20-forty.comBecause love isn’t always 20/20!
Reheating Old Soup
This is the confusion in my brain vomiting onto paper with the help of my trusty pen….
Sometimes the hardest part is letting go. But what happens when you can’t and what to you do when they won’t? What do you do if you know you should let go but don’t want to?
Can things ever really change? Can you ever fully forgive someone when they’ve hurt you so much? Can you start over as if it is a completely new relationship and somehow manage to not repeat past mistakes? Can you trust yourself not to drudge up the past when you are mad or hurt?
If you can’t make it work, then how do you get over him and attempt to move on -again? How do you make it work with someone else when he is constantly on your mind? How do you not compare everyone else to him -the good stuff and the bad?
What about his family? What if you are completely in love with them too? What if you wish you could see them everyday and hug them and tell them that you love them?
Why does love have to be such a double edged sword? Why can’t you just shut emotion off and have no cares or worries? Why couldn’t it have just gone like it was supposed to, like you always knew it would?
Whoever said it was better to have loved and lost than never love at all was wrong. If I had never met him, never loved him, my heart wouldn’t hurt in this way?
Brad K. September 17th, 2008, 9:20 am
Kira, we *have* to acknowledge our desires. We *shouldn’t* expect to achieve each and every one, or even most of them. Desires for revenge, for ‘teaching a lesson’ to another, for showing how much we can hurt another - desires for large quantities of chocolate and ice cream every day - there are many desires that we experience that we cannot allow ourselves to express or pursue. But we have to acknowledge that we have these desires.
When you are torn about missing him, about missing his family, when you realize that his history shows he isn’t good for you, that tells me that you were bonding, were becoming mates, in the life-mate sense. This kind of partnership and togetherness requires closeness, empathy, and intermingling of interests, values, and perspectives.
Right now you are grieving the loss of a loved one. Someone important in your life is no longer there - your body had adapted to him, from the time you shared breaths and touched hands. Your mind had begun adapting to his likes and dislikes, his plans, his dreams, and you had conjured shared plans and dreams in response. Your heart still clings to him, and his associations and family, as part of *your* family. ‘Getting over’ this will go through all the steps of grieving - the hurt, the denial, the anger at him for not being there, later the acceptance that he is gone (from this role in your life), and healing will come, in time.
You may find “Return To Me” with Minnie Driver and David Duchovny to help, a little, with how you deal with loss and moving on. The movie is a bit cheesy, and more fun than drama. But a nice story, and Duchovny makes a good point, late in the movie, about dealing with the loss of his first wife.
As for trying again with him, that is tough. If you can decide that the way he hurt you is less important, to you, than losing him would be, then you also have to be ready to make a decision. You have to decide that you love him, and forgive the hurt. You let it go, you accept him, and the likelihood that he will do it again. Sort of along the lines of “Hate the sin, and not the sinner,” forgiveness must be just that - let go of any anger or disappointment or suspicion, or even feeling defensive lest the hurt happen again. Forgiveness is one of the great acts of love.
Unless your capacity for love and for hurt is infinite, though, you have to be responsible to yourself and others. You can only forgive when his is *contrite*. When he acknowledges his wrong, when he expresses regret for the wrong, and also for the hurt it caused, and also when he acts to never repeat that wrong, then forgiveness is the right, loving response. But if he isn’t clear about what he did, what the consequences are, if he doesn’t own up to being responsible - if he expects to go on as he has before - then being gracious and forgiving *will create a monster*. Being strong, requiring contrition before you forgive, is an even greater act of love.
Talk with someone about grief, and about loss.
Blessed be.
Honey September 17th, 2008, 11:09 am
I think that if someone hurts you in a particular way, then even if you forgive them they will not change–that is, they will hurt you again and again in the same way. People change for the next person they are with, *sometimes*, but habit and the dynamic that you’ve established are powerful things and they will rarely be able to change for you. So, like Brad K says, you have to decide if you can deal with whatever behavior for the rest of your life.
Eventually you get over the loss of a relationship where you were fully invested and made plans…but it takes a LONG time, and it’s tough (if not impossible) to give dating anyone else any sort of real go until that happens. Not fair, to ANYONE, to date until you’re healthy again.
Best, Honey
Honeys last blog post..Working out a Sex Schedule?
craze September 17th, 2008, 12:56 pm
Sometimes it’s just a long, slow, painful process. There really isn’t a way to shut off emotions or stop thinking about him. Each day try to do something for yourself, being kind to yourself truly does help. I don’t think it’s wise to date when you’re still hung up on someone. You have to be able to give a new person ALL of you. I’ve been where you are. There is a really good Randy Travis song, Out of My Bones, that explains how you feel perfectly. Look up the words.
crazes last blog post..New life
Sinfullyanon September 18th, 2008, 2:16 pm
That’s just it, Kira. If you “never had loved,”
you wouldn’t know the possibilities…In a sense, it’s
never really a loss, (in it’s fullest sense) but, something
to move on, or move into, with a deeper & richer understanding.
If the “letting go,” is necessary, the lessons of it
are just as important.
Smile, and hold on to the positives.
~x~SinfullyAnon.