When I was in high school, I got a boyfriend, and though I was definitely too young for a serious relationship, I ran blindly into it, hoping I was doing the right thing.
I told myself I was going to have to take what I could get. Someone had finally shown interest in me, so I was lucky, and it would be stupid to pass up the opportunity, even if I didn’t initially feel the same way. At the time, I was starting to come to terms with my affection toward women, but if I could stomach being with a boy, I would never have to worry about unraveling the knot of feelings I had shied away from for so long.
We were young and stupid, but I was too stubborn to admit my naivety, and before I could understand what was happening, he turned into someone I didn’t recognize, someone who was supposed to be on my side but never was, someone who showed his “love” through being anything but loving. He seemed to have an idealized version of me in his head, but the more he tried to manifest a perfect girlfriend, the more trapped I felt, and the more I resisted.
I became a person I didn’t know or enjoy being; I was a shell of my former self. I had no social life outside of him, and I stopped caring about the things that had once brought me joy. When he yelled at me, I yelled back until I was crying, feeling so small and broken. It was exhausting and disheartening to think that this was what love was.
I eventually broke up with him, and, for a long time, I looked back at that time of my life with nothing but hatred for him and pity for the poor kid who didn’t know what she was getting into. I avoided relationships like the plague, and, by doing so, I spent several years learning and growing from that experience.
I found out who I am when I don’t have someone telling me what I should and should not be. I learned how to enjoy being alone, but I was also taught how important it is to surround myself with people who love and care about me because they were there for me when everything came crashing down, even if I hadn’t done the same for them. Through healing, I taught myself how to show compassion to myself and others. I realized my own worth. One of the most important things I learned, however, was forgiveness.
I am not saying that I have forgiven him, and it’s hard to say if I’ll ever forgive him for the things he said and did to me, but I have learned to look at him without malice. It wasn’t until embarrassingly recently that I ever thought about him in a semi-neutral light. I was convinced that he was horrible, undeserving of sympathy or forgiveness because of what I had been through; in thinking this, I forgot that if I am capable of changing for the better, so is he.
He has a whole life I will never be a part of, and I have the life I’ve always dreamed of, without him in it. He has people surrounding him who love him, just like I do. He has also had these years to grow and learn separately from me, and I hope they have had the transformative effect on him that they have on me. I hope he shows the people in his life genuine love and acceptance. I hope he treats them so much better than he ever treated me. I hope he understands that, though I wish I had never had to go through what I did, I am who I am today because of what I learned from loving and leaving him.
Since then, I have had other similar experiences, though not romantically. I have had my two best friends in the world suddenly stop talking to me, seemingly out of nowhere and with no explanation, and I have had to make peace with that loss and confusion. I have had to mourn a part of my life that no longer exists because these people – for some unknown reason – no longer wish to exist to me, and I have to be okay with that because there is no other way out.
I have had other close friendships fade out, and I have had to deal with the grief of knowing some people just aren’t meant to be in your life forever, even though you wish they could be. These losses feel like the antithesis of breaking up with him; I see the end coming from a mile away, and instead of running toward it, excited for freedom, I hold on for as long as I can, hoping to prolong these perfect yet finite relationships, thinking I can avoid the inevitable.
I have also done my fair share of harm. I have hurt people I love, people who absolutely did not deserve it, and I have had to live with the knowledge that I will never be able to reverse the effects of that harm. I have unknowingly become the villain in other people’s stories, all without understanding why.
Despite this pain, I believe that everything in life happens for a reason, even if that reason isn’t readily apparent. I got through my first relationship, and it led me to my brilliant, beautiful, absolutely lovely girlfriend, who treats me better than I could ever deserve. I had to lose friends to make room for the people I now love and cherish dearly, and who I could not imagine life without. I had to be hurt to change and grow, and that is the case for every other person alive.
The saying “You live and you learn” is such a cliché, but it’s true. Life is one big learning opportunity, and it wasn’t until I thought about it that way that I learned to forgive, both others and myself. You live, and you hopefully learn something along the way, and you become better for it.
