The very first boyfriend I ever had cheated on me for the entire two years we were together. He was 19 years old and I was 17—very naïve, very gullible, and very much in love. Although, looking back at it now, I think what I felt for this guy was something more like infatuation, not love. I thought he was beautiful: a thin brown skin young man with long, full, captivating dreadlocks that accentuated the oval shape of his face. He walked proudly and with so much confidence that it clouded my logic, common sense, and judgment. And although I knew he wasn’t treating me right the entire time we were together, I felt that in the small and few moments he was sweet to me made up for all the times he wasn’t. Generally, he was selfish, manipulative and self-centered. At the time, I didn’t realize it because I couldn’t believe that someone as beautiful as him would ever fall for a simple girl like me.
There were times I’d spend days just waiting for him to call me and when he finally did, he’d make me feel silly for being upset about his uncommunicative nature. He would often call me just so that I could give him a ride somewhere (I had a car; he didn’t) and then I wouldn’t hear from him again for days. I remember the two Valentine’s Days he had disappeared while I waited for him to (hopefully) surprise me by showing up at my house. Both times, knowing he was not home, I delivered his gifts to him at his house. I never received a gift from him, no explanation nor an apology. I was so miserable in that relationship that I knew I had to leave him for my own sake. But there was something about him that desperately held me to him and the thought of breaking up with him was just something I could not bear. It was strange. I didn’t want to break up with him but I knew I had to.
I recall the day I told him that perhaps we should take a break from each other. This was his reply: “Ok. But once I walk out the door, you know you’ll never see me again. Are you sure that’s what you want?” My heart pounded, desperately afraid of the finality of my relationship with him. So I told him no. In doing so, I allowed his bad behavior towards me to continue.
The day I broke up with him the first time was an empowering day for me because I had finally stood up for myself. At first I was fine! I felt liberated and confident and proud that I finally did this thing for myself. Then he started to call me again and asked me to take him back. Maybe he’s changed, I thought to myself. He wouldn’t keep begging me if he really didn’t truly love me. It took about a week’s worth of pleading before I took him back with high hopes. My only demand was for him to spend more time with me and to treat me like I was really his girlfriend and not a buddy who drove him places. He spent the next two weeks being an exemplary boyfriend. However, I soon started to feel taken advantage of once again. So after a couple of months, I broke up with him for the second and final time. I didn’t do it out of anger- it was a decision that I prayed on. Again, I didn’t want to lose him but I came to the realization that he was toxic. I knew he was no good for me. While I understood what I did for myself was brave, necessary and commendable, I still suffered greatly from the loss of a relationship with a person who I truly felt I loved very much.
The suffering came as a result of my finding out about his girlfriend, a girl who he had once introduced me to as his sister. My whole world shattered around me. I couldn’t eat, sleep or focus on anything else but the deception that caused the inside of my chest to hurt. I didn’t think I would ever recover from the pain that his lies had caused. The next few weeks, I went over and over in my head- and in detail with my friends- all that had occurred between us, making the connections and putting together what did not make sense to me before. I suddenly understood why he consistently disappeared for days at a time- he was busy!
Yes, the experience did cause some unhealthy decisions regarding men and relationships. Yes, for a long time I did allow it to define me as a woman and define who I’d be in a relationship. That’s why I was flabbergasted when I found myself, over thirty years later, in another long-term serious relationship with a different man who I somehow allowed to—among other things—smother me with manipulations, exhibit micro aggressions against me, and reprimand me like a child for mistakes he could have easily made himself. I didn’t understand how I had permitted these things to happen despite all the inner work I had done over the years to help myself become an emotionally stronger person who uses her voice. Once again, I had to gather the courage to leave a toxic relationship that could have silenced me forever.
Despite both relationships, I choose not to beat myself up over the choices I made to be in them. One can say that we all learn from our mistakes in order not to repeat them. It seems to me that perhaps I didn’t learn what I needed to learn about myself the first time around, which is why I was forced into experiencing something like it again.
The first time it happened, I learned that I actually can survive after being in a relationship that made me feel unworthy of anything better. But this time around, my lesson was much more empowering. I had to learn to use my voice. To tell my significant other what bothers me in the relationship without fear of his negative reaction and the consequences thereafter. It forced me to reflect on so many situations where I silenced my own voice in failing to express my dissatisfaction with some aspect of the relationship or his behavior. It showed me how I was passive and in retrospect I learned how I can verbally empower myself in the future. By no means is it an easy lesson to learn. But I am here for it. I’ve taken my notes and I review them quite often, with the intention of committing them to memory. The next time I find myself being put to the test in a serious relationship, I will review my notes, apply them accordingly, and hopefully, finally pass.