Personal

[From the Diaries]

After almost a year of battling something so uncertain, something that kept knocking me off balance every now and then, I finally detached.

It did not happen dramatically. There was no grand decision. No explosion. It happened so quietly I did not even realize it at first. But somewhere along the way, it must have been intentional. Because there were so many nights I prayed to feel less. I wished I could dull the intensity. I wished his actions did not hurt me the way they did.

And then one day, they didn’t.

His betrayals felt less shocking. His patterns less surprising. Even my anger softened. It was almost as if I was watching it from a distance. Like I was waiting for the feeling to completely dissolve.

And maybe that was the moment it ended.

Like every other time, I swore I was in love when it all began. And like every other time, now that it is over, I question whether it was love at all. But I have to say yes. Because I did things for this man I would never do in my right mind.

So either I was in love.
Or I was out of my mind.

Which, honestly, sometimes feels like the same thing.

Now that it is over, let’s look back. Not too much. Just enough to make sense of it.

For the first few months, he wasn’t really mine. Not fully. He said he was committed. Later, I would find out that wasn’t true. That period felt like hell, but I normalized it. I saw him through rose-tinted glasses and convinced myself that chaos was chemistry.

Sometimes he would disappear for days. No explanation. I would unravel quietly. Sleepless. Anxious. Trying to make sense of something that did not make sense.

In October, I wrote:
“I think I know deep down that I deserve better, but better hasn’t really come along. My heart doesn’t settle on better — it settles on chaos.”

In November, I wrote:
“Fuck that love that doesn’t wipe my tears or hold me when I’m down.”
“The worst men make the prettiest girls feel ugly.”

By the end of November, I was in mental trenches. The lowest I had been in over a decade. And I am ashamed that I allowed someone to take me there.

But by April, something shifted. I had shifted.

In May, I wrote:
“I want to love without surveillance.
I want to breathe without fear.
I want to trust again — even if my hands are still shaking.”

I was still trying. Still hoping.

And then June came, and I wrote:
“There’s a version of love we don’t talk about enough — the kind that lives on after trust has been broken, the kind that stays even when the heart has been bruised more than once.”

And somewhere in between those words, without even realizing it, I had started choosing myself.

I did not walk away from love.
I simply returned to myself.

And I want to end with this.

I am not walking away angry. I am not walking away bitter. I am not even walking away heartbroken in the way I expected.

I am walking away relieved.

Like a weight has lifted from my chest.

Because loving him felt like standing on ground that could collapse at any moment. Like bracing myself constantly for impact.

And now, for the first time in a long time, I am standing on solid ground.

And I am free of that.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

We stayed back a few extra days after the family left.
It was supposed to be just us. A softer ending to the trip. A reset.

Instead, it became something I don’t think I’ll ever forget.

Things between us have been rocky for a while. If I’m honest, maybe they’ve always been. We had already fought the day before my family left, and after that nothing felt steady. I’m not blameless. I know my attitude can be sharp. I know I react fast when I feel disrespected. I know I struggle to stay calm once I feel dismissed.

That part is mine.

But that night scared me.

It started over something so stupid it almost feels embarrassing to write.

We were playing Monopoly Deal. A game we’ve played a hundred times. Lately he’s been winning a lot, which is fine. It’s a game. But just as we started, I had no money and he had plenty. I asked for rent.

He said, “Just say no.”

I looked at him. “But you have money.”

“That’s what I want to do.”

It was small. Petty. Childish even. But something about the way he said it irritated me more than it should have. It felt unnecessary. Like he was enjoying denying me.

I threw the cards down. Game over.

He started justifying it. Saying he had to play a card. It didn’t make sense. It felt like backtracking just to prove he wasn’t wrong. I got more upset. I started tearing the cards. I was visibly angry now.

And then he said, “I should get this on video.”

I saw red.

I threw the cards at him, grabbed my phone, and started walking out. As I closed the door, I heard him shouting, “Why did you hit me? Why did you hit me?” over and over.

In my head I was thinking: because you tried to record me in my rage. For what? To use later? To show someone? To prove I’m unstable?

The moment I stepped outside, I heard chaos behind me. Loud chaos. Things being thrown. We were practically the only ones staying in that house. Every sound echoed. It wasn’t even our house. It was my brother’s in-laws’ family home.

I had face to lose.

I went down to the pool and sat on a lounge chair, hyperventilating. Angry. Embarrassed. Trying to calm down. I kept asking myself, what has this place become for us?

Then I heard more noise from upstairs.

Still him.

Still loud.

Still unapologetic.

What if someone hears? What if someone comes to check? The shame of that possibility felt suffocating.

Then the door slammed. Minutes later he was walking toward me, still furious. I could see it in his eyes. That deep, hot red anger.

