I was loved – trust me I know.

So I write this for him, for you & to you
I know he’ll never read it, in fact, even if he did it would probably drive him insane with more anger and hatred – for what i did & what i am.
Fact is, I don’t have the right to say this anymore, or even the right to talk about this which is why until now, i haven’t.
Everyone knows my coping mechanism for lifes’ hurdles is to write, so it’s only fitting that despite what I’m about to write, i write it all down anyway.

See I loved someone with everything I had once upon at time, I thought I had given him the very best of me, I always thought he could’ve done better or tried harder, to the point that I just wasn’t as happy as I once was anymore and then one day – I left.
This is, I guess, a sad story, it’s a story that’s never been told properly or in it’s entirety, a private battle for some time now between my heart and my mind that I’ve never truly shared. An internal war and struggle to let go of someone’s memory, of the best of emotions and the absolute worst. A war I had long thought I’d won, this instead should be a story of success, not defeat.

To start, all relationships or associations with men since him have failed me, and I fell to my knees just recently when I realised why this was so.
In all honesty, the wave of physical heartbreak hit me like not just a ton of bricks but a 1000 tiny needles all over my body, my eyes were hurting, my head even worse off and my tummy had dropped to the point i spent some 45mins locked in the bathroom in and out of the shower, sick.  sick with shock.

In the time that’s passed since , I have done things I’m not proud of, I have continued to hurt him whether he even knew it or not, and I was doing it all completely oblivious and desensitied, it wasn’t until I sat back and had a look at the life i’d chosen and the people i’d let choose me that I realised it all must have been hurting him even if he couldn’t admit it and it HAD to stop. There were moments where i was free of him, moments where i would know i wasn’t hurting him – where i thought to myself he’d be ok and this will help him pick up and move forward. everything i tried to change to somehow assist him in getting better ended up not only making the pain stick around for longer for not only him but myself as well, it also caused a wave of our most heated arguments to date, hatred, obscenities, screaming, police threats & abuse. The best thing for us was time and distance, to forget eachother and wipe years of scarred memories away, write new ones and trick ourselves into thinking that was life back then. What was wiped had to be replaced, i’m starting to realise that chunk of my life is simply far too large to forget, to wipe clear or to replace with lies.

They say forgetting is impossible, that in time you can heal wounds enough to look back on the past and see the positives and move on from the hurt. For us, that wasn’t the case. Forgetting was the only option, blocking and single handling removing one another from not only our lives as a couple but the lives of every single person that surrounded us was the only reason, up until now that we were able to date new partners and try love again. I had to stop my heart from feeling like it used to, i had to stop it shrivelling up and morphing into whatever it was the next man in my life desired, and obviously that was never going to work. I tried this method, I picked up what once was all I knew and ventured out completely alone to start a whole new life and way of living, it was as if everything I had known was nothing now, nothing mattered anymore. I had no friends because as part of the detox process they all had to go as well – they weren’t my friends or life, they were his, and rightfully so. Everything was new to me, yet everything had his god damn scent, trace or memory attached to it. These were the hardest 60 days of my entire life. And in these 60days I also made some of the biggest mistakes of my life, I did things I am most definitely ashamed to admit, I got hurt, and I also hurt others, many. In these first 60 days alone, all I had done to this poor boy was destroy his world, all his worlds. In my selfish confusion of ‘yes i want this, no i don’t want this’, toying and toying with him til we ended up being simply eachothers booty call when we pleased, or we’d take out our anger and hate on each other so aggressively due to an underlying love for eachother we were too frustrated, jealous and stubborn to admit. His friends were tired of hearing him whinge and complain about me, and what little people I had left in my life were the same. We were so against each other, so different, things had changed so drastically between us over time we’d simply been left behind. All that was left was argument after argument and waves of awful abuse. Yet through it all we loved each other, even though to his face time and time again I would deny it, his tears would flow and he’d beg me to come back, and I’d deny feelings I knew were there. At one point the roles had reversed and it was me begging for him back, bawling my eyes out in confession of my innermost feelings & emotions. It was the craziest most messed up time of my life. I had locked that door, I had slammed it shut and locked it finally after our biggest argument ever had ended. The door was padlocked for gods sake. It had to have been, I thought it was, I knew it was, I was stronger now, better. I didn’t need him, and his hatred for me meant I couldn’t even risk breaking that padlock.

