A contortionary tale - part 1
Watching a movie brings up uncomfortable memories of a past relationship that found me losing myself on repeat. While the connection is long gone, I still find myself living out the insidious dynamics that were at play more than 10 years ago. This is Part 1: How it began.
College ID card, 2008
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This is Divine Interruption.
I'm Sarah Hildreth Rankin.
Okay, we're here.
Oh, what a time, my goodness.
I'm having experiences that are forcing me to look at some things and listen to some things that previously I was probably pushing down and not paying attention to.
And my body's actually leading this process and showing me what I'm supposed to be sharing and working through.
It's been quite a profound process, actually.
And today, I'm being led to talk about something that I really never thought I would talk about.
And I don't know if I wasn't ready or, well, there's a lot there, actually.
But I'm now here and this is happening.
I want to talk about tons of other things, but no, this is what we're doing.
My body's been showing me the way that this is important, even if I'm not super comfortable.
But I'm here and I'm going to do my best, and I might need to break this up into two episodes, because it's long and it's complicated, and I hope that I can share it in a way that just honors what it was.
So I took my kids to a birthday party a few weeks ago, and they're at the age now where I don't actually have to attend the birthday party.
So I had two hours to myself, I came home, I was like, I'm going to fold some laundry and watch a movie.
So I put on It Ends With Us.
I don't know if you've seen it, it's based on a book.
I knew nothing about it before I turned it on.
It's a pretty intense movie.
It's actually about domestic violence and a relationship that occurs over time, where two people almost come together with two different traumas, and when they connect, it brings up a lot, and a lot of things happen.
And I don't want to give it away in any way, so I won't talk about it too much, but either you've seen it or you don't, but you understand the basis of what it's about.
So as I'm folding laundry, and towels, and underwear, and all the things, I'm watching this movie, and I'm just starting to feel a little off.
And I wasn't expecting this.
I was like, oh, I don't feel so well.
I feel kind of sick.
And as I'm nearing the end of the movie, I actually feel like I'm going to throw up.
Like actually physically, I'm going to go vomit.
And then I'm starting to feel emotional.
I'm like, oh, I feel really uncomfortable in my body.
Like I want to throw up.
I want to cry.
I think I want to scream.
Like I want to thrash around.
Like I feel angry.
I felt so many things at once.
And it felt like it was coming out of nowhere.
Now, the movie ends, and I'm like, oh, I gotta go pick up my kids.
So I need to park this, and I need to come back to it later.
Right now, I need to go put on my like mom hat, and just, you know, chill out a little bit.
So later that night, I came back to it.
I had some time to myself, and I was like, what was that all about?
What was happening in my body?
Like, what was I going through?
And I don't really know.
I cried a little bit more.
I did some stretching.
I put on some music, and I danced around, and I tried to, like, shake the emotions out of my body.
And that helped a little, but I didn't have much clarity around exactly what was happening.
And I thought, okay, that's just done.
So later that night, when I'm sleeping, it's like two in the morning, I am woken up, what feels like suddenly, with extreme pain in my hips.
It feels like they are on fire.
It's very painful.
And the pain was, I'm going to call it violent.
It felt like a very violent pain, like a ripping, tearing, searing sensation.
And I'm like, what is this?
What is happening to me?
And as I'm feeling this pain, I'm starting to see flashes from the movie between these two characters and their relationship and the dynamic that they have.
And that feeling, I'm going to call it unease.
Because there's just this feeling of, what exactly is going on here?
What's happening between these two people?
Especially with this man.
Like, do I trust him?
Do I like him?
Is he a good guy?
Is he a bad guy?
Like, is he a safe person?
And what is he going to do?
Is he going to do something?
Is something happening that I don't know about?
Like, what's actually happening here?
And it kind of ramps up, and I'm starting to feel anxious.
And I'm like, what?
What's happening?
Is this okay?
Is it not okay?
How am I supposed to feel?
