I am happily secure in a new relationship. Almost 2.5 years and we share our first apartment together. Everything's fine and the love is flowing! But among this global pandemic that is the coronavirus, there is a ton of time to think...and one thing I thought about is how my last relationship ended and how I have and have not dealt with that.
For the backstory, I met Paul in the very end of 2015 and we wound up spending the New Year together moving into 2016. We were both in our mid-20s and it just seemed to mesh well. Much of it is blurry now--but by January 2016 we were officially boyfriends and then by February I was already professing my love. This isn't surprising because I am historically codependent. Codependent or not though, it was genuine love. I loved Paul with all my being but what I did not do well was balance that love to scale for the reality I was in.
Paul lived with his family and worked nearby them. He did not have a vehicle and his family was 45 minutes from me. Because he had no car, and a low-paying job, I had to make it a point to visit him. A 45 minute drive isn't bad during the honeymoon phase. But when the relationship develops and especially when the codependent feelings form, 45 minutes becomes a problem. To make matters worse, although his family knew he was gay, they didn't like it. They tolerated him but they had no interest in tolerating me and they made that no secret. It eventually became awkward and uncomfortable to be there, so I would drive the 45 minutes to pick him up, take him to my home with my then roommates (and drag family), who were welcoming, even in our own shady way. It did not help that occasionally we would have to make trips back to walk his siberian husky, so as you can imagine, this got frustrating. But I continued to deal with it.
I guess I always figured, and this is codependent thinking, if you do for others, you will eventually get yours.
and I should note, Paul is not a bad guy. He isn't a bad guy now and he wasn't a bad guy then. I have no reason to believe or ever state that he intentionally was causing harm to me. And while I am not blaming myself either, I also did not set the appropriate boundaries, as codependents often don't. As such, this process continued well into the year and a half relationship.
Most of our relationship was good. No, it was great, actually. We had lots of fun together, he was an upcoming performer in the local drag circuit as a male entertainer and I was his number one fan. I was at almost every show. I was gaining traction in activism, to the point of running protests and workshops: he was almost none of those events--despite me having asked him to be.
After eight months, we decided to be poly. By poly, we were monogamous romantically but poly sexually. To explain further, we only "dated" one another but we would have sex with other individuals. It was usually something we did together, either at sex parties or hook-ups, but occasionally we did it separately. We always communicated and it worked out very well. This may sound like the part of this story that leads to the relationships demise but it wasn't. The poly life did not cause us any distress and if anything, brought us together closer for the most part.
In 2017, after the devastation of the Trump win, we all went into a collective depression and the activist life became more stressful and demanding. To make matters worse, tragically in March 2017, my sister-in-law was killed in her home, rendering my older brother a sudden single parent to a 3 year old girl overnight. I felt I had no choice. I left my home and moved into a spare room in his home and I jumped in as a co-parent to my niece. I am still happy I did that. But as you can imagine, this increased my stress and I needed more support than ever from Paul.
But nothing had really changed. I still had to transport him and when I was too tired to do that, I would pay for Lyfts to do it, which adds up quickly. I kept doing it though. Now I was starting to vocalize it.
Paul couldn't keep his income together because he kept losing jobs. A person can get fired, hell, I have been. But in a year and a half together, he went through at least five jobs. It's difficult to believe its unfortunate luck by that point.
I continued to rack up credit card debt helping him out with bills. I remember at one point, I paid over $500 to catch him up and we agreed he would pay me $75 every paycheck until the debt was settled. When it came time for a paycheck he sent me $25 and I demanded the other $50. It was an argument I wish I hadn't had to have because honestly, why couldn't Paul just live to his end of the bargain? He complied, though, and gave me the $50. But it left me feeling very sour.
My birthday in 2017 was not pleasant. By this point, we'd been together a year and three months. He said he was handling it and we went out with a bunch of my friends which was nice. I regretfully, however, paid for my own meal and drinks and Paul's meals and drinks. I also, for some drunken reason, decided to share a video of a sexual nature with someone I used to flirt with (before our relationship). We had exchanged stuff like this before. I suppose I didn't conceptualize it as a problem back then because we were poly but because the person was someone I had some previous emotional connection with, it was naturally uneasy for Paul. He was upset and rightfully. I remember telling him I was very disappointed with being responsible for my own birthday cost and that I was tired of being neglected. I said that wasn't an excuse for crossing that boundary though and I apologized. It wasn't an excuse, it was trashy to do that. It was acting out. There is a reason, for sure, but not an excuse. We worked through that.
Honestly, though, that's when we should have broken up. Doing all this for him, jumping through emotional hoops, financial hoops and all of that and at the very least I should have been able to felt special on my birthday.
But we didn't. Because when I say I loved Paul, I truly loved him and as a codependent I was willing to let that be my detriment. However, the relationship never truly recovered from that night.
In July, things came to a head. I remember I was so in the zone when he came over (via a Lyft funded by me). I wasn't in the mood. I wasn't excited to see him. He was building a Sims family, and I remember it was an imaginary us in the future with a child and a dog. I scoffed at it because I was annoyed how nurturing that was. I went to lay down and we cuddled, which would be for the last time. He had a show that night, I went, as always and I had some wine, as always. The show went amazingly, in my opinion, it was some of his best work.
