Cutting the cord

So, I finally have it. Closure! And to be honest none of his answers surprise me now. I just needed to hear them, and to hear them from him. I've been waiting a long long time to hear them.

At the moment I feel... I don't know really. Not distraught. Not angsty. Not surprised. I don't know. Empty maybe? But not in a really bad way. I don't know the words. I don't know the feelings. I haven't been here before though, not ever.

There are some things I need to say I guess. Not that it really matters as I now know things are not going to change and it was the not knowing that was the hardest, but my final word I suppose...

I accept what he's told me.

The saddest thing for me is that he isn't the man I thought he was, but in a way that makes it easier to let it go. The man I knew, the man I loved, he loved me too. These answers come from a man that never loved me, not in the way that I love anyway, and I will deal with that as I need to. But it means that the fundamental belief I have that 'love will conquer all' isn't shattered, it means I can still believe in that and so I can still achieve it with someone else. I didn't want to let that belief go, I don't want to be wrong about that. I've had to face being wrong about him or wrong about love. I didn't want to face either but the first is easier.

So forget empty, now I'm sad. Sad to think about achieving it with someone else, sad to have to let him go, to let it go, sad that he never got to appreciate how much he mean't, to me. And now I know that I have to move on. And that hurts.

The thing I loved most about DM, and there were a whole lot of things, but the thing I loved most was his strength. His ability to realise what he wanted and to push for that until he got there. His willingness to take risks and push forward. His unwillingness to settle. These answers don't reflect that man. He is not the man I thought he was. This is a man that is settling, a man who is running. But I accept his reasons for doing so. I'm disappointed in us both. In me for not knowing him as I thought I did. In him for not being the man I thought he was. Maybe one day, after this, I will end up just settling too?? It will be easier than taking a risk with someone else, I know that, but I don't think I was born to settle for anything less than perfect. Naive?? Maybe. Destined to be single for ever? Maybe. A runner away?? I don't think so. Even if it kills me to face it.

I have to accept I was wrong about him. I have to accept that I could be that blind, that I could be that easily deluded to what was probably glaringly obvious. Lessons like that are not easy to learn.

The saddest thing of all, the thing that makes me shake my head with the pointlessness of the last 18 months is that after all this, even reading this blog, he really doesn't know me at all. He has taken what he wants to read from this. Has been blinded by the "other stuff" and not seen me within it. He didn't love me, and he still doesn't know me. And whatever life brings my way I need to be with someone who can accept me for who I am. And that isn't him any longer. He's right that it depends on what you need in a relationship. We need different things, and despite more pain that I thought I would ever be able to feel, I'll take my way. I'll hold out for something more than "could be better". Even if it means going without.

Of all the people in all the world, and despite the fact that "I live my life like I do" (whatever the fuck that means!), he could trust me. I know that without any doubt at all. When he was in my life nobody else mattered that way. I was willing (more than willing, I wanted it for me, for him, for us) to take my family, to leave my friends, to risk a new career in a new country, to do something I would never before have contemplated, and begin a new life with him. A new life with us. Because he needs to do it and I wanted him to be happy. I wanted us to be happy. I don't say things lightly, but this is one thing I am saying. I never would have left him. I truly truly never would have left him. He might not have believed it then, I can accept that, but it hurts that after all this he can't believe it now.

It's not fair for him to blame "the way I live my life" for him leaving. That wasn't the way I lived my life with him. And I won't take the blame for it being so. I will not be held responsible for the end of this! For the first time in my whole life I did everything right. I didn't do what I always do and deliberately fuck it up. I will not take the blame for this!! And he was wrong. So so wrong about that!!!

It's ironic actually that it was him that cheated, on me; emotionally only maybe, physically I'll never know, on P (the current girlfriend) with me; physically definitely, emotionally I'll never know, but DM, don't blame your failings on me! I was the safest bet you could have ever made! I'd stake my life on that. I won't let you used this blog to validate your fuck up. Would you have felt or answered differently if I had been a virginal girl during this whole time??? No, you wouldn't!! So, I won't let you say, "See, I knew I was right". You weren't!! But you will need to deal with that (or ignore it as you usually do) yourself. I guess our "instincts" got the better of both of us. You told me to trust mine, I did, they were wrong. Yours were wrong back then too.

You say that what you really want is your wife. Well you should have fucking fought for her then. You should have stayed and fought! Instead of emotionally running away from the situation and letting her leave, and then being too proud to take her back when she offered. That's what love is. Being willing to fight when you need too. Not being so fucking proud that you end up regretting it the rest of your life, not being so fucking proud that you will pass up on the opportunities to have those beautiful children! You could probably have had both if you had got off your high horse for just a second! You'll probably end up with neither because you wont accept that.

I won't be second fiddle to anybody, not for anybody. Whatever I am, however I "live my life", I'm worth more than that. And now you've voiced that it helps. It fucking hurts, but it helps. Because it's just fucking sad. Sad that you did that to yourself. And I am not going to do that to myself, I am not going to let this pain ruin the rest of my life either. I won't hold you up as the person I always want to be with but didn't have the balls to fight for. I'm braver than that. I know now that if I love then I can fight, and I will fight. I've fought for you for nearly a year now. A pointless fight but at least I know I did everything I could. At least I know that this wasn't my issues, it wasn't my fault.

Right now this hurts like hell. Seriously, I thought I had been through it already, but it still feelsl like the first time we said goodbye. As painful as the first time he said goodbye. But it's different now. There is nothing to fight for anymore. He says I don't know how much he has hurt. Maybe so. I didn't appreciate it at the time, but I appreciate it now. I know he doesn't know how much I have hurt. How hard it is to step into something you never believed was possible and to trust in that, only for it to be nothing but a fallacy. How fucking hard it is to open yourself up, to open your family up to somebody only to have them walk away. How hard it is to all this time later have a 6year old girl, my beautiful intelligent daughter, still ask when she's going to see DM, to still cry because she misses him, to still tell me that I'm wrong and of course he loves me. How hard it is to have a 13year old boy, one who doesn't share his feelings easily, tell me that he doesn't want me to have another boyfriend because he doesn't want me to be sad again. He can't know what that is like. He can't know how much that fucking hurts to hear. But we are two different people, coming from two different lives, so maybe neither of us will ever appreciate each others feelings. It doesn't really matter now I guess.

He's the only person in the world, and I mean the ONLY person in the world, that I would trust implicitly to raise my kids if I wasn't here to do it. I would have given him my family. The only thing any of us truly truly have. I wanted him to have it. And I wish I'd had the chance to have given him his own.

For the time that I was happier than I have ever been, and may ever be, I thank him. For my answers I thank him. For letting me go I thank him. It's been a long time coming. For not ever stepping into my life again I thank him. It's over now. Time to move on. I know I have the strength to do that.