So all of this is coming up from this movie, and that feeling of unease and distrust, that brought up a lot in me.
And as I'm feeling my hips, and these sensations in my physical self, I'm connecting it to a relationship that I was in for six years, where I was feeling all of these things.
This was 10 years ago now, and I'm still trying to figure out exactly how I felt about it, and what exactly happened.
Like, how did I end up in that relationship?
What did I learn?
What went on?
What was okay?
What wasn't okay?
And that general sense of unease.
And as this came up, it didn't go away.
So, it's been coming up for me continuously since I saw this movie.
And now I'm seeing other things that are reminding me of experiences I had in that relationship.
And as I'm going back to that place, those years, and as these memories are floating back, I'm like, why don't I want to go there?
I feel like I've gone there so many times, and I've relived it and sorted it out.
And I was like, that's done, you know?
But I'm realizing that there is still something there, and that what's there that's preventing me from looking at it closer or from sharing it, because I'm feeling called to talk about this here.
And as soon as I had that thought, I was like, no.
Like, I'm not going to talk about that.
Well, why not?
And when I examine that further, and I really feel into it, I've realized that I'm afraid.
I'm afraid to share this story.
And what I'm experiencing is actual fear.
Like, I have fear in my body.
And it's just this old power dynamic that's still at play there.
And every time I've gone to examine it more, or thought about talking about it, I'm just hit with this barrage of contradictory emotions, and feelings, and thoughts about all of it, and I just feel paralyzed.
But, you know, I've been led here now, and even though this feels challenging, and I'm afraid of saying the wrong thing, I'm afraid of being misinterpreted, I'm afraid of being not heard, or so many things are coming up for me, I just also know that I just have to do this.
I need to take whatever's been hiding out of the dark, and it just needs to be put in the light.
I just need to take it out of me.
And whatever feels scary or uncomfortable, or that I'm afraid of, just needs to be out there.
It just needs to be outside of me now, and it can't hide anymore.
I've been led here over the past few weeks.
As much as I've tried kicking and screaming to not be led here, I have re-read all of my old journals.
I have really thought about how I want to talk about this, and what is appropriate, and what isn't, and is this...
I keep saying, like, is this okay?
Like, am I gonna hurt someone?
Or, I don't know.
There's just so much there.
But yeah, I've been led here, and it's time to talk about it.
And this is just me taking something out of my darkness and just putting it into the light, so that it doesn't have to be so scary anymore.
And I just want to say that this is my experience, obviously.
This is coming from my perspective.
And that's what it is.
But it's time for me to honor my own perspective, instead of having fear of hurting other people, and about not sharing my truth, because I feel like it's somehow betraying the other person in this relationship, or other people in general, that might misconstrue what I'm saying.
So, I am going to do my best here.
I'm going to do my best.
So, I'm going to call this person that I was in a relationship with, Tom, just changing his name for privacy reasons.
So, when I first met Tom, I don't think I appreciated how vulnerable I was at the time.
I was 23 years old.
My dad had died just a year before.
I had left the job I was working.
I'd left the town, the province.
I'd done some traveling, and then I'd moved and lived with my mom.
I was unemployed, and then I found a new job.
So, I'd switched jobs multiple times.
I had ended a relationship and started a new relationship, and then I ended up moving in with this person.
And there was a lot of things happening at once.
I'd had a lot of change all at once.
And I had also decided to start this new program at school.
So, go to college.
And that felt really exciting.
It was something new.
I was craving, what's funny, is like more change.
I kept changing things and thinking that that was somehow going to fix how I was feeling on the inside.
So, it was like a coping mechanism to maybe not feel a lot of the things I was feeling.
I just kept changing things and moving on from things and starting new things, which I don't think I really had full grasp on at the time.
And yeah, I found this intensive, two-year communications program, and it felt like it was all of these things coming together at once that I was really excited about because I'd taken fine arts and university and dropped out after a year and just had felt very disenchanted with all of it.
