Thanksgiving morning I woke up crying. It was still dark outside but I had been sleeping weird hours for a little over a week – ever since the break-up and it wasn’t unusual for me to wake up this way as I was prone to night sweats and night terrors; but this was different, this was fully conscience sadness. I was filled with a sorrow so deep I wasn’t even sure it was mine, positive that it belonged to someone who had lost much more than a potential mate. There had been no nightmare or thoughts of him when I had fallen asleep, and yet there I was at 3am, missing him so completely I had woken up from a deep sleep with tears running down my face and his name on my lips.
It wasn’t a secret I missed him. I was very apparently weepy, moody, sullen, and downright withdrawn from everyone I knew for weeks. I tried to hide how much it was all affecting me, which took more energy than anyone could ever imagine, when really it took everything in me not to scream, “no, no, it’s not fair!” like a small child having lost their favorite toy. But begging and pleading had done nothing for me and in fact had made it much worse in the end. If I had learned anything from my previous break up it was that resistance was futile, something I so easily forgot when it came to losing someone I cared about.
More than being futile it was sad, I was sad. I, once again was pining for a guy who didn’t want me and it was breaking me further apart than I already had been. “This will be different.” I would say to myself while practically skipping from happiness after we had made it “official”. I had nothing to be afraid of, right? Why is it our worst fears always become our own living nightmares?
“Being sad won’t bring him back any faster you know,” my friend and co-worker would say to me when I would randomly fade off into thinking about it all. I knew this, of course, but it helped only a little as my hope for a speedy reconciliation waned smaller and smaller each day. I spent most of my time trying to focus on his flaws to trick myself into feeling grateful it had all ended but it would only work for a few hours, at most a whole day.
I made mantras, ran miles, and wrote stories to help pass the time. I went out with friends, worked almost everyday and became the most productive version of myself. Everyday I wanted to text him, to call him, to see his face just for a moment, if only to pretend that none of this had happened, that I had been dreaming this whole time. I would tell myself to hold on just one more day, that the next day would be easier, that this was temporary pain leaving the body and all I needed to do was sweat it out. I tried sincerely to move on everyday and everyday I would miss him more than the last as if none of the things I was doing to help forget him worked at all.
Thanksgiving morning I woke up crying. I sat up and cried even though we had been broken up for weeks, even though I had accepted what was happening, even though everyone around me told me it would get easier and not harder. I cried huge tears while my body tensed up around a pain I couldn’t explain. I wrapped my arms around myself tightly and whispered, “It’ll all be okay, everything’s ok, I’m here for you,” the way he would when I woke up from a nightmare. I slid into his side of the bed, something I still thought about because I hadn’t slept on it in the many nights since he was last in it.
I laid there and I let my heart break and was thankful because it was the only thing that reminded me that I was alive.
God, I Hate My 20's 