I Hate You, I Miss You
Love and the rollercoaster of emotions in healing a broken heart.
I hate you. I’m angry. I miss you.
I hate you. I hate you for leaving me, for squashing us. Ours was a good thing; a beautiful thing of mutual respect and adoration, friendship, chemistry, passion, and deep connection. And you walked away, wounding in tow, escaping your pain once again, leaving me another casualty of your limited capacity for love. No, I don’t want you. I want more. I want someone who sticks around when they say they love me. I want someone for whom my life, as messy as it can be sometimes with two kids and an ex-husband, isn’t too much. I want someone who holds me tighter as my life gets messier; not someone who lets me go. I want someone who doesn’t retreat to dark places without telling me and then one random day walks out leaving me blind-sighted; questioning all that ever was or maybe wasn’t at all.
I’m angry. I need someone who sticks around when life gets tough because it does. I need someone who chooses love. Love isn’t butterflies. Love isn’t born out of the magical easy days; that’s romantic love and it is always temporary. Real love is born out of tough times. Real love isn’t a feeling but rather a choice; it is something you do, despite circumstances, again and again. You left me during one of the toughest times in my life since my divorce, and in the midst of a pandemic no less; that is not love. Love is staying the course for the duration of the ride on the rollercoaster that is life. Love is a commitment to the relationship. Love is a commitment to us. You failed us.
I miss you. I miss you every day, or maybe I just miss the illusion of you, I don’t know anymore. I wake up each morning with you on my mind, as I did before. And just when I think I’m over you, I see you in my dreams again; I’m lying in your lap and we’re laughing and philosophizing about life. And then I wake up and I miss you all over again, thrust backward in my journey of healing. I still have one of your shirts and sometimes I admittedly bury my face in it and for a fleeting moment, I feel close to you again.
And then I curse you.
I’m angry. I love you. I hate you. I miss you.
I thrive without you.