And now I was finding something that I was like, oh yeah, this is hands-on, this isn't theory and papers, this is hands-on learning about audio and video, television and radio and publishing and journalism and graphic design, all of the things that I loved and putting it all together.
So it was a very intensive two-year program that included a summer work term as well.
You're in a small cohort of 20-plus people, and it really is a situation where you're full on.
So there's not a lot of time elsewhere, or there wasn't anyway in my life.
It was mainly focused on this program, doing projects, staying up late nights, weekends, really devoting all of my time to this program.
So I entered into it, and yeah, just kind of threw myself in right away.
And I met Tom on the bus.
He was in the program.
And we became friends quite quickly because we'd take the bus from downtown to the campus every day, there and back.
And he was really charismatic.
He was funny.
He was really likable.
He had really high energy.
He's a very quick-witted person, so very fast with his words.
Someone who you would not want to get into a debate with because he'd always have the right thing to say, and he'd be able to say it faster and get to the point quicker than anyone I'd met before.
And he was really curious, so he was very interested in me and my life and what I thought about things and things that I had experienced.
And we had a lot of really, really great conversations.
It was easy to get to know him because we always had something to talk about.
And he really cared about the world.
He cared about changing things, making things better for people.
He cared about animals and people, and our society, and making sure that people had access to basic needs, like health care and social services.
Like he's very passionate about helping other people.
And he also spoke truths.
Like I found he could be quite abrasive, like especially to strangers.
Sometimes he would be the person who would speak up and be like, hey, don't do that.
Or like, what are you doing?
And it would kind of come out of nowhere.
Or even in class, he would speak up and call the teacher out on something, which was almost shocking.
Like I really admired this quality in him, because for me, it always felt like my voice was kind of stuck.
And so being able to witness someone just speak up for themselves or say things that maybe everyone's thinking, but no one would dare say, yeah, I really admired that quality.
So we became fast friends and really enjoyed getting to know each other.
We would talk about the program and what we were learning, and he would tell me about who he liked in our class, and who he thought was attractive, and why, and who wore great clothes.
Like he was very forthcoming about his feelings in that way.
He would tell me about his relationships.
So I don't really remember, but I know that he had a girlfriend he'd been in a relationship with for a long time, and that was kind of messy, and they were still kind of dating, but breaking up, and there was someone else that he liked, that he was kind of seeing, and he shared all sorts of things.
And because I was his friend, I was just like, oh yeah, like I felt supportive, it was interesting, and I saw things from his perspective, and I had that distance of being a friend.
So I didn't feel overly involved.
Maybe if I was the women in some of those situations, I would feel different, but I wasn't, so it was okay.
And he was very thoughtful.
So he gave me gifts at Christmas and on my birthday.
We'd attend a lot of different parties for school with our other friends.
We worked on projects together, and we just became very close.
It felt like we were almost like best friends in that program.
It was really fun to have like a new best friend.
And then at some point, it felt like the energy just shifted.
I feel like we'd been out somewhere with a group of friends, and later that night, he had sent me like a drunk text, and it said something about me being really special.
He's like, oh, you're really important to me.
And I don't know, I started to feel just more confused about all of it, because as soon as that gate opened, it felt like I couldn't really deny the pull that I was feeling towards him as a person.
And I've always had this sensation, and I'm curious, I wonder how it plays out for other people, but it's almost like my soul pulls me towards things in a very strong way.
And I always know, because it just kind of says, it's like, I want this experience.
I'm just drawn to something.
I need this experience.
That's what it feels like.
And it's not always considering the future or where that thing is going, because I don't know, but it's almost like, I need this.
Now, I don't know if I need this for good or bad reasons, or like what I would deem to be what that experience could be, but I just need this.
And that's how I felt about him.
I'm like, oh, I need this experience.
I need to be around this energy.
It's new.
It's pulling me to something.
His energy is different, and it's exposing me to new things.
And I need that for my growth in some way.