Let me tell you something, locks aren’t untouchable, unbreakable things. They are a tangible material i had metaphorically used to tell my heart to get over it, and start making a life for itself. Locks? Well locks – they break, they all break in the end. They only break after much wear and tare and/or countless attempts at breaking through though, and then they snap. You can’t fix a snapped lock, you simply go and purchase another and lock it shut. That’s where I am, I am a snapped lock and I’m currently browsing new locks, window shopping for which lock might be stronger this time round, what will fit best and hold shut tight for the rest of my life. I need a heavy duty durable lock. It’s a shame that such a lock just doesn’t exist, one that can withstand that next 30-40 years i might be around, or one that’s keyless so I can’t be tempted sometimes just to have a peep or look back. Even though he’s well and truly moved on, he smiles all the time so I hear, and has found his princess, I think he too sometimes uses that key for his very own deadlock.

So as my heart sits here in a state of shock due to the recent snapping of my locks, I write this to him. It’s no plea and it’s definitely not a letter of begging, really, it’s just a bunch of things he already knows. So as I take him for a somewhat sad trip down memory lane I invite you to join me, join me and in doing so learn a valuable lesson. It’s taken me 2 failed relationships, a great deal of male attention and company to realise, right now in the heartbroken mess I am that you should never EVER let go of someone you love. Love hurts, but it IS worth it. I’m well past the point of reconciliation with my lost love, we passed the ‘being friends’ stage and most definitely will never be ‘us’ ever again, in fact, I will never see him again, but all these secrets and feelings i’d so long locked up aren’t so hidden anymore, you can see it written all over my face. I love him, despite absolutely everything we’ve ever been through, the pain, hurt, tears, screaming, everything – the lot. I will never stop loving him, and there’s so much I wish I had’ve said moons ago, so much I wish I could’ve done. Things would be different now. So as I write this unusually depressing blog – i promise there won’t be many like this, come hold my hand with me, as a very, very shaken, heartbroken, ashamed, mistaken and vulnerable teary eyed girl escorts you down memory lane with the man she has always held close in her heart, the man she’ll never truly be able to let go of….

To my Darling, it’s not that I don’t think about you anymore, because I do.

I think about you all the time, when it’s late at night and the world is asleep, when all the stars sing me their lullabies and I know you hear them too.

I think about you in the mornings so cool and crisp as I wake to my own reflection and hide the imperfections you saw as treasures away, locked shut by the swift brushing of pink rouge across my cheeks, you never were a fan of my morning skin & makeup routines.

I think about you when it rains, when it’s sunny or windy. When I’m laughing, crying, excited, courageous or scared. I think about you on the train, as I’m walking, eating & breathing. I mean, I try not to think about you, but you always find a way even in the strangest of times, to reappear in my mind.

Darling, it’s not that I don’t miss you anymore, because I do.
You always thought I hated you, I’d let you go completely and I was over you, that I was perfectly fine because I’d acted the part, well
I lied…

I miss you at night in my empty bed after I’ve tucked myself in because you’re not here to pull my blankets over me, kiss me gently and cuddle me to sleep with your silent lullabies or the fact we’d always have to squeeze into your tiny single bed like silverware in a kitchen top drawer. You’d be the big spoon and I was always the little spoon, eventually we found a rhythm that meant we preferred a single bed over a bigger bed with each other in the end anyway.

I miss you when the sun rises because there’s no blinds in my room to let the light seep in through gently, and there’s definitely no morning kisses and snuggles before venturing out of the bedroom for breakfast on the verandah, better yet – we were usually always rushing off here and there that mornings like that were so rare they were magical.

I miss you every time it rains – the rain always ruined things for you, you never were a  fan but I do remember our first kiss fell after much anticipation under a wet sky, tears from heaven as we called it. I constantly kept telling you ‘this is illegal, illegal illegal illegal’ but you kissed me anyway. Do you even remember? It was so cold and we had driven to the dam and fallen asleep in your car after trying to escape the wind chill outside.

I miss you when I’m laughing, all the times you would make me laugh with your smart humour and silly jokes, how you took a photo of our names you’d written on your freckly little hand and sent it to me one day saying ‘this is us ‘, or how funny it was when i tallied up how many cheeseburgers i sold in one 4hour shift at mcdonalds after school one day. All our mischievous late night drives, how you used to drive me to school just so you could have breakfast with me and my tummy would hurt from laughing before we’d even made it out of the school carpark.

