was not even a lie, the lie was just to call this a relationship.
A couple months after Christmas, I started to be ghosted by my own boyfriend.
I’m sick, I can’t, not today, actually, I have to fly to Brazil for work…
Ok, ok but, but do you still love me?
Of course, to the moon and back.
How would you describe the feeling, of being suffocated and wanting to scream at the same time?
Of free falling off a cliff, flying through the air but being slammed on muddy ground, grasping for roots at the very same time?
Social media would call this a toxic relationship, and heck it probably was. The thing is, it takes two for a relationship, even a toxic one.
We're quick to label, put a cute little bow on it, drop it in the drawer and say; that thing, that relationship, that behavior, it's definitely THAT (filling whatever label of choice) and it belongs here. Then we shut the drawer and think we can be done because we recognized it.
Guess what, after countless times of hanging up the phone and immediately breaking out in tears, I had a hunch I wasn't exactly in a healthy relationship. Did I get out? No. Not for months. And even after I did, I still wanted to fix it. Fix us. Save us. Build us. (With a full sized construction crew if I had it my way). I wanted to make us happen so bad, I did things that today, I don't know if I still want to bury myself in shame for or just give my younger self a hug because she was in so much pain.
What I did? Well let me vomit it out to you...
One time, I walked passed his house (actually several times, on purpose) and noticed his bike was broken, the saddle had come off. Get ready, I went to buy a new one and left it there with a letter... (after I had rung the doorbell and he didn't answer).
I sent texts that should have been books, pouring out the pain that I could no longer hold all to myself.
I wrote poems, on how nothing is ever too late, if you really want it.
I spent 2 full days perfecting an email, explaning, elaborating, begging.
And I hit send. Still hoping. Not realizing that I had buried my self-worth so deep I was about to turn into lava.
But no one ever talks about what it actually feels like to be trapped in a relationship, by the hope, the promise, that fucking picture in our head about how it's supposed to be. About what it feels like to be held hostage by your own nervous system.
My 20-something self was not steering the ship here, she was standing by as the 5 year old was begging to slip into bed with mom.
The 9 year old needed to hear how loved she is, not just that her grades were fine.
The 14 year old who thought she learned her worth when she could use some hard words in a serious duscussion with dad.
My 20 something self did not know that pain, but her body has been carrying it. She felt it, every time she was begging to be seen by a man who spoke empty words. And words will forever fail to capture what it takes to be crushed by a weight no one sees, to sink to the ground because waiting for promised love sucks every drop of energy out of you, or what it means to awaken to a malnourished child within.
We know her.
We are her.
And I will do what I find in my power,
to heal her.
Today I reached into my kitchen cabinet and found this mug. The Christmas mug.
It's cracked.
A big long crack, turned black from tea or coffee.
It was never going to last.
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