One Day at a Time: Day 24

I saw a picture of me and him on a friend’s Facebook album and I felt embarrassed. On a different time I would have been proud, to say the least, and overjoyed for the exposure. I would have been pleased that such view was for everyone to see. All those girls that had access to this account and were looking at this picture would be melting in the lava of jealousy and hatred towards me because that girl next to the object of their affection wasn’t them. Yeah, I would have been elated, but today I’m not.
Like I said, I felt a bit ashamed because I could recall the feelings I felt going through my veins looking at the moment in time captured by that photograph. The same feelings that today I’m desperately try to abolish once and for all from my being. I could recall the false sense of security I felt. “Here I am, here he is. He’s with me. not you. me!” What a fool, Patty! You’re a fool!
I remembered the coquettish way I looked at him all night and I felt sick. Knowing now what I know I saw my image on that picture and I felt disgusted by it. That person is pitiful, I thought to myself.
Maybe that’s how everyone saw me, but never dared to say anything. Realizing this kill the last bit of self-respect I had left. All these time I was this pathetic fool being pushed around and played around by this guy and I was so blind I didn’t see it.
I left the album, closed the window, and shut the computer down as if by doing this the picture would somehow spontaneously combust and disappear for noone to gaze at ever again.

The First Test

I overestimated my lack of emotions. How I discovered this knocked me off my feet, and crudely slapped me in the face as if to say “snap back into reality!”
I found out that as I’m living my life, apparently, so is he. The naive notion that I had that he was crying his eyes out because I no longer chose to be part of his world, that I had shunned him, deprived him of my presence, my jokes, my smile, my compliments, my sweet terms of endearment, our Sunday morning breakfast dates, our 18 hrs text conversations, just me, this idea is completely wrong. It bursted like a bubble. It fell like a castle made out of a deck of cards knocked down by the wind that was the news I had just heard.

This weekend he attended a wedding with a date. The one he introduced to everyone as his girlfriend. I imagined how a previous conversation between them had been like. He casually asked her if she could come along. She, very nonchalant, said yes, of course, but inside she was bursting with joy and excitement.
“What to wear?” she tought.
As soon as they hung up she called her bestie and asked her to go to the mall and scour for a super sexy yet sophisticated little number.

My overly active imagination had gone haywire, here I was crumbling away all the confidence I had slowly built over the last few weeks. How could this one comment do this to me? What’s going to happen when I actually have to face him? Am I going to be strong enough to carry out my feat of getting over him in a year? This is only a test, but if I didn’t fail I think I barely passed.

One Day at a Time: Day 17

There’s always 3 sides to every story. There’s mine, there’s his, and there’s the truth. Today I’m going to be discussing his side of the story. The guy point of view. I was speaking to two of my male cousins about my decision to end this relationship. It was an eye opener to say the least because they gave me an insight to how a guy acts, thinks, and behaves when it comes to females. As he shared all his own personal experiences I couldn’t help but notice how familiar it all sounded. I have been there before many times as that girl he was describing in his anecdotes. All the things he would do or say to these girls was what I would experience or hear from this guy, and somehow because it was coming from him it seemed so innocent. I was wrong.
A guy is a guy is a guy. Is that simple. When he would tell me every little escapade he had with other females it wasn’t because he regarded me as trustworthy like I thought, it was because he wanted to make sure that as a chilla* I knew my place in his world. When he would be vague about someday taking me serious, it wasn’t because he was confused about his feelings towards me and he needed more time. It was because he wasn’t going to cut that bridge, he needed to have me readily available whenever he wanted. Even it was months or years in between.
He knows me too well so he always knew what to say to me to keep me at bay. All that power is too dangerous to give to someone, but once they have it they can control you like a puppet until you decide to cut the strings.
It was really hard to listen to my cousin explain this to me because I really believed that I was different, that I was special. That the times that we had spent together had made our bond be a rare material that could withstand everything. I idealized this connection to the point that he was a deity and our relationship was my religion. How can I let this happen? When did I let this happen?
Thankfully, I can see now that he is just a dude like any other male inhabiting planet Earth. He’s not special, neither am I to him. This was all about who had control over whom. I’m ready to take back my power, my will. It’s funny how you think succumbing your power to someone can be perceived as love. I’m taking note of it not to make that same mistake ever again.

*chilla- girl on the side. mistress. f*^% buddy.