An Epistle of Hate and Hurt

Dear Sir,

We both know the sacrifices I had to take in order for me to fly to meet you, to be with you, to love you, and to further our relationship. I had to face all my failures as a wife, mother, daughter, and woman. I was fractured. It was a massive leap of faith and an exercise in pure trust. The largest I had ever undertaken in my life. You were worth it. We were worth it. Love was worth it.

I will never forget the day you made me realize, in all its painful glory, how replaceable I was. How does a person tear down another so thoroughly – especially one they professed to love and cherish and want to be with for the rest of their life? You not only did that to me, but you did it so completely I became self-destructive for years. I was swept under the rug on which you thoroughly stomped and wiped your feet.

You threw it all back into my face. You were not the man I knew. You were not my Sir. You were mean and final. There was no love or warmth in your voice the last time we spoke, at least in my mind. You were telling me you had moved on. You were no longer willing or wanting to wait. You blind sided me. Your beautiful voice was acid to my ears. My world stopped. My heart froze. I felt dead.

Then I heard her. She was there! What kind of cold-hearted snake calls to dump someone with their newest fling in the room? (And Lord knows you’ve had more than your fair share.) You couldn’t even give me the courtesy of disposing of me in private like a man. You turned it into a twisted ménage à trois. You wanted or needed an audience for your grand finale. Bravo.

You informed me that you told her she had “won.” I was aghast. I didn’t even know I was in a competition. Love wasn’t a sick game to me. You two were disgusting. You were no prize. How conceited was your thinking? You were a wolf who finally took off your sheep’s clothing.

After hearing her venomous voice, I don’t recall anything that was said before or after. We discussed recently that you believe I just quietly hung up the phone without saying goodbye. I would have done that. I wouldn’t have wanted you to hear me cry or react. I would have tried to leave with my pride intact. It didn’t work. My fractures instantly shattered.

Immediately after that phone call, I began to doubt myself. What was so inherently flawed about me that made you toss me aside for some women you claimed held no attraction? It couldn’t just be about sex, could it? How shallow. How carnal. How sick and wrong. How soon after me did you fall into her to find solace in your so-called misery? You even made certain to tell me how much I had cost you on a monetary level. What a gentleman to compare me to a high-priced call girl. I was akin to a whore. I hope you earned every penny. What a horrible stain on something I thought was so beautiful. Where did it all go wrong? I was duped by a deviant. Well played Sir.

That was it. Our time was over. Camelot defiled. The end. There was nothing left to say. I became a shadow of my former self. For years I disassociated you. I was afraid to feel. I blocked out nearly everything about you especially your golden eyes. (How humbling it was to have to ask you their color years later.) What was once so special and pure became an acrid stench that I couldn’t rid myself of no matter how many times I tried to eliminate it from my senses and memory.

I loved you. No, I hated you. I wanted you. I missed you. I despised you. I didn’t trust myself. I believed you both were mocking me and laughing at my expense. You allowed her to be part of my humiliation and pain in that fateful day with that lethal phone call. I was your sacrificial lamb and you handed her the sharpened knife. I saluted your fortitude. I was another notch on your infamous bedpost. A number. A body. No one worth investing in. I didn’t know you. Did I ever? I was torn in two. One minute I wished you would be hurt as badly as you hurt me, then the next minute I wept knowing I didn’t really mean it.

Over the years I trained myself to stop thinking about you. I had to stop binging then purging myself with memories of you – of us. You weren’t worth my tears. I had no idea what became of you. I wanted to pay you back every red cent you had wasted on me. I didn’t even search for you. I didn’t dare. I was not a martyr to fall prey to your cruelness again. Once was quite enough. I became safely ensconced and numb in a self preservation mode.

I wondered after your parents for the longest time. It was torture not knowing when your father passed. I assumed it was not long after I met him only to find out he lived another few years! He was a delight to me. Not knowing hurt. You took that from me. Then to find out that the woman of your black heart couldn’t be bothered with him and would callously wish he would die. Damn her. I will never forget him telling you how beautiful he thought I was and to never let me go. My laughter is quite hollow I assure you. I am also so incredibly saddened to hear that your mother has recently passed. Damn you.

They say there is a fine line between pleasure and pain. They were right – whoever they were. And I hated them too.

I was broken, and you were the bastard who was the crux of it all. It took years for me to rebuild my self worth. Fuck you, Sir. Fuck you. And fuck her too.

Devastatingly,

Darling

……………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Darling

I am sorry.

S

©2013 Darling and Sir

Advertisement

Shattered

Dear Sir,

When I first met you, I was not in a good place.  My safety net had torn. I didn’t know who I was any more. I was hurting and struggling in every aspect of my life.

I was grieving very deeply over the loss of a close family member. My head and heart were still dealing with that as well as some atrocities that happened to another innocent person in my life. What was once strong was crumbling and tumbling down around my head.  I was barely hanging on.  The only time I felt unburdened was when I could escape to chat and forget for a short time. I’ll admit it wasn’t the healthiest way to cope, but it was a brief reprieve before returning to my painful reality.

