Before we get to the juicy shit, let’s give you my back story.
We went to high school together. We had some common friends who brought us together in our twenties. We started out as fuck friends. We both just came out of serious relationships. We hooked up every week for almost a year. Then we started spending time more frequently outside of the bedroom. We truly enjoyed each other’s company. It didn’t take long before we fell in love and it was fucking awesome. We were best friends and totally in sync. We had so much fun together; going on adventures, laughing and talking for hours. Oh yeah, and the sex was fucking phenomenal.
January 2009. I was so in love and so convinced that he was The One that when we went to Jamaica I proposed to him on the beach the day before his birthday. We were sitting beside each other on the shore, drinking Bahama Mamas while the ocean kissed our feet. I felt compelled to pop the question that very moment. Without hesitation, I turned to him and simply asked, “will you marry me?” I totally caught him off guard. He turned, giggled and asked if I was serious. I said I was. He said “Yes!” and he cried, blaming the wind whipping sand in his eyes. The moment was like a dream, it was perfect. We were so fucking happy.
He surprised me and re-proposed with a ring that same year on my birthday. The experience wasn’t how I imagined. It was awkward. I didn’t feel what I thought I was supposed to when a girl finally gets a ring. I loved him with all my heart, but I’ll never forget the indifference I felt when I put the ring on. It was weird. But the ring was perfect and I couldn’t wait to spend the rest of my life with him.
We were in no rush to get married. I lost my job, went back to school and worked two part time jobs. We worked hard and played hard. We spent all of our time together, hanging out with friends, smoking weed, camping, drinking, going to concerts, etc.
I loved his family. They were genuine, kind, funny, generous and loving. My family loved him so much.
So, most of our friends got married during our five-year engagement. We had great times at these weddings. But as time went on, he was changing, he didn’t seem happy. Something was missing in him. He hated his job. He had trained to be a firefighter and wanted to be one so badly, but the competition was fierce. We thought of ways that could help him reach that goal, but he didn’t want to do any of it.
May 2011. I was about to graduate from college. I was ecstatic because I was finally going to buy my own car and ditch the bus. But we were given the opportunity to purchase his grandmother’s condo for a fantastic price. We jumped on it. I sacrificed my own wheels for a home with my love and I couldn’t be happier. But, at this point his moods were getting worse.
I knew something was wrong while we were in the process of renovating a couple of weeks before moving in. I was so excited for the next chapter of our life together. I put my heart and soul into repainting the 1100 square foot space. He gutted the bathroom and fixed everything up. We worked so hard on it. I fantasized about us being so excited about our first home that we would fuck in the middle of our renovating mess. But that never happened. He didn’t ever really give a shit about it. I would stay up into the wee hours of the morning painting, cleaning and organizing because I couldn’t wait to move in. I remember so vividly, one night, scrubbing the kitchen floors on my hands and knees at 1am – alone – and balling my eyes out the entire time because I knew – I just knew, something was terribly wrong. My gut was screaming at me, that if shit didn’t change, we weren’t going to last.
We threw a housewarming party shortly after moving in. His mom could sense that something was wrong and when she asked what was going on, I just lost my shit and cried. I told her I loved her son with my whole heart and the home we had together, but he wasn’t happy. She told me that she had noticed the change in him. She loved us so much that she offered to pay for him to go back to school and to get us (or him) therapy. She was willing to give us anything and everything to help our relationship, but he said no to each suggestion, without even a second thought.
I only confided with my two besties (J and Miss D) and my big sis (Queen B) about my struggles. I think I didn’t tell many people because it would make the situation too real. I hoped things would get better. Miss D said “you’re losing your sparkle”. I denied it, but she was right. She is always fucking right. I was losing myself in trying to save Us.
After about a year of living together, we were more like “roommates”. We made plans separately, he stopped kissing my forehead before he left for work each morning and we weren’t having sex. We wanted different things. I was feeling cooped up as a domesticated “housewife” to a man who wanted to sit on the couch and smoke weed. I was over it. I wanted to travel, party, socialize. I just wanted to feel freedom or excitement.
We tried having “talks” and things would get better for a short while, but then he’d go back to being miserable. He told me he tried to see life from a positive perspective, but it was too hard. We were in no way house poor, or “just getting by,” but it wasn’t good enough. He made me feel like our situation was not meeting “life’s” expectations. He had this idea ingrained in his head that by the age of thirty, we needed to be in a specific place in life. He grew to be so unhappy. He constantly compared our situation with others; he complained about his job and he wanted more money. He refused to seek out solutions and support. I felt like he was putting all of this internal pressure on himself. It’s like he was disappointed in how his life turned out even though it was pretty awesome and we had so much to be thankful for. All of our friends were getting married, buying nice homes and having babies. I never asked him to pick a wedding date, buy a big house or have a baby. All I wanted was for him to be present with me, to appreciate how hard we worked and to enjoy the life we were building together.
His attitude became the “same shit, different day” kind. I was exhausted fighting for the both of us to be happy together. I ended up unhappy, feeling like I needed to walk on eggshells, always trying to be the positive one and internalizing the pain. My heart was breaking a little every fucking day.
November 2013. After being engaged for almost five years, he turned to me in bed and asked, “are we going to confront the elephant in the room?” I turned, and without any hesitation, answered, “yeah, we’re over”. The weight I had been carrying for almost two years finally lifted off of me. He cried his eyes out, and I layed there, feeling a huge sense of relief. At that very moment I couldn’t cry, but wanted to. I think at that point my body was drained of its tears.
I told mom about it the next day; and broke the news down to each of my homegirls, one by one. They were all shocked and devastated.
We decided to stay “together” over Christmas. He offered me the condo. He said I always loved it more than he did. I thought I couldn’t afford it. I was working two part time jobs and couldn’t hustle it. I should’ve thought more about it, but at that moment, I just wanted out. The facade was a load of shit and Christmas sucked. We still got together with family and bought gifts. What the fuck were we thinking?
I decided to move out February 1, 2014. He said I could store my stuff there until he sold the place. Nearing the end of January, we were both so sad, but I could feel that the love was still there. It’s like we felt sorry for each other or something. We went out for dinner on his birthday, the day before I was moving out. It was lovely and utterly sad. We talked and laughed. But then I made a joke about me moving out the next day and we cried, staring at each other from across the table. He reached for my hand and at that moment, I just wanted to erase the bad shit and go back to how it was.
We came full circle. We got engaged the day before his birthday in 2009 and I moved out the day after his birthday in 2014. I tried giving the ring back, but he refused. He helped me move boxes from our condo to my mom’s. We both balled and held hands as we went back and forth in his work van. It was awful. My bestie J helped me pick up the rest of my shit the next day. She hugged me as I cried.
Now in my thirties, single for the first time in six years and living with mom. Fuck me.