Somehow, he didn't think so and his anxiety was very high. I had him drive us back to my home in my car. He was complaining about the show and I was trying to use positive and affirming language. He yelled at me. I don't remember what he said but I lost it. I started yelling back and told him to just drive. I was fuming. I was mad. I was already feeling many feelings and I had complained about the lack of emotional attention, the costs adding up of transportation, the lack of secure income, the neglect, the problems so many times. I guess I wasn't interested in what his concern was this night at that point.
We're heading back into my house and I tell him to stay outside that his Lyft will come get him. He was confused but then mentioned his laptop was upstairs, so I told him to "hurry his ass up and get out here, you have 30 seconds." I told him I've set the houses alarm and that the system is connected and monitored & I didn't want any trouble with the alarm company, so hurry up and get out so it doesn't go off. I also did not want it to blare and wake up my niece. He walks outside and I tell him to wait for the Lyft, he said something back, whatever it was, I didn't like it, so I closed the door.
I canceled the Lyft.
It was a petty thing to do. I see from my upstairs window the Lyft arrive. They talk and then I get a Facebook message. See, Paul's phone was off because, well, he didn't pay the bill. But he could Facebook through his laptop. He messages me that the Lyft was cancelled. I told him to pay for his own Lyft because he's a grown ass man. He said he would give me the $50 from the show he had just done. I don't know why he didn't just give the Lyft driver the $50. I refused though because I as being petty intentionally. I'm not proud of that.
I waited, and spoke with a friend on the phone. Maybe 20 minutes pass and I re-order the Lyft. The guilt starting to get to me. I get a text from a "mutual friend" telling me to think rationally and that he doesn't want to see anyone get hurt over fight. I told the friend I re-ordered the Lyft already to which the friend says, "not from what I am being told." I told that friend they can come pick them up if they're so concerned but I ordered the Lyft for this grown man and it's on its way.
In order to not deal with it anymore, I walked outside. Paul looked shaken and upset. He told me he was overheated and that he is sensitive to heat, so he might pass out. It's funny, in a year and half I wasn't aware of that, and he never had a hard-time walking to and from where-ever non-essential errand/friend visit/cigarette run in the midst of a hot summer day, but 3am sitting on a bench outside my door was "overheating". Nonetheless, I went in and got him water. I told him I was sorry and that I was acting out of anger, the Lyft arrived and I saw him off.
I went back inside and cried myself to sleep.
The next morning I messaged him and I apologized again, I said I was unkind and that I acted out of anger. It was then we officially confirmed the relationship was over. He asked me to mail him back a key necklace he had gotten me, which I thought was petty. But whatever, I mailed it back.
I don't regret ending the relationship.
I do regret how I ended the relationship.
Here's the thing. Paul is one of the best human beings to ever cross my life. I loved him. But I acted strictly out of anger. I made him feel unsafe in that moment, even though it was only perceived, and I am certain it was humiliating. It probably was very painful being dejected by someone he (says he) loved and someone who loved him. I know it hurt.
I guess that WAS the point at the time.
I apologized for it then and the day after. I apologized for it again. A week later he asked if we could still be friends, I said yes but we would need to stay back for some time, while we heal. I unfollowed him on my social media.
I did not just fall OUT of love immediately. It doesn't happen like that.
He eventually vaguebooked me claiming I (though I wasn't tagged) wasn't true to my activism because I was going to leave him at risk by "making" him walk from my home in Riverview to Citrus Park. In his post, it was a "good thing my friend stepped in" to prevent that. I'll never forget that. That friend, by the way, texted me about 2-3 minutes AFTER I re-ordered the Lyft. I was under no obligation to pay for an adults Lyft ride. I still believe that today. But I hate that I hurt Paul that way and made him feel unsafe or that I did not care about his safety.
We talked about the not-so-vaguebook post, he said he did not know I re-ordered the Lyft before the friend's unnecessary intervention and apologized for the post. I told him it was fine, of course, but that he was the one who reached out to me to be friends--so we either are friends or you want to trash talk me, it can only be one or the other.
We worked it out.
I still wasn't out of love and I think that's why it bothered me. In fact, I still struggled with it and in 2018, I actually reached out. I did. I said I hadn't stopped feeling those feelings and wanted to try to build a friendship again and see if that goes anywhere, romantically or platonically. He said while he had no resentment and we were good, he felt our friendship was best placed in the digital realm it was at the time, only communicating (seldomly) online. I said I respect that and I went on my way.
Today, we don't really interact. We're still connected on Facebook and it's been almost 3 years since it ended. I have no hard feelings toward him and we've had some good digital conversations since then. I let him know some of the things he's taught me and he's told me some of the wonderful things I taught him.
Paul's presence in my life was a gift--and I hope I was one in his overall.
It ended poorly. And that's where my regret is. If I could do it all over again, I would have not let it got to the point it did. I would have been tender in how I said goodbye. I would have told him everything I think about him but that I needed my boundaries because it was toxic. Not that he was toxic. It was toxic. I wish I had given him the respect he deserved instead of that dramatic, painful and anger-ridden goodbye. But I am human. And that's a reason, not an excuse. I have told him this, if you're wondering. I think he believes me. I think he understands, looking back, as to what happened and why. I'm sure he has acted out of anger and you, the reader, have. It's not about excuses.
This isn't intended for mass consumption nor is it intended for Paul to read. If he did, that would be fine, but I am writing this for my own healing.
I regret the way I said goodbye. I regret that I acted so petty. Because although the love was not meant to be, it was genuine, it was strong and it was passionate. I don't regret loving or knowing Paul.
I only regret the goodbye.
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