So I felt very pulled to him.
And I was in a relationship at the time, and it was very complicated and very stressful because of all the reasons, right?
When you're in a relationship with someone that you love and you care about, and I did.
And we had kind of had our own, like, weird epic story and had just come back together.
And my partner had moved cities to be there with me.
We had moved in together.
It was my first relationship living with someone.
And he was, like, stable and solid.
And yet here I was starting this whole new leg of my journey, essentially, of growth and meeting this new person and being in this new program and just wanting something different.
I just wanted adventure.
I wanted change.
And again, perhaps this pattern was a bit of a trauma response.
But at the same time, that's what I wanted.
And even wanting that change, I convinced my partner to move.
I was like, no, we just need to move apartments.
Let's find a new place.
And we did that.
And within, like, two weeks of moving into our new place, I broke up with him because I was just like, no, like, I can't do this.
I need to have this new experience.
And it was extremely painful, you know?
I was used to being in this space.
I got very used to kind of holding this, like, searing pain of, like, loss, and then this feeling of adventure and adrenaline.
So that's very familiar.
I used to think that that's, like, where I thrived.
I was like, oh, I thrive in this, like, chaotic place, this chaos of deep, intense emotions.
I don't think that's super healthy, but at the time, that's what I was craving, or I was used to that, and I kept playing out that pattern.
So I found myself moving back in with my mom again and just completely untethered, ending this relationship and it being very messy and complicated.
And I jumped into something new right away.
So with Tom, I just jumped in, I was like, okay, I've broken up with my partner, I've left my place, I'm ready to do this thing.
And that's what I wanted.
That was the choice I made.
I just had no idea where that would take me.
So the beginning of that relationship, it was kind of like being on Cloud 9, despite the feeling of being extremely upset and sad and grieving over my other relationship.
It was just new and exciting.
And here I was with this friend, like this friend that I loved and knew all about.
And now we had this whole other dynamic to explore in a relationship.
We had just finished our first year at school.
We had these new summer co-op jobs in our fields.
And it just felt like the summer had opened up with all of this possibility.
But I will say, there was this moment, this moment where I first felt almost like a tear happen in this dream bubble that I had.
And it was very early on.
We had gone out with a bunch of friends from school.
We were going to go meet them at a bar.
And we were at an ATM machine.
I remember this very clearly.
And as I'm taking out money, he just says something really casually.
And he says, Oh, you know what?
You were the girl in high school who everyone was friends with, but nobody wanted to sleep with.
And I just, I didn't even know what to say.
I was completely stunned.
It really threw me off.
And he said it as if it was the most normal thing to say, so casual, like something that, you know, your best friend and now the person who's pursuing you because they're in love with you and want to have a relationship with you would just say, like that's a normal thing to say.
And it was this conflicting message.
I was like pure cognitive dissonance.
I was like, okay, so you love me and care about me and obviously find me attractive and therefore want to be in a relationship with me.
But then you're seeing something that is so rude and mean and telling me that I am also unattractive and undesirable.
And how do I feel right now?
It's like holding these two conflicting things, like, do you like me?
Do you not like me?
It was like, yeah, that moment when something just seeded in my brain, this little feeling of unease.
It was like we were these magnets, these magnets that came together with such force.
And yet, through that connection, there was always this line of uneasiness for me.
I always felt like there was just a little something, just like that cruel comment, where there was a subtle sharp edge to our relationship.
And it was almost as if there was this unspoken agreement that he was in control, and I am less than him, and that at any moment, he has the power to completely take my power away.
And that's how it kind of began.
And then, he started to almost build some insecurity within me, or that's what I started to experience.
There would be just more, very subtle, or not subtle, but for me, it felt subtle, because everything else seemed fine, but then he would just make these comments out of nowhere, like, oh, you know who really looks, you know, who's really, really attractive, and who looks really good.
You know, this person or that person, and someone that we would know, like, oh, if you just dressed like that, then maybe, oh man, you would look so much better.
