I am 24F and Itās been six months since my breakup, and I wish I could say that Iāve moved on. In many ways, life has been good to me. Iām doing well at work, things are falling into place, and if you looked at my life from the outside, you probably wouldnāt think there was much to be sad about. But thereās this void in me that nothing seems to fill.
The hardest part is that while Iām still struggling to come to terms with losing him, he seems to have moved on. Heās started going out on dates, and as much as I hate admitting it, it aches to know that. I still find it difficult to even think about seeing someone else, let alone actually date. And yet, heās out there meeting new people, making new memories, and opening himself up to possibilities that I canāt even bring myself to consider right now.
Sometimes, it feels like he got to walk away from the relationship and leave me standing exactly where we broke up, carrying all the grief as if it were mine alone to carry.
What makes it even harder is that the breakup hasnāt just meant losing him. It has meant slowly losing everyone and everything that came with him.
His aunt is my colleague at work. Sheās genuinely one of the sweetest people Iāve met. We even visited her place last year when we were still together. When I joined this organisation, she was always there to support me, encourage me, and have my back. Sheās been so kind to me, and Iāve always appreciated that about her.
Recently, I found out that sheās leaving the organisation, and Iāve been experiencing this strange, bittersweet sadness ever since. Of course, Iām happy for her and whatever comes next in her life, but a part of me is grieving what her leaving represents. Another person connected to him, someone who became a part of my life in her own right, is about to become another person I may no longer have a reason to stay in touch with.
His family, the people I once thought I might continue to know for years to come, are slowly becoming strangers again. And thereās something so heartbreaking about that. These are people I once had a place with, even if that place was through him. Now, I have to accept that they might eventually become nothing more than people I used to know.
I wanted him to meet my dog. I wanted my dog to meet him. It sounds like such a small, silly thing to grieve, but I really wanted that. There were so many little things I imagined sharing with him, ordinary moments that I thought we would eventually get to experience together. And now, theyāre just things that will never happen.
I think thatās what people donāt talk about enough when it comes to breakups. You donāt just grieve the relationship that existed. You grieve all the versions of the future you had quietly built in your head. The conversations you thought youād have, the places you thought youād go together, the people you thought would remain in your life, and the seemingly insignificant moments that suddenly become impossible.
Sometimes, I canāt help thinking that we couldāve had it all. And I donāt mean that I think everything would have been perfect. I know relationships are complicated, and there were reasons he ended up where we did. But I genuinely believed in us. I believed there was so much more left for us to experience, and accepting that our story ended before any of that could happen has been incredibly painful.
Maybe this hurts so much because, deep down, all Iāve ever wanted is to find someone I could love for the rest of my life. Someone I could choose every single day, someone with whom I could let my guard down without being afraid that my vulnerability would eventually become the reason they leave. I never wanted anything extraordinary. I just wanted a love that felt safe, a person I wouldnāt have to keep preparing myself to lose.
But somehow, life has repeatedly given me people who leave after I show them even the slightest bit of vulnerability. Every time I let someone in, every time I allow myself to believe that maybe this person will be different, I end up having to pick up the pieces of myself all over again.
And this time, I genuinely thought it would be different. I thought he was different. For once, I allowed myself to believe that maybe I had finally found the person I had been looking for all along. Someone I could build a life with, someone who would stay, someone I wouldnāt have to grieve someday as just another person who once meant everything to me.
But he left too. And I am so tired.
Tired of grieving people who were once so certain about me. Tired of having to make peace with another absence. Tired of starting over emotionally when all I ever wanted was to find someone I wouldnāt have to start over with.
Yesterday, I met him, and for the first time in my life, I told someone I hated them. I have never said that to anyone before. I also told him that I donāt love him anymore and that Iāve lost all respect for him in my eyes.
I donāt know if I said those things because I genuinely feel them, because I wanted him to understand how much he hurt me, or because Iām desperately trying to convince myself that I no longer feel what I do. Maybe itās a mixture of all three.
What I do know is that there is so much hurt underneath all that anger. And perhaps the most exhausting part is having to carry it while life continues as usual. Going to work, talking to people, laughing at things, making plans, and doing all the things a normal person does, while some part of you is still trying to understand how someone who once meant so much to you can become someone you no longer recognise.
I donāt want to be the person who keeps looking back while he moves forward. I donāt want his dating life to have the power to ruin my day. I donāt want to keep wondering whether he misses me, whether he thinks about what we had, or whether losing me has affected him at all.
But I would be lying if I said I didnāt want him to feel the loss someday.
Not because I want his life to fall apart or because I want him to be miserable. I just want him to experience, at some point in his life, what it feels like to lose someone he once deeply loved. To understand the ache of knowing that a person who was once such an important part of his world is no longer there. To miss someone not because he is lonely, but because that particular person, with everything they brought into his life, is gone.
Maybe thatās a selfish thing to wish for. Maybe itās just the hurt talking. But there is something profoundly unfair about feeling like youāre the only one left holding the weight of something that once belonged to two people.
How many more times do I have to grieve? How many more people do I have to lose, how many more times do I have to open my heart only to have it broken, before I finally find someone who stays?
I know nobody can promise that life will never change or that love will never hurt. But I wish I could experience a love where leaving isnāt always a possibility sitting quietly at the back of my mind. A love where I donāt have to wonder how long someone will stay after seeing the parts of me I donāt show everyone. A love where being vulnerable doesnāt feel like Iām handing someone the very thing they could use to break me.
I hope that one day, Iāll look back at all of this and realise that I no longer need him to understand my pain for it to finally stop being mine to carry. I hope I find someone who makes me feel that I donāt have to keep bracing myself for the day he leaves. Someone who doesnāt make me regret letting him see the most vulnerable parts of me.
And I hope that, until then, I donāt lose the part of myself that still believes in a love that lasts.
Because after everything, all I ever wanted was to love someone for a lifetime and be loved with that same certainty in return ā¤ļøā¤ļøā¤ļø