“Why did you hit me?” he shouted again.

He didn’t care who heard.

“Because you tried to video me,” I said.

I don’t think he even heard me.

He kicked my flip-flops with his foot. Kicked the lounge chair I was sitting on. It wasn’t enough to hurt me. It was just enough to intimidate.

It was disrespectful in a way that made my stomach drop.

I stayed quiet.

When he walked away, I went back upstairs.

The room was worse than I imagined. Things everywhere. Not just messy. Thrown. I wanted to take pictures, but I was scared he would see me doing it.

So I started cleaning.

I needed control. I needed something stable. I needed the outside to be calm because the inside of me wasn’t.

As I cleaned, he started throwing more things onto the bed. Packing. Unpacking. Moving with intensity. We were supposed to leave the next afternoon, but everything felt unstable. Like he might walk out at any second.

I said nothing. I kept cleaning.

When the room was spotless, I could breathe again. Just a little.

He came out of the bathroom, shirtless, and tried to hold me.

I resisted with everything in me. I bit him. Pinched him. Grabbed his hair. I screamed that I didn’t want to talk anymore. I didn’t want him touching me. The way he had behaved downstairs didn’t feel like the man I knew.

It felt like a display. Something meant to overpower. Something meant to assert.

I broke free and sat at the desk. I bought an Apple gift card. Completely random. Dissociative almost. Like my brain needed something ordinary to focus on.

The desk was next to the bathroom. I could hear him crying in there.

I didn’t go.

I played music. June Gloom. It was mid-June. It felt fitting.

He came out and closed my laptop. I opened it. He put it away again. I grabbed it. He grabbed it back. I had to beg for my own laptop.

He started slapping himself, saying, “Hit me now.”

His eyes were still red.

I kept my tone flat. Calm. Almost numb. I just kept asking for my laptop until he let go. I grabbed it and came downstairs.

It was only early evening.

I remember thinking: I still have hours to get through.

I wasn’t scared of him exactly. I was scared of the volatility. Of what might happen next. Of the unpredictability.

The next morning was no better. Slamming doors again. I hate that sound. It feels intentional. Like it’s designed to make you flinch.

At the airport, he kept asking if we were really breaking up over a game. Said it was the stupidest breakup ever. Said I was stupid. Said he didn’t care if we broke up.

Then, in the same breath, he asked what he did wrong.

He said even after I hit him he was still here.

He told me not to put my ego above us.

He said he was sorry if he had done anything wrong.

Sorry if.

On the flight, we were seated next to each other. He tried to take selfies by putting his phone in my face. I pushed it away. It fell. He tried again. I pushed it again. People probably saw. I didn’t care.

He kept taking pictures of me. I looked the other way.

Right after takeoff, he moved seats.

And all I could think was this: he does not see himself in this. He only sees the moments I lose my composure. The torn cards. The biting. The hair pulling. My reaction.

Not what builds up to it.

Not the door slamming.

Not the intimidation.

Not the way I felt like I had to survive the night instead of sleep through it.

Maybe in his version I am the villain.

The girl who broke up over a game.

I am fine with that.

Because it was never about Monopoly.

It was about fear.

And I cannot build a life with someone if I have to feel this terrified just to stay.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

I am honestly so tired of this relationship. I don’t know why I thought you would change. I believed your words. And now I have to carry this weight all over again.

The other week you slipped. You cried. You broke down. I understood. I held space for that.

Two days later, you did the same thing. And that is where I stopped understanding.

I am tired. I am exhausted. From having to mother you. From overthinking every word you say. From carrying the emotional burden of not being able to trust you.

I take my healing and my peace very seriously. These are some of the toughest days of my life, and not once have you truly put me first. Your actions have been selfish. I am completing my thesis, pushing myself to the finish line, without a single ounce of real support from you. And by support, I do not mean solving my problems. I mean at the very least not adding to them.

You do not seem to care that your actions have consequences. And I have been living in the secondhand damage of those consequences for far too long.

I am tired of being the adult in this relationship. Tired of managing the emotions. Tired of managing the chaos. I am exhausted.

I wake up worrying about what you might have done the night before. I wake up bracing myself for whatever new story I will be told. I wake up already drained. This relationship feels like it is slowly killing something inside me.

I have so many other things I should be focusing on. My growth. My work. My future. And yet my energy keeps circling back to you.

I do not understand why your words never match your actions. I do not understand why loving you feels like carrying a constant anxiety.

You cannot be there for me because you do not have yourself together. And I keep asking myself, how much longer am I supposed to wait? For you to step up. For you to be responsible. For you to make sensible plans and actually follow through.

You do not.

There is always instability. Always excuses. Always something unfinished.

This is not what I wanted.

