When one realizes they don’t want the love they had back. When you realize you are not holding on to anything, that there is and possibly never was anything real. The illusions you held for so long shattered when she left. The illusion of healing to reconnect ourselves back in love shattered. She never placed your feelings first, though she claims too. Her “role” as the empath, who always places others needs before her own, is actually fueled by narcissism. The exact trait I was trying to avoid, the thought system I had battled for years. I know I am insecure, so did she. I know I am fragile, so did she. I did not know I was vulnerable, but she did. Every phase of the relationship wrought with doubt, while we were saying each other was the one? Doubt mixed with neediness? How does that even work…well it doesn’t. She had the ability to treat me with respect and dignity she claimed to have. Every opportunity that she had to make the choice to treat you and your relationship with respect, she avoided. Every opportunity to do the right thing, to get closure, she avoided because of her own fear, her own emotions. She always did what was best and easiest for her, at the expense of your feelings. That is not empathy it is selfish, self serving. It is about no one but her.

Being able to step back and see this should make me mad, should make feel relief I got out the situation, out of the relationship. Yet, it only serves to hurt me further. It makes me feel more insecure, more broken, more worthless. I reached out multiple times just to be able to move on…to come to actual closure. And she avoided why? At first I saw it as self preservation, shielding herself from the pain the reality of our break meant. That it was just too, difficult for her process, because it was breaking her heart to make this choice. That’s fair that I can understand and accept. I feared she had moved on very early on…couple weeks removed from house hunting and major RV purchase…and she is already falling in love? There was never any indication that this would have been a motive for her, or even a possibility …I mean she was leaving me because she felt “she had too” that she needed to focus on herself and family and not a relationship. She could have said “I found someone else” and she likely would have hurt me by saying that, but that was the respectful, mature right thing to do. Not telling wasn’t for my protection…not telling was her self preservation…she didn’t want feel bad, she didn’t want to feel guilty about herself, she didn’t want to see she was selfish. And most importantly…she did not want to feel ANY of the pain or loss I was suffering with the relationship ending…she wanted to avoid, seek a way to not have to process her own emotions. She can’t be alone so the solution was easy…she is so afraid to be alone, but says she is afraid to need somebody. She hide her pain in the arms of another…it’s not the relationship she has that hurts, it’s the disregard for my emotions, my well being. This shows how broken she is and would have continued to be broken in our relationship, she would have continued to make me feel like I was not enough, I would have continued to worry she would leave, because it felt she was always about too. None of that is how being in love is supposed to look, or feel. Love is not easy, but love is kind. Being aware of how your actions, and decisions affect those you care about is easy. Understanding that protecting yourself and your feelings can cause great pain for another is easy. These qualities must live in the person I love, because they make love easy, because they make it possible to do the work. This is what I thought I had and clearly didn’t, this is what hurts. The blatant disregard for me as a person, let alone the person who she claimed to love…really just hurts.