For the most part you wouldn’t know that there’s anything wrong and for the most part, I am okay. But out of nowhere, there are moments when waves of sadness feel like they’re crashing down so hard on my chest that I can hardly stand it.

And then the moment passes.

And I’m okay again, going about my daily life as if I hadn’t just lost the person I’d fallen so in love with.

Admitting all of it sounds to over the top and overdramatic to me but I’ve chosen to be okay with that.

I’m choosing to be okay with the fact that I’m not the person who simply says, “his loss,” and moves on and with the fact that I still feel like we need to give it one more shot. I’m okay with giving up some of my pride to acknowledge how much a relationship meant to me.

This was the relationship where I finally learned to accept love, where I learned what intimacy feels like, where I finally let down my guard and let someone in that I truly cared about. This was the relationship that made me finally believe that I could have love.

The fact that it’s over doesn’t take any of that away from me.

But still, there are those moments where the feelings of loss stop me in my tracks. Sometimes it feels crushing, other times it’s just a small sigh escaping before I can stop it.

Either way, I breathe through those moments and carry on.

I carry on because I still believe that things will turn out okay. I believe in my strength to get through the pain and the loss. I believe in my ability to grow and learn from this situation. I believe that love will find me again and that next time I will be better prepared for it.

Whether we never see each other again, try and stay friends, or give our relationship another shot, I believe that I will be okay and that things will turn out right.

In stepping back and observing my behavior through this, it’s remarkable to see how much stronger I am now than I was two years ago. Two years ago I lost a pseudo relationship that was mostly dysfunctional and in which I was never really loved. Yet, losing it nearly destroyed me as I tried to hide my pain in a combination of alcohol, pain killers, weed, and other men. I tried desperately to fill that void.

For those of you who were reading back then, yeah, it was that bad. I never came out and admitted it but I was waging a slow destructive battle against myself because I couldn’t deal with losing something that felt like the closest I would ever come to finding love.

There have been breakups between then and now but none of them had much of an impact on me because I was the one walking away. And, there was my Gentleman Friend who it hurt to leave but it was made so much easier by the fact that I had finally realized that I deserved to be treated better and that I deserved to be a priority in someone’s life.

This time, though, I was that priority. I was treated well. I was loved. This time it was a decision made out of what he perceived was best for both of us.

So, this time I decided to take care of myself. I made the decision to not drink at all until I knew it wouldn’t exacerbate the hurt or make me act out. I’ve made the effort to fill my life with things that are healthy and productive. This time I don’t question if I have the strength to get through it or if my life will always be so lonely and difficult.

This time I believe in love.

And I know I will have it again.

We went from being that couple that no one could understand why we were together to seeming like we were truly a match, opposite in the right ways. It was wonderful and beautiful and thrilling to fall in love with someone so different and it was wonderful and beautiful and thrilling to watch that same someone falling in love with me.

It came when I didn’t expect it and in a man that I would have never believed I would fall for.

Could we have made it work? Yes. Probably. But we didn’t.

Call it timing (awful job and other things we were going through), call it our age (we both just turned 26), call it general incompatibility (yet we were so good together), or whatever else one can think of. It doesn’t matter anymore. At this point I have one job: to move on in a healthy way.

It feels unfair that there are no breakup songs that seem to fit our situation. I’m not angry. I don’t want revenge. I wasn’t abandoned or wronged in any way. Adele does nothing for me in this case. Perhaps somewhat appropriately, all I have is an opera aria that I was assigned to learn just before we broke up.

Donde Lieta from La Boheme

Donde lieta uscì
al tuo grido d’amore,
torna sola Mimì
al solitario nido.
Ritorna un’altra volta
a intesser finti fior.
Addio, senza rancor. Ascolta, ascolta.
Le poche robe aduna
che lasciai sparse.
Nel mio cassetto stan chiusi
quel cerchietto d’or
e il libro di preghiere.
Involgi tutto quanto
in un grembiale
e manderò il portiere…

Bada, sotto il guanciale
c’è la cuffietta rosa.
Se vuoi–se vuoi, serbarla
a ricordo d’amor!
Addio–addio, senza rancor.

 

From whence she joyously left
at the beckoning of your love,
all alone must Mimì now return
to that empty nest …
Returning once again
to embroider make-believe flowers.
So farewell, but without bitterness. Listen, listen.
Gather up the few things
that are still scattered about.
Tucked inside my drawer are
that golden bracelet …
and my prayer book.
Bundle up everything
in an apron
and I’ll send someone to fetch it.

Only listen–under my pillow
you’ll find that pink bonnet …
If you want–if you’d like to, you should keep it
as a memento of our love.
So goodbye–goodbye, with no bitterness.

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