I am just so tired.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

I never really talk about how bad it gets. There is so much shame around things people do not understand. Anything outside the norm becomes “icky” or “what’s wrong with you?”

But it is just my reality.

Some days are hard to explain. I can usually feel a low coming before it fully lands. It sits somewhere deep in my body. But the timing is never convenient, so I ignore it. I push through. I function.

That is what they call functional depression. You still show up. You still do the things. It almost feels like it operates on your terms. It takes over quietly, and you learn how to coexist with it.

I stayed in bed for over twenty-four hours. The day before, I forced myself to go for a run because the voices in my head were getting louder. I felt uncomfortable in my own body. Restless. Exhausted. I thought moving would fix it.

It didn’t.

It made everything heavier.

I am not paralyzed, but I feel mentally impaired. Like my brain is moving through fog.

And then there is the weight of relationships.

I only have one that truly matters right now. And even that one feels fractured some days. So damaged that I do not know where to begin repairing it.

When I am in these lows, I no longer try to analyze them. I let them wash over me and wait for them to pass so I can feel like myself again. So I can have the energy and the will to exist properly.

And then something happens.

Something small on the surface. But not small to me.

An interaction. A name. A presence that already carries history and discomfort. Old rumors. Old wounds. Old doubts that were supposedly resolved.

Weeks ago, I had already discovered conversations that should not have existed. Explanations that felt thin. Timing that felt suspicious. I wanted them to make sense. I really did. But they didn’t.

And my mental state is not an excuse for anyone to take advantage of my vulnerability.

I am supposed to be with someone who understands me. All of me. Especially the flawed parts. Because they are part of the package.

Instead, I kept uncovering little deceptions. Names disguised. Details hidden. Small acts that required intention. Not accidents. Intention.

When I saw the most recent thing, I snapped. It felt disrespectful. Especially when we are supposedly rebuilding trust.

What shocked me more was that he was angrier at my reaction than at the behavior itself.

He did not understand how it looked. How it felt. How, in the middle of trying to repair something fragile, actions like that feel like someone stomping on glass.

I do not even have the words anymore.

I was already mentally drained.

And now I am just tired.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

I can forgive you. I know you’re sorry.

But will I ever be able to trust you again?

And what are we without trust? Just two people tiptoeing over shards of glass, careful with every word, every silence, every notification. I don’t want a love that feels like that.

I don’t want to be bracing myself all the time.

We can admit that we had something beautiful and now it’s just broken.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

At six in the morning, when you couldn’t sleep, who came to your mind?

We weren’t even fighting.

So at six in the morning, out of the “kindness” of your heart, who did you reach out to? Another woman.

The same woman you’ve been rumored to link with. The one who caused so many arguments. The one you hid in plain sight. An affair you will still never admit to, even as you make me feel stupid for questioning it.

And then this.

You still care about her.

My man does not embarrass me like this. And yet, you already have. So many times.

Chance after chance, only for you to show me exactly who you are. Not who you promise to be. Not who you swear you’re becoming. But who you are.

The lying. The deception. The humiliation.

If only you cared about me enough to pause and think about how I would feel before doing any of this.

Knowing how fragile our trust already was. Knowing that fully. And still, you chose to reach out to her.

I’m sure you reach out to others too. You just forgot to delete this one. That’s the mistake. Not the insincerity. Not the betrayal. Just the incompetence to cover your tracks this time. And you’re usually so good at that.

But here’s the thing. I see right through you. Every time. I always have.

If I chose to believe you, it wasn’t because I didn’t know better. It was because I hoped it would finally be different.

You have hurt me too much for us to continue like this. I have forgiven things that should have been unforgivable. And every time you do something new, the old wounds start bleeding again because they never healed. I just covered them up for you.

So let me go.

Let me go to someone who deserves me. Even if that person is myself.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

I dreaded coming home.
To the stillness. The emptiness.

Nothing had changed. The furniture was the same. The walls were the same. The air was the same.

Except he wasn’t there anymore.

Work was chaotic as ever. There is no possible way the world should feel this still with the amount of stress sitting on my shoulders. But it did. Without the concept of his existence in my life, everything felt dull. Boring. Pointless.

He was the little bit of purpose I had. Even if it was small, it was still purpose.

Maybe I do love him.

And just like that, I am back in that same indecisive loop. Only this time I have more facts. More clarity. Thanks to the amount of therapy I have had over the past five years.

So now the question becomes: is it love?

Or is it my unhealthy, insecure, anxious attachment style gasping for air like a fish out of water simply because he is no longer there?

I walked so much today my feet are aching. I took the longest route home just to avoid facing the reality that now exists.

I did buy flowers on the way back. I could not bear to look at the dead ones slowly collapsing in my vase at a time when it feels like I am facing a kind of death myself.