I miss your silly work uniform; you know? remember that day I walked all the way to your work to surprise you with lunch and it was the first time i’d seen you in that bright red shirt and black slacks, you had sushi and iced tea and then i walked back home. you visited me again later that night as i was upset and brought me my favorite packets of mentos and turkish delight and held me on the driveway as i cried my eyes out – everything was falling in to place so wonderfully, we were already attached to each other even if we were too shy to admit.

I miss that sparkle in your ocean blue eyes every single time we united again, your smile from ear to ear with a cheesy glisten and how soft your lips would feel against mine. The way you’d twist my hair ever so gently and tuck it away then gently lift my chin to yours, how we would miss eachother like crazy after a day or two apart, yet seemed to go weeks sometimes without eachother. I remember after conference when i flew back in to brisbane, it had been our longest time apart at this point, 2.5weeks and i had never seen you run so excitedly to me before, that smile was priceless and that first giant hug something only fairy-tales talk of. I can recall a night after you’d been away for a week, you sprinted 1km to me because you knew i was at the end of that same street walking to you at the same time and we walked laps around the lake, spent the night near that secret bridge i’d found under the starry sky in eachothers arms telling the deepest of secrets – keeping in my mind i had that silly midnight curfew.

I miss your sometimes annoying taste in music, how you’d play the most ridiculous songs just to tease me. songs like ‘banana phone’ and ‘ding ding dong’ and you knew every word to that song ‘one week’ by ‘barenaked ladies’, yet most people can’t understand a single word of it, pretty impressive it was. Considering we spent most of our time and days always in the car, driving all around sth east qld, even though at times i would get mad or annoyed, it really was cute. I guess I took that for granted a little and I’m sorry.

I miss how you’d take me to university with you, include me in your tutorials, how we’d fall asleep together brain fried in the library on top of our laptops and respective textbooks, how we’d do lunch with eachothers uni mates or wait for eachothers’ lessons to finish so we could head off home together at the end of the day, even though we were in completely different studying worlds we always seemed to end up side by side completing assignments or projects and helping eachother study. I remember one time you made me read pages of your study notes out aloud as you recorded it, that way when you were driving to your exam you could study by my voice – practical is what you thought of it, i thought it was straight out sweet.

I loved our holidays, we rarely had time for things outside of your busy world and  I was never well, but we did spend an amazing week or so together eating the best sushi in NSW, discovering new hidden beaches on long drives, playing with brumbies and taking photos outside poles with thongs stapled on them or graffiti covered old lighthouses. Our own little well earned adventure, camping at night beside eachother without touching one another, playing monopoly so passionately i threatened to break up with you if you didn’t let me win, late night games of spotlight and all the ginger beer we could handle.  Those are some of the best memories i’ve struggled with letting go of, I really should’ve told you more often just how beautiful that trip was.

I miss the way it felt cooking for you, how you’d come up behind me and surprise me with a hug or a kiss on the neck, stick your finger in the sauce or how you absolutely without a doubt detested capsicum – my favorite vegetable to cook with, or how you ate almost a whole carrot cake i baked for you in one night and when it was your turn, you made me the one thing you knew how to cook well – noodles, not just any noodles though, you mixed the craziest of sauce combinations through it until in winter we decided it would be a regular nightly dinner feature.

Well, I also hate that we’ve ruined so many things.

I hate that I can’t go anywhere near the harbour in Scarborough, the seaside in Newport, in fact, I hate that the whole city of Redcliffe is stained with painful memories of you. There was nowhere we hadn’t explored, even the silliest of things like the Redcliffe museum were memories I once upon a time treasure reliving with you. The RNA Showgrounds, any sporting complex, the television channel ‘ONE’, my softball ball and gloves, old jerseys and the fact I’ll never ever wear a cap on my head again, I won’t go back to Byron Bay, I rarely visit the beach and I haven’t been swimming since – not once. Even the look of a diamond ring in a jewellery store window has a nasty sting. You’re everywhere, what’s worse is that sometimes on my way home late at night from work I drive past your street, I’ve done it for months now. This should’ve been the first sign my locks weren’t so locked.

