When The Only Option Is Moving On

I did everything I could for you. For our whole relationship, I tried my best.

I made myself into the best person I could be because I wanted you to feel as lucky to have me as I felt about having you.

I worked hard in school, I worked so hard at music, I took care of my body, and I took care of our relationship. I always took pride in you, and it made me take pride in myself as well. I liked having someone to motivate me, someone to make proud, and I always exceeded expectations because I always wanted to impress you. And I thought I always did, but in hindsight, I guess it was never enough.

I feel like an idiot, looking back now, how I told everyone how proud I was to be yours. How I believed you when you said I was always enough. I still remember the last time I saw you, when you wanted me to lie down next to you in bed but I said I wanted to shower first because I was gross from the long day I had. You looked at me and said, “Come on, you know I’ll love you no matter what”. And I believed you.

How before the old version of you went away, I was on the phone telling my best friend how amazing our relationship was and how I didn’t understand why other couples fought. How embarrassing do you think it was for me to call her only a week later, crying, to tell her you left me without an explanation?

And when you broke my heart, even though you did it in the worst damn way, I still wanted to fight for you and I did. I tried to give you space, which was the hardest thing for me to do in all of my emotional turmoil. I wouldn’t talk to you for a week, and then I’d ask if you changed your mind, if you missed me. I was following the advice of countless “get your ex back” websites that I would scroll through in the middle of the night, teary-eyed, and hoping for anything, anything that could bring you back. Any foolproof tactic, any trick that worked and made exes regret their decisions. I would get so angry when I’d read a blog post saying, “If a guy leaves you out of the blue, he isn’t worth it”. Because I didn’t understand, and I didn’t want to give up. Eventually I reached out to you and begged, like an idiot. I told you I’d never connected with someone so well in my life, I listed all the reasons our relationship was right, I told you how everyone thought we were a match made in heaven. But you wouldn’t listen.

At that point, I realized asking you to come back wasn’t going to work, so I switched to trying to make you come back. I told you after a month that I was over it, that we could just be friends. It was your suggestion in the first place.

I thought if we were friends, you would remember why you loved me.

But I saw how much you suddenly didn’t care anymore. You never reached out to me to talk, and when we did talk, I was always the one driving the conversation.

I asked all of the questions, and you had no interest in my life anymore. And I asked you if you even wanted to be friends, hoping it would stir something in you, to make you realize if you didn’t take me now, I would be gone forever. Your answer absolutely broke my heart, as if it could be broken anymore. No, you’d said. I just don’t want to be on bad terms.

And I finally realized no matter how hard I tried, whether I waited, or pretended to be friends with you, no matter how much I was there for you,

I realized I can’t make you feel the way you used to about me.

I am very angry, because there are definitely ways you could have handled this situation better. Perhaps if you’d given me some warning, I wouldn’t have been scrambling for so long to try to salvage what I thought was true love.

But you broke my heart, in the worst way, and I can’t hold on anymore. As much as I loved you, I need to love myself more, because I can’t let someone who doesn’t care drag my heart around anymore. You have given me no choice but to move on, and even though it hurts so badly, it is liberating.

It will be a long recovery, because it was such an intense relationship for me, but I know I will make it. I already feel the weight lifting, of not having to try to make you love me anymore. Because that choice was yours, and you chose not to love me anymore. And you made my decision for me, too, in the end, because the only option you left me was to move on. So I will.