When I met you, I was shocked that someone as pitiful as Nick would ever leave you. You were beautiful. Waaaay out of his league. I thought he must have been some kind of stupid. You were brilliant, confident, had an impressive backstory, a real deviant, like me. I couldn’t believe you weren’t taken already. It felt like I had walked upon a massive jewel, sitting in plain sight. What luck! 

You were sexy, and fun, and totally in to me. Slender, with an incredible body, big beautiful glowing green eyes, long jet black hair, you were literally everything I would have have chosen had I been building the perfect woman from scratch. It seemed unreal. 

As we talked and got to know each other more, I was totally overwhelmed by you. You allowed me to talk freely about my past traumas and could relate, having been through a similar situation. We conversed with ease, and in short order, you seemed like someone I’d known my whole life. I legitimately thought, I finally found the woman I had dreamt of since I was 10 years old. I was totally enthralled. 

We spent the entire second date looking into each others eyes for long periods of time in between intense kissing for nearly 5 hours, you were giddy like a school girl. It seemed too good to be true, even the sex was unreal. I felt as though I was either still sleeping and would wake up any second, angrily, dirty and disheveled, alone, in the clothes I wore yesterday, OR I had just won the f**king lottery, twice in the same day. 

When I woke up, and saw your shirt on the floor, I knew it was actually happening… life was about to fall right into place. It’s like we were made for each other. I forgot everything that had bothered me. We both started down a path of healing from our pasts and formed what I thought would be a lifetime bond. I even said, “I WILL marry you some day. I can feel it.” As soon as I spoke, you looked deep into my eyes and the corner of your lips made a slight smile, and you melted into my arms. I felt liberated from pain. Hopeful and optimistic, for the first time in a number of years. It was such a powerfully warm and pleasant feeling. 

Then abruptly after barely a month, the first crack appeared in the facade that soon began eroding at an ever increasing pace. All the feelings began to recede. I saw that person in you still, but she became like a hologram projected over someone else… Someone I couldn’t quite make out yet. Then you were just as I first met you again. I had to ask myself, am I tripping? Hmm… I made some mental notes, and mostly dismissed it. As the weeks and months wore on, you became more and more possessive and controlling, and I kept finding myself in a state of extreme stress. I had a sudden realization, that something was totally off here. I couldn’t put my finger on it right away, but slowly, the hologram faded more and more, allowing me to see what was really going on, who was the person behind there. 

You became irrationally insecure, and spiteful sometimes. Passive aggressive, defensive, quick to assume, and entitled to violate my privacy, and even lied to me multiple times. This pattern became worse and worse and that confident, radiant, equal, gave way to a scared, insecure, vulnerable, and even somewhat manipulative person. A year in, and you were unrecognizable to the person I met the previous January. 

You had altered your life path dramatically, and I was forced to adapt and accept this, or you guilted me. Once you rebooted your old job, you really did become someone else. A completely, self-centered, manipulative person, and I felt ignored. You pushed your idea of your sexuality on me, and made a plan with me to move forward, together, yet I was immediately sidelined in favor of your new identity. Every thing we did became centered around this. I was desperately trying to find that person, the hologram I had spent all those magical days with… and I began to realize that she wasn’t real. 

Even under intense stress, and continuous, low dose, emotional abusive, episodes where arguments flared and emotions ran high, I still felt that maybe I was just being to harsh, too impatient, and not empathetic to you enough. Then amidst this, you violated my trust for the first time. Lied blatantly to my face for 8 days, before meekly admitting what I already knew to be the truth. You tried to justify it, before what seemed like a complete and genuine apology. Things calmed down, you seemed to be returning to normal, and I was dismissed all this a second time as just ironing out the kinks in our relationship. Yet I could no longer speak freely. I could not talk about my traumas and if I even mentioned them, or how this was starting to feel similar, you became intensely hostile and passive aggressive. I felt like I was going insane. I felt like I was constantly worried I would offend you and you would go through this whole episode of angrily accusing me of something, then apologizing and as soon as I would calm down, bam. It began again. I started to feel at this point, like this was a losing battle. You were no longer the person I had fallen in love with and any vision I had of the future with you had long evaporated. Then you became even more controlling, and needy, and ever so slightly more manipulative. You refused to hear what I was saying and instead acted on raw emotion and it was coming to a point where I knew, it was no longer possible to continue. 