Or, what would it be like if you got a boob job?
Oh man, then you would be really attractive.
Okay.
Or he would critique the clothes that I would wear, and just kind of tell me that, nah, that doesn't really look so good.
It'd be better if you looked like this.
Or he would tell me that I was at my best when I was really skinny.
He's like, when you're skinny, you're really attractive.
And he would be referencing other girls that we knew, and bringing them up in a way where I just wasn't sure why he was bringing them up.
And then I started to have these memories flood in from just a few months before, where when we were friends, he'd be talking about the girls in our class, and he would be talking about these other women that he was dating, or not dating, or whatever was happening.
And all of a sudden, I was seeing it from this other lens, and I was like, oh, how does that make me feel knowing that he has a crush on this person, or knowing that that's the type of person he's into, or knowing that he was carrying on multiple relationships at once, or saying certain things to women that maybe I wouldn't agree with?
I started to see it from a different lens now that we were dating.
And on one of our early dates, we biked out to the beach, had a picnic, like it was really nice.
And again, he said something that's just, some of these things, they just stick, right?
You just can't quite get them out of your brain.
And he said, you're the kind of girl who looks good when she's at the exact right weight, but you cannot afford to gain a pound.
Like you would not be able to pull that off.
And again, we're in this beautiful surrounding, we're having a great time, great conversation and food.
I felt safe, and then he said that.
I was like, huh, like this, this feels really bad.
Like I would never say that to someone.
I really, you know, and I would question myself a lot.
I'd be like, would I say that?
Is that okay?
Is he just being truthful?
Maybe he's trying to help me.
You know, I would really question what was happening because then he would say something really nice, or then he'd be like, okay, let's go, let's bike back.
Awesome.
I'm having the best time.
And I'm like, what?
You just kind of tore me down in that moment.
So it started out like that.
My insecurity started to kind of build as there was more questioning of how he felt about me.
It felt like he was questioning that or letting me know that he didn't approve of me while he also did.
And a few months into the relationship, I found out that he was still connected to his ex-girlfriend.
And it happened in the way that it does happen, right?
It's like, I go to check my email, his email's open.
I kind of scan quickly, and then I see a name pop out, and then, oh man, it's like, I'm going to open that.
And that's what I did.
And I really, really, really regretted that.
It was awful.
It really changed me at the time.
I had never experienced something like that, and I just wasn't expecting it.
I wasn't ready for it.
And so when I saw that they were carrying on some form of relationship, and I saw what they were saying to each other, and it was like, you know, it was his private email.
There was no reason why I should be looking at it, but it had been open, so I chose to.
And that really shifted things for me, and it really began this two-year period of just intensity, an intense period of my life that honestly, when I look back on, it's hard to believe that it even happened because I lost myself so hard, and I became very, very hypervigilant.
I was never sure if he was lying or telling the truth.
I felt like when I would bring things up, he would question me or turn my words around.
There was a lot of gaslighting, and there was a lot of half-truths.
It was a very, very messy situation.
And even now, I look back, I can't tell you exactly what happened and what didn't.
I just know what I witnessed and how I felt.
I've even gone back and read my journals, which I think I just need to burn them, honestly.
That period of time is just so dark for me, and it was just me trying to figure out what was going on in my life.
So we broke up multiple times over that summer.
It was a very short period of time when I really think of when we actually started dating and then launching into this intensity.
I would find something, I would question him about it, we would fight about it, back and forth, he'd tell me something wasn't true and that I was being crazy.
And then somehow we would end up back together.
Like when we would get together, he would be able to talk to me in a way.
And it was just very good, very convincing.
And on my part too, it was just easy to kind of fall back into this pattern.
And when I was with him, that just kept happening.
I really just didn't, to be honest, I didn't trust myself around him after a few months.
Like after that summer, I didn't know what I would do or say when I was with him.
Especially after I'd broken up with him, I was always afraid.
I'm like, what's he gonna do?
