This is a story of giving up.

I fell in love with a person who never really existed. Micah showed me a version of himself that felt like he was my soul mate, my person, the love that I’ve always been looking for. But that wasn’t real. I haven’t been able to accept it until now. I haven’t been able to let it go, because I desperately hoped on some level that I could get back to the person to whom I gave my heart. As Taylor Swift sings, “When the toxins take their hold, you’d rather die than let it go.” I couldn’t face the truth that this love was poison. 

I’m in mourning for losing Micah, but even more so for losing the person I thought he was. It’s mourning for losing the hope I once had for a love that’s big and beautiful and eternal. It’s mourning for losing a part of myself that will never be whole again. 

One of my first posts about Micah was called “This is a story about finally feeling safe.” In the first few weeks of our relationship, I felt so incredibly safe. I believed with all of my heart and soul that this person would hold me in a way that nobody else ever would or could. I let down walls that I didn’t even know I had, and revealed layers of myself that were previously hidden from even my own consciousness. I trusted him in a way I have never trusted another. And that’s why even though these wounds may heal, I fear that the damage that has been done has irreparably changed the structure of my heart and the way I’m able to love. 

Before Micah, I had finally found the strength to set strong boundaries in my abusive marriage, which included moving out and living much more independently. I was able to start to assess the damage from those years with Romeo, and to see where my triggers were. I discovered that I have CPTSD from the emotional abuse in my marriage combined with extensive childhood trauma. I started learning who I was as an individual, and the more I learned the more I was able to finally start loving myself and seeing my own value. 

Then came Truly. Looking back, I think he was a test from the universe of how strong I could be in the face of a new threat to my budding sense of security within myself. He came in a flurry of color that lit my heart on fire and sent me hurtling into love-bombed bliss. When emotionally harmful behaviors started to sneak in oh so subtly, I found myself back in the cycle of highest highs followed by lowest lows. I found myself anxious about what was coming next. I found myself once again in a relationship that was hurting me. 

I believe that I passed that test. I held onto my love for him for as long as I could without sacrificing myself. When the time came, I let go. And I vowed to never stay in a relationship with a partner who makes me cry with the regularity and intensity that I’ve come to know so well.  

That’s when I met Micah. I used to believe that he was my reward for passing the test of Truly, for enduring so many years of heartbreak and pain. I thought that he was the reason that made it all worth it. I never guessed that he was actually the person destined to deliver the final destructive wounds that my heart could withstand before losing some of its vital functions.

My ability to trust feels beyond repair. I now know from experience that you CANNOT know who a person really is until you’ve been with them for some time– I would hypothesize that about six months to a year would do it. You CANNOT truly know them until you’ve spent considerable time together in a multitude of contexts, including stressful circumstances, conflicts, emotionally triggering events, and the mundanity of everyday life. 

It doesn’t matter if they say all of the right words, and you truly believe them in the depths of your heart. It doesn’t matter if you have the best chemistry with them that you’ve ever experienced. It doesn’t matter if you make each other so goddamn happy that it becomes unimaginable that it could ever be different. It doesn’t matter if you see your very soul reflected in their eyes. It doesn’t even matter if everything feels absolutely perfect and makes the most sense anything has ever made. Because those things aren’t real until they are tested over time. 

People lie without knowing that they’re lying. They portray versions of themselves that are incomplete, missing details that may change the connection entirely. I believe that they often don’t know that they’re doing it at all. But the reality is that the full picture of who a person is can absolutely destroy even the most beautiful and magical of love affairs, once revealed.  

I don’t believe that Micah is a bad person. I believe that like me, he is a damaged person who wants and deserves to be loved. I believe that unlike me, he wasn’t designed for polyamory, even in a mono-poly context (one monogamous partner and one polyamorous). I have struggled and ultimately failed to find a way for us to communicate that doesn’t hurt one or both of us. Despite my best efforts, I have not been able to establish and maintain boundaries to protect myself from frequent and severe emotional harm in this relationship. I have tried putting up walls, and even adapting myself to have walls that can go up and down as needed. But in the end, I’ve found that he will always find a way to hurt me regardless of how I try to protect myself, and he’ll do it while making it seem like it’s my fault. 

(Oh, and if I try to defend myself, he’ll deflect and claim that he doesn’t want it to be about blame, and then waddayaknow, I’m the problem once again for turning it into an argument. See the paradox?) 