I found you. I began to trust you, and little by little I shared my life with you. Granted I shared it in bits and pieces as to not overwhelm you. I suppose I was testing you in a way; consequently, I wanted to know what you could handle. I was waiting for you to run the other way. You never did though. You stood strong.

I confided in you some very raw parts of me about my past and my present. Neither of them painted a pretty picture. At the risk of sounding macabre, most people couldn’t imagine my trials much less go through them. I didn’t act or consider myself a victim even though I felt so alone. I had family, yes, but at that time they were part of the problem. I didn’t generally confide in people, but I found such an empathetic, listening ear in you – a partner. My cup runneth over and you willingly shared my burdens.

Then at the pinnacle of our relationship the stability, I thought I found in you, was taken suddenly from me. It was taken by the very person who lifted me up – you. I figured my burdens were too heavy for you to handle, and you bolted. I couldn’t understand what I did wrong. I felt foolish. I had been abandoned and discarded with very little value.

I broke. I was nothing. I wanted to believe that you didn’t deserve me, but I didn’t really believe it. You obviously wanted someone better. Why in the hell did you throw me away? Throw us away? Throw it all away?

I found a modicum of strength to survive for two little ones that deserved better than I could give, because I couldn’t admit defeat. Not to them.

In writing this, I feel so much pent up and forgotten resentment and anger.  It’s an unfocused emotion that, if left unrestrained, has the potential to send me into a downward spiral. I won’t go there.

How could I have been so wrong about us? How could you?

Painfully yours,

Darling

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

My Dear Darling

 

How awful it must have been for you to pen those words. I remember your raw, brittle pain all too well from that time as you tried to come to terms with your terrible loss. I know there are some dark moments to come but before we go there I must say your distress seemed obvious to me. Yes you put on a brave face, but to begin with I was truly perplexed that no else in our room seemed to notice or care. My heart reached out to you. I did nothing more than offer you my ear and my time. Both of which I would give gladly and unthinkingly again.

It is interesting to hear you choose the word “testing.” It never felt like a test but I know you were incredibly wary about letting your guard down. I think the test was for both of us, me to see if I would cut and run and you to see if you could even speak of the matters that troubled your soul. I just let you patiently find your own way and that really was what you needed. All I ever did was offer a ready ear and some words of encouragement. I know you broached then discussed at length some incredibly intense and hurtful subjects. It is not my way to judge someone by their words alone, actions I find to be a far better indicator of a person’s strengths and weaknesses. That means very little of course as you were the recipient (I chose not to use the word victim out of respect for your inner strength) and not the perpetrator. Hence when in our future when my own actions fell so far short as to be reprehensible, I had no choice but to find my own self wanting, very wanting.

Yes you are right our relationship was stable. It was also loving, honest, trusting and respectful. I threw away all of those things. Yes I bolted, but it was not from you. My Darling in my eyes you were and still are perfection in a partner. I have no intentions of listing those perfections because that would be just puerile. We fitted so beautifully together, comedically, emotionally, intellectually, physically and even spiritually. That was the perfection. As you say I bolted, but from what I bolted was never you; it could never be you. I bolted from my own shortcomings, my own failings, my own inadequacies. I was not worthy to be part of your life.  After I had betrayed your trust and cheated with another I knew I was woefully unsuitable to be your life partner. I would never be the man you thought I was. You deserved so much better than me and you deserved nothing of what I did to you, to us.

To hear you say that I broke you, claws at my heart. I thought I left in a way that would assure you that I alone would assume all the blame. To hear you describe yourself as having “very little value” is a body blow to me and just makes me feel far more wretched than I already do. I can say unequivocally that “throwing you away,” as you so painfully describe it, was the single worst decision I have ever made in my life. A life I might add where I went on to make a number of particularly poor decisions in the years to come.

I have attempted to explain my mindset when I ended us in that awful letter I emailed you. The words are woefully inadequate. I will reread that painful document and see if it is fit for publication here. The crux though is true. It is not an excuse nor for that matter even close to an acceptable explanation. You had gone temporarily from my life, for reasons upon which we had both agreed. I thought I was strong enough to deal with the silence. I was manifestly wrong on that front. Not only could I not deal with the silence but I had lost the one person who would have helped me through it. I needed to pick up the phone and call you. You would have put salve on my worries, I would have felt your love, and you would have calmed my inner demons. I was too proud, too stupid and too arrogant. Then when I could no longer cope I did what I did. You were never wrong my Darling. It was I who made the most grievous error.

 

You Will Always Be My Darling (though I no longer have the right to say it)

 From Sir (a man who has fallen so far below the level required to hold such a lofty title), on bended knee, begging your forgiveness for the wrongs he has done you. However unworthy he may be he is still very much in love with you.

©2013 Darling and Sir