I brought it all up and laid it out. Told you why I could no longer continue, and you refused to accept it. You cried and acted like I was just using you, and guilted me. This pattern became recurring, getting more and more toxic as time past. No, it wasn’t all bad, but the length of time between those good times, was getting longer and longer. 

So much drama, fights, hypocrisy, lack of understanding, guilting me, and still refusing to actually hear what I was saying. Then as soon as I felt like making an exit, you would suddenly be in financial stress, and guilt me even more by saying you needed me and I was just leaving you like this. Keeping me an emotional prisoner, yet failing to realize that in doing so, you were eroding everything you liked about our relationship. 

This got worse and worse, until I finally snapped. You had violated my trust, AGAIN, downplayed it, justified it, ignored my feelings, and continued that for quite some time. By then, I was all but completely checked out, but felt like somehow it was my fault, and even though I loved you, I had forgotten why. I felt as though I was being blackmailed into staying with you. You finally agreed to seek treatment for what I thought was vulnerable NPD or some combination of trauma related, ptsd-like, disorders. It’s all blending to together time wise for me now, seems like a lifetime ago. Throughout all this, you maintained that you loved me, and would treat me just well enough that I would stay. While simultaneously creating situations and doing things that would keep me on my toes and chained emotionally. THIS IS WHAT EMOTIONAL ABUSE IS. 

Then, even after all this, I still loved you, and would listen to what you had to say, and forgive you. 
After I started to not even be able to recognize myself, and fighting with you about something for the 239248th time, I asked for a brief break to collect myself and relax. To which you ramped up your shit until I lost it. After two weeks away, and some serious soul searching, I (idiotically) began to miss you, and when we reconvened, I actually was hopeful for the first time in a long time. You affirmed your trust in me and agreed to continue to seek professional treatment, and I believed you. You promised to resolve things in a more healthy way. I laid out a my boundary and said “if you do this again, no questions asked, I’m out.” You agreed and understood. 

3.5 weeks later, the day I saw a glimpse of the hologram, and felt amazing for the first time in a many months, you had 2 min alone with my phone and did the one thing I asked you not to do. Then flipped out on something randomly and became enraged and vindictive as soon as I ended it. Then you said every hurtful thing you could think of, and publicly tried to play the victim and finally ghosting me and refusing to return my belongings. All I have to say now, is after intense thought and some help from my therapist, I am aware that you are a deeply disturbed and insecure person. Who happens to be exceptionally gifted in the art of seduction and control. You exploited every thing I told you and used my past against me to manipulate and control me. You constantly altered my reality by gaslighting and manipulating events to seem like you were somehow a victim. In retrospect, I don’t really remember what I like about you. I’ve forgotten the way I felt about you entirely. I feel broken, and more twisted up than ever before. I knew it was too good to be true. I tried so hard to maintain and you chipped away at me constantly then was always surprised I was breaking… It is a sad, tragic, and toxic life to live. In retrospect, I learned so much about people in that relationship. I am broken, but I am not gone. I will overcome, and have the skills to avoid people like you in the future. I don’t hate you, but I hate what you did, and I don’t like who you became. I don’t appreciate the way you treated me and I will have a really hard time ever trusting anyone. I believed you. I really loved you, even in spite of all the BS. I am tremendously disappointed in you and will likely not be forgiving you any time soon. 

I know you know what I’m talking about. You have been aware of it for a long time. But the difference this time, Is I KNOW too. I will not allow you to regain access to my heart. In some other life, it would have been amazing, but in this one, you destroyed my hope for the near future, took potentially years off of my life, and made me doubt myself and who I am. 

I know you’re really just extremely damaged yourself, and lack the support and skills needed to make a recovery form this. I know you could, if you really wanted too, but I can no longer take part in that process.

I wish you all the best in life. You’ll be better off without me. I know it. 

Goodbye, J. Even though you destroyed the hope you instilled in me, I know that hope is possible and somewhere out there, is the real hologram. I just need to break free to find her. 

xo
– Mr. D