I moved to Florida from New York in 2018. I left the city that I loved and a home that made me feel safe, not because it was to be my Shangri-la but rather because the person that I was dating wanted to live here. It unfortunately, turns out it was not meant to be as he fell apart around six months after we got here. And as much as I hate to revisit what occurred, it helps when moving on after a break-up to take a look at the journey.
When I met Scott* (not his name) I had been through two dreadful relationships back to back. One was physically and emotionally abusive and the other was with someone that was an alcoholic. So, when I met him I was ready for a soft place to fall. And of course he presented himself as just that. He presented himself as the person that I could rely on.
We met through an online dating website, and after some back and forth via text and phone conversations, we met for dinner. Though we had a lot in common, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to date him. He was preppy and looked a little like my biological father. Side note: my biological father abandoned me when I was six months old but is in my life now. But as time went on, my feelings changed, and Scott* became someone that I felt I could rely on. I loved him, and he said that he felt the same.
As much as we had in common, we also were opposites. He was a complete type A, and I am a creative person who is not hung up on perfection. Most of our disagreements came from me, wanting him to be more affectionate and ignore his endless need to bleach and dust everything. And I am sure I drove him crazy because I was perpetually five minutes late.
But going in I had warned him of my tardiness and he laughed it off. I even showed up five minutes late to our first date and announced midway through I liked eating cereal in bed, had two dogs that slept with me and was imperfect in many ways. Once again he laughed, but as our relationship progressed, those things seemed to annoy him. He wasn’t perfect either, but I focused on the fact that I didn’t think that he would let me down. I didn’t need perfection. I needed someone I could trust and rely on. I didn’t think that he would ever leave me swinging in the wind. He seemed solid.
We moved to Florida in 2018, things were ok at first, but then he started to change. We arrived in April and by September he started becoming quiet and distant. But I understood that it was hard for him to adjust to being retired since he had always worked so very hard. By October, our intimacy was non-existent. He wouldn’t admit that he was depressed or that he was even withdrawing. So, of course that meant I needed to go into “fix mode.”
Sadly, based on my childhood insecurities, I have always felt that it was my job to fix whatever was wrong. I always think that it is my job to make things better. Always my responsibility to smooth things out. The problem with that is that I never heal. I instead, ignore my own pain in my attempt to help the person that hurt me feel less guilty, about hurting me. Yes, I know how that sounds.
In addition to being retired, he had been a first responder during 9/11, so I blamed some of his darker moods on PTSD. Some of his friends had been sick, some had died and while we were here that trend continued. Things grew increasingly worse, and by December, it was as if I was living with a ghost. I confronted him and he said that he felt we were going in different directions. I had no idea what the heck that meant. So I suggested therapy and date nights. Needless to say, nothing I did worked because, well, he had already moved on emotionally. He just neglected to tell me. And in my learned dance to please and make things better, I was focused on solutions and not my reality.
By Feb. 2019, it was clear that there was nothing left to fight for. I couldn’t sleep because I couldn’t stop thinking about how disconnected we had become. It took me falling and fracturing my foot in two places to help me stop and evaluate what I was doing and what I was ignoring. I confronted him, and asked if he wanted to go any further with our relationship, his response was no. It was a kick in the gut. His reason he claimed was based on a conversation we had had early in the relationship. Everything became surreal.
When we first met, we had discussed adopting kids, and at that time, he told me that he didn’t want to. Eventually I acquiesced and decided that having a healthy relationship with him was going to be enough. Well, he used that conversation and my desire as his out. He claimed that he couldn’t live with the knowledge that I had wanted to adopt. He said he felt guilty and that he didn’t want to go further. I had never pressured him and never even brought it up adoption to him after we had conversations about it in NY. In fact, I was training to be a volunteer at one of the hospitals. I had asked to be assigned to the unit with kids, specifically NICU. I had planned that as my way of helping kids.
I was hurt that the relationship was ending, but I was angry that he chose to use a non-issue as the reason. I felt betrayed because it felt as if he took something that meant so much to me as an excuse, to justify his inability to continue in the relationship. He made his inability to commit my fault. And I think that was the part I felt was most hurtful. Still, though I was confused and hurt, I wasn’t ready to give up on Florida. I wasn’t going to quit and run back to NY. I told myself that God wanted me here for a reason. So I bought a place and stayed.
When Scott* finally left in May, I was at peace with his decision though scared of the unknown. I was freelancing, which meantI had no idea from month to month how much I was going to make. But I wasn’t really afraid of how I would survive. You see, every person I had ever dated had let me down. My parents had also taken the easy way out when it came to raising me. To be honest they were both very selfish individuals, so my life has been about surviving. I grew up always having a plan B.
I was drawn to Scott* because he seemed to be the opposite of my parents, but he wasn’t. I had attracted into my life the thing that I wanted least and didn’t recognize it at first because it was what I was so used to. In one short year of moving to Florida, my life was upside down, but it was my mess. He ran away. I am not built to run. Maybe having a hard childhood made me tough. Maybe being a biracial girl in a world that tells you to choose, or that you aren’t enough, or that you will always be underpaid no matter how educated or hard you work, has made me resilient. Or maybe being a woman has taught me that life can be painful and that you have to always work around that pain and get up everyday. All I know for sure was that I had to accept my new reality, so I looked at it as an opportunity to make changes.
Since leaving, he has apologized profusely and told me about his regrets and how he misses me. How he misses all the things that he criticized. He has also told me that he was severely depressed, and that is why he couldn’t maneuver the relationship. Ok. Still doesn’t change my life. Because as much I understand mental health issues and have forgiven him, it does bother me that he blamed the breakup on my desire to adopt. He has damaged my ability to trust. I am working on that, because his reasons aren’t a factor in how I move on. And move on I have.
When we said our last goodbye, I watched his car leave, all I could think was “I am done just surviving.” I am going to live without worrying if I am good enough or if I am enough to have someone pick me and stay even on our worse day. His leaving almost pushed me back into my victim mentality of believing that all men will abandon me like my biological father did. He did so when I was six months old, and it is easy for me to go back there mentally. So, very easy for me to crawl back into that sad space.
But good men don’t leave and the story that I told myself so long ago, that I am not enough, is one that I am rewriting. My missteps from the past cannot continue to define me. The hurt little girl that lives inside me, due to parental neglect and other abuses does not have to rule me. So, here I am. And so a new adventure begins.
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Sounds like me and you were going thru the same thing but kinda different, i'm so sorry you went through this solo like me. When you left to florida i was like, why the hell is she going there now, she's not old, but this blog tells me all, i give you credit for packing up and leaving for sure. Listen yeah we all grew up in different wacky ways but we are from Shaolin and grew up together from going to school, I will always have your back, although some times you think i'm a ........... btw i'm unemployed now due to corona, and helllllllllllll no not coming to florida unless i'm gonna play golf.
Life is unpredictable.