I hate that whenever I think of sport all I can think of is you – our date to the cowboys/broncos Suncorp Stadium game decked out in our favorite cowboys gear, surrounded by raging broncos supporters in the most nail-biting game i’ve seen played yet. Seeing little children play sport, pint sized sporting outfits/gear, the lot. Following you to work with the after school programs so for an hour every afternoon even though I sat on the sidelines and journalled, i could look up and see you running around and playing games with little children who adored you, your energy and enthusiasm for others children made me most of the time, clucky for the day we would bring our own kids in to the world. I even keep an eye out for you on the television sometimes, the news, if i google you i find stories and ways to keep up to date with your progress. Sport is and was your dream, now you’re in the states i’m certain you’re career is about to take off. I’m sorry I’m not there, that I’ve missed your great sporting achievements, your university graduation that i’d dreamt about. I’m sorry, my smile would’ve been the biggest and my arms open the widest when you came down the stairs with your graduation cape and scroll.

I hate that our favorite food just so happens to still be my favorite thing to eat. I’m sure you can look back and laugh that day we went to our favorite place – subway and ordered our usual footlong, only for me to have eaten half then run outside to throw up before returning to sit back down like nothing had happened and finish the other half. at the time you were worried, but we definitely got many laughs out of that looking back. I guess I took for granted sometimes how supportive you were of your sick girlfriend, how she was always sick and she couldn’t go running with you, swimming or play soccer or ball with you. You weren’t the best to be honest at showing you cared, but i guess after your girlfriends 12th visit to the hospital in a year it gets a bit old. I want to thankyou for loving me through the very ugliest of times, holding my hand when i was screaming in agony to the point you were in tears, cradling me to your car up my long driveway when i couldn’t walk from the fits and tremors in my body, helping me use the bathroom or shower, and holding me whilst i was vomiting.  I realise now had hard it must’ve been to see someone you love, so ill. I want you to know how hard it was for me too, don’t you forget. I wanted to always take you up on that cycling offer, to go and play sport with you, sign up to be on any of your teams, go for a jog with you or play catch. I wanted to be that healthy sport girlfriend you fell in love with.

I can remember the exact date you finally told me that you loved me, how perfect and precious it was. I remember how beautiful you looked, and the tear in your eyes. The fact I couldn’t say it back because I was scared even though I knew I loved you more than anything. And when I did, oh how magical that was. You were leaving one day after a visit, sitting with your driver car door open as i sat on your lap and attempted to say goodbye for another night, only to slowly whisper into your ear a subtle ‘i love you too’ – the response you had waited months for. You jumped right out of the car, picked me up and kissed me like you had never kissed me before. We had overcome a lot in those few months, but for all parties involved sake, that is one secret we can keep locked up.

I hate that I haven’t been near or to the beach since – you know. Anywhere where the waves are crashing, seagulls squawking or children playing reminds me of our first anniversary, 1 year had passed and I had thought you’d forgotten. You then drove me to coolum for lunch at my favorite cafe – the coffee club. bittersweet is all i can to sum it up. we had the world at our feet at that point. survived some of the ugliest when i’d wanted to leave you, we’d had our first holiday, battled through all the times i’d moved house, my health concerns and first year uni stresses. we worked together and we worked together well. it was the most surreal feeling knowing we were so secure in each other that every hurdle thrown our way only made us fight harder, and keep growing stronger. we both knew, without saying it – we were it for each other. there was no way we’d ever leave one another. I cannot tell you how sorry I am that I let that argument over that dreaded new years eve escalate into what it did. I still think what could’ve been if maybe id’ just said ‘yes’ to your beautiful question instead of ‘i don’t know’. it was beautiful darling, it really was, and i’m sorry my answer broke your heart. I’m sorry I ruined your new year, and the very start to a bright 2011 for you, what was meant to be ‘for us’.

I hate that the cinema reminds me of us even though we rarely went. I had just gotten that new job, everyone knew you without knowing you because you were all I spoke about, even after 1.5years together already, you were still the most important and significant thing in my life. Note that I spoke about ‘you’ not ‘us. You were the one i was proud of, achieving his dreams, climbing higher and higher, you were smart and talented, well respected by thousands. I guess that feeling of dating a ‘celebrity’ that i always spoke about was true. You were a celebrity and wow, look at you now. Look where you are now! I knew you’d be here, I knew 2012 was everything for you. Maybe this is why my locks snapped, because the date dawned on me.