Do not misunderstand me. This is not just about a man. Not just about a breakup.

It is about the pain I carry in general. And not all of it was caused by him. I have my own issues. My own wounds. Things I am still working on.

He did not take my pain away. But his presence made me feel less alone in it. On the days I felt rotten, he made it feel survivable.

Now that changes.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

Who am I to grieve love? What have I ever truly known about it?

Sure, I’ve written endlessly about being in love and falling apart in love. But have I ever really loved? Do I even know what it means to love and to be loved?

I don’t think I do.

The man I once called the love of my life, the one I genuinely believe would have given me the entire world, I kicked him so hard I’m surprised he never kicked back. We did not have ugly fights. No screaming. No name calling. We just, hesitantly moved on.

And the final breakup elated me.

It was the only breakup that ever did. I knew he deserved better than the way I was treating him. Even though it hurt to let go, even though I was losing so much, I had to. I think a part of me always believed we would find our way back to each other once we were more grown.

The part I forgot was that he was always grown. I was the one who needed to catch up.

And with the way I treated him, why would he ever wait? He didn’t.

That entire relationship was me questioning whether I had ever really loved him at all. I mistook adoration for convenience because I was a girl who had never been treated right. And he treated me right. There was nothing he would not have done for me. That is not nostalgia talking. That is fact.

I was young. Messy. Stupid. Too young to see the bigger picture.

It has been over six years. He has moved on. God knows, he probably has a family of his own. The one he would have had with me. Actually, he would have. If I had been patient. A little more mature. A little less broken.

All I had to do was grow up. But I wanted to have fun.

Do I miss him? Not like that. It is more the realization that if I could have found love, happiness, and loyalty in one person, it would have been him.

Loyalty.

I say that word carefully now because I have never felt as betrayed as I do today. Not once. Not twice. Over and over again. And now I understand the value of it. Loyalty feels like a prized possession I casually threw away a long time ago.

I am too fabulous to be in the wrong relationship and let a man treat me like this again and again. I really am. This is not arrogance. I have worked too hard on myself to throw it all away.

So what is stopping me?

Everything any woman my age would consider.

But do I really want to gamble the biggest decision of my life? Is the man I love, the one I carry around like candy and armor, someone who will constantly embarrass me?

Lord knows I have allowed it so many times already. And he continues to do so. Is that love? Does he even love me?

He cannot. You do not do these things to someone you love.

I know that because, for a brief moment, I was madly in love with this very man. And he ruined my love for him by never truly loving me at all. I gave him more than enough chances. And in every single one, he let me down tremendously.

But maybe what truly terrifies me is this: for the longest time, I believed I was incapable of real love.

The only real love I can remember is the one I felt at nineteen. I gave him everything. When it ended, it took years to recover. And once I did, it felt like I had never loved him at all.

And then, years later, I felt this soul-consuming love. Brief. Intense. Maybe synthetic. But it felt real.

I wonder where I went wrong. I loved this man. I wanted a life with him. But his honesty did not exist for me. Karma, maybe. Lord knows, sometimes I feel like I deserve this.

But all the lifestyle changes I made could not have been leading me here. To this place where I am utterly and hopelessly confused. There has to be more.

With my lost love, I cried wolf. I drove him to his edge and then cried about it. As if who he became was not partially my doing. Anyone would have changed under the weight of how I behaved. I was terrible.

That is not to say he did not hurt me too. He did. But compared to what I had done, it would not even measure. Anyone runs out of patience eventually.

But right now, this man pushed me here while I was in a better place. A softer place. A more loving place. I had healed. I had figured out what I wanted in life.

He does not know how good he had it. He does not know how many people would have hoped, wished, prayed, and begged to be loved the way I loved him. And I gave it so easily. So freely.

All that love I had saved. Guarded. Protected.

Poured onto the wrong man.

Not because I was broken. But because I was healed. More loving. More grown.

The twisted fate of timing.

So now what?

Do I accept that I missed my cue to start a happy life? Maybe. I could tell myself that. I probably already have.

But I am too fabulous to belong to the wrong man. And too fragile to end up in the wrong hands.

My sensitivity is not always tears.

Sometimes it is slammed doors.
Shattered glass.
Rage.

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Personal

[From the Diaries]

I loved you when I barely had any reasons to.
And I love you even more now, because I have so many.

You’ve somehow grown into everything I ever wanted. Not perfectly. Not magically. But intentionally.

Thank you for the effort you put into yourself. And into us.
Thank you for not giving up.
Thank you for loving me through some of my hardest days.
Thank you for never looking at me like I was less than because of my mistakes.

But most of all, thank you for sliding into my DMs eleven years ago.

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