Emotional abuse isn’t always the way it looks in the media. It isn’t always loud or obvious or even scary. During conflicts, an abusive partner may keep their voice calm, avoid disrespectful language, say comforting things, or be physically affectionate. That doesn’t mean that they aren’t also using emotional manipulation to try to hurt and control you. 

Sometimes emotional abuse is quiet, subtle, or confusing. Sometimes it makes you question what’s actually happening and whether you are somehow doing something wrong, even though you’re doing nothing but giving grace and unconditional love to your partner. Sometimes emotional abuse looks like your partner’s words not matching their actions, and their declarations losing all meaning for rarely being kept. From the outside, a relationship may look sweet and loving, but the psychological workings underneath can be anything but.  

For weeks now, I’ve been frequently afraid of what Micah will say next to hurt me emotionally. I know that this isn’t healthy. It doesn’t matter if some part of me feels like it’s my fault because he tells me that I’m doing things wrong. All that matters is that he’s hurting me, he knows it, and he isn’t doing anything to stop it. He can’t even acknowledge it because he’s too focused on his conviction that I’m actually the one hurting him. 

I know that he is hurting, that much is clear. He’s hurting for any number of reasons, some relating to our relationship and some not– but the thing is, I’m not doing the hurting. He’s feeling hurt by things that I’m doing that aren’t actually, well… hurtful. And instead of sharing his actual feelings with me, he’s been making accusations and delivering criticism disguised as feelings. There often hasn’t been any way for me to respond that he won’t turn against me. 

“I feel like you’re (doing or not doing x, y, and z)” is an accusation and/or a criticism. There isn’t even a feeling in that sentence. And there is a fine line between validating feelings and validating illegitimate accusations. I’ve offered sympathy for the negative feelings he’s experienced, but it doesn’t lead anywhere. The problem is still there; he’s still upset and there’s nothing I can do about it because I’m not actually doing anything wrong.

I’ve tried simply apologizing, but found that it doesn’t help either and honestly sometimes feels disingenuous. I can’t truly apologize for something when I didn’t do anything wrong, because a true apology includes an intent to repair– and I can’t fix something that isn’t broken. 

Being put through this cycle over and over again is emotionally exhausting. He didn’t often explicitly ask me to change anything, but he continuously criticized me and accused me of being hurtful. Over time, this wore me down and caused me to change my perfectly reasonable behavior out of fear of upsetting him. But even trying to accommodate him, nothing I did or said was enough in the end. I have finally realized that there is nothing I can do to make this relationship work. 

Giving up is something I hate to do. I especially hate giving up on people. Giving up on someone I love? That feels impossible. I love Micah unconditionally, and I will safely lock away that tiny remnant of hope that he can someday treat me better. I’ll keep it with me just in case, always. 

But there is also something somehow freeing in the acceptance that this is over. I’ve been living in fear of the pain I knew he was capable of causing me. I’ve been putting so much of myself into trying to be a good partner for him, even though I never could meet his expectations. I know now that it was a losing race from the start. I can finally stop running and rest. What’s lost is lost. Perhaps in the future, it can be found again. After all, stranger things have happened. 

The more I live and love, the more I realize that we know absolutely nothing about the future. We can have our dreams and make our plans, but ultimately there will always be things that we never see coming and couldn’t plan for. 

When Romeo and I ended our relationship a couple of months ago, I thought that it was the end forever. I had accepted that he wouldn’t change, and I had decided that I wouldn’t let him change me. That was that, and I let it go knowing that I did everything I could for as long as I could. But life has a funny way of making me eat my words, and I should know by now that it’s wise to never say never. I don’t know what my relationship with Romeo will look like in the future, but I know that right now, we are spending time together again in a romantic capacity and I am feeling healthy and happy in our relationship. 

Ironically, although Micah found my reunion with Romeo to be not apprehensible, it now serves as a reminder to me that unexpected things can and will happen in life. If Micah is meant for me and I for him, then this is only the end for now. And if we aren’t for each other, then time will tell that too. 

In either case, I know that he isn’t safe for me right now, which means I have lost him. My heart is broken, crushed, shattered, and turned to ash. I’ve been holding back the avalanche of pain that I know is waiting for me to acknowledge it, and writing this blog post has been a great way to keep it at bay. But I can only ramble on for so long… and it’s time to face it.