I said how much I hated it when you just rocked up to one of my shows/performances. You had a flower for me, and a big kiss and a hug yet I was filled with so much anger towards you for you even thinking it was ok to show up that I didn’t appreciate you the way I should have. I had wanted you to hear me sing, play my piano or guitar or dance for our whole relationship. I wanted you to experience what i had to offer, what my gifts or talents were, that i too was good at something, but you never had the time and i never had the time to pursue my dreams because being the girlfriend i wanted to be for you, meant that i gave up my dreams for yours, temporarily. I’m sorry that I treated you the way I did around the time of that show/tour. I guess seeing your face in the distance in the audience and trying to sing and dance my heart out feeling sickened wasn’t how i’d pictured i’d feel when the day came that i’d finally get to see your smile in the crowd at one of my shows. I had dreamt of that moment to be so much different.

I hate how much we argued about things like texts, driving & drinking. In fact, that was all we ever argued about! I was always worried when you’d go out drinking, like a silly mother or worry wart even though I knew you’d come home to be in one piece, even if half of you was glued to the toilet bowl or hanging out my window. Or that before I got my P’s and was living from places like Cashmere all the way to the back of Narangba, you hated the driving distance between us and that you were the only one who could drive. I tried to always thank you and show you how much it meant, I guess I just didn’t do it enough. And argh! the hiptop, that stupid hiptop. I was so happy to get rid of mine when i finally got my blackberry but you made things hard going months without a proper working phone when we always needed that communication due to our hectic lifestyle. Silly, ridiculous, pointless arguments, and i know for a fact they wouldn’t be happening now if..well, 2011 happened a little differently.

See darling, it’s not like I don’t think about you, miss you – it’s just that I do it all too much and I hate that I still love you.
And I want to write a million more thing here about us, about you. Your bright white, big cheesy grins, your super tight hugs and cuddles, the cute conjoined names everyone called us, storm chasing, christmas and boxing day, your birthdays, my 18th, the lot. But you won’t read this, and even if you do, the fact I’m still so in love with you won’t change a damn thing. If by any chance you know of a good locksmith, or a place where locks such as the one you own are available for purchase i’d love it if you could drop me some contact details.

Until such time, I am unlovable.
I am totally and utterly unable to offer my heart to anyone.
Time may be what I need, but it’s been over a year already.
A lot can happen in 12 months, a lot did happen but not enough that it mended my broken little heart.
Know that I think of you often, when I’m driving home and I pass the diamond near my house or even the leagues club itself.
You still own a part of my heart, it’s always with you, I never got it back, and you’ve raked up the worst overdue fines for borrowing it for so long.
I wish things were different sometimes, I wonder where you are and what you’re up to. And I shouldn’t.

I am unlovable.  I will not love another until my heart is whole enough to offer.
Nobody wants to pick up the pieces of someone elses broken mess.
I’m in love with an unlovable, and the totally lovable have fallen in love with me – the unlovable.
For now,  I wish you well in the biggest most important year of your life.
I hope Florida keeps you safe, and your girl back home gives you everything I didn’t and more.
Thank you for loving me, despite it all.
Just promise me you’ll find me a lock as good as yours & return that part of my heart to me so I can let you go.
I don’t like this snapped lock state I’m in, I hate that I love you and I should’ve told you how much I missed you before you me go for good.

To all prospective lovers of mine out there who’ve found me or haven’t found me yet, just be weary. My relationships don’t last, I don’t stick around very long and I always run away from men before a relationship can even be founded. Let it known that this little broken lock realised all of this on the weekend just past, that she really isn’t as whole as she thought she was, that deep down she still longs for her heart to be whole again, for the one person who can fix it. She’ll get better, she’ll find a new lock and everything will go back to how it has been. Don’t bother searching for the key and don’t bother telling me ‘time will heal’ or ‘just forget him’ or even ‘you’re crazy’ because I know how crazy I am right now but I had to admit this, publicly on my blog for you all to see, in order to start taking those few million baby steps to finding the perfect lock. It’s the closure I’ve needed. He may be a prominent feature in the pages of my journals for the last year but the story has ended and the cover of the book is shut. I will marry my locksmith. And I will give him the keys to a whole and complete heart. With or without him. Goodbye to lost loves. There’s now nothing left to hide from you.

Just promise me you’ll find me a lock as good as yours & return that part of my heart to me so I can let you go.