What's he gonna convince me to do?
I felt like I wasn't even myself.
It's like I was being mentally coerced.
Maybe that sounds crazy, but that's really how it felt.
I just wasn't sure what I was gonna do.
So the end of the summer, I broke up with him and decided, okay, if I just go away and I don't see him, like I don't have access to him, he can't come over, he can't call me on the phone, I won't have to see him, then I know I can break up with him because that's what's in my best interest.
Like I don't need to be in this situation, it's really painful.
And why does he even want to be with me?
Obviously, there's like other people at play here, he's doing other stuff, he's not fully interested, and yet he desperately needs me to be with him.
It's very confusing.
So I took off on a road trip, I went back to Alberta, and I didn't see him for, I think it was only like two, two or three weeks, something like that.
And I was able to, when I had that distance, come back into myself.
And I'm like, oh, girl, you're a strong person, you're gonna be okay.
You can do this, you've done this before.
And it's like, I always knew that was there, but when I was around him and in his energy, I found it very hard to feel myself and to kind of have that grounding or know who I was and what I stood for.
The only problem was that I had my second year of school to go to, so I had to go back to school in a couple weeks.
And I was so worried and so stressed out about what that would be like, having to see him again, being in the exact scenario where everything started, being in a small group of people where we knew each other, we'd be working together.
I was just dreading it, and I just really wasn't sure what it was going to be like.
We didn't end on good terms.
We had so many intense moments that I was like, is he going to be kind?
Maybe we can just be friends or we can just be on the surface.
Maybe we can forget it even happened.
I wasn't sure.
I didn't know what I was walking into.
And that first day back at school, I barely made it to the end of the day.
It was just so intense.
And again, this feels very high school when I'm talking about it, because maybe you have memories too of when you're a kid or a teenager.
And every moment, you're like, someone looked at me and, oh, I just broke down in tears or who's mad at me?
Like that kind of drama, that's what it felt like.
And it felt like I was trying to be this better person.
I was trying to be kind and thoughtful and considerate.
But also, I had to hold my own boundaries to keep myself safe, because I felt like if I allowed his energy back, it would somehow there'd be this insidious moment where it would just creep all over me.
So I tried my best.
I barely made it to the end of that day, and I went home, and again, there's journals and journals of this, of me stressing out about it.
It's just painful to read.
But it wasn't comfortable.
It was very much, I felt like a bit over the top, like he was kind of trying to get to me in some way.
And yeah, by the end of the week, we had gotten back together.
It just happened.
It was almost like that was the easier option because I didn't know how else I could have survived.
I know that sounds really dramatic.
That's honestly how it felt, because it felt like I was being purposely messed with, like manipulated, guilt tripped, and controlled.
Like I felt very trapped.
And I felt like someone's energy was working against me.
Like if we weren't together, if I wasn't doing or being the way that he wanted me to be, or if he wanted me to be with him, and then I was choosing not to be, he was going to make our interactions and my life very challenging.
And that's what it felt like.
So I did feel quite trapped.
And I had, over that summer, moved into my own apartment.
It was an awesome apartment.
But the memories of being there are extremely painful.
It really is, I just remember just crying so much and almost like spinning around and just like freaking out and just feeling so much despair.
Like, I don't know how to get out of this situation.
Like, I need help.
And that's what the relationship felt like.
So once we got back together and we were in school, it just went on like that.
It was this up and down, this chaos of what's true, what's not true.
I still felt like there was so much going on in the background that he wasn't sharing with me.
He would be upset with me for things.
If I didn't drive him to school at the right time, if I would go up and work on a project without him, that kind of stuff, it was all like really petty stuff.
But it was just like when you're in so deep with someone and they know you and they can say something that just cuts to the bone.
It was like that.
It was like being in this hellscape for me anyway.
And by the end of that term, again, broke up with him as, okay, we need to break up, this isn't healthy.
And I actually found my way to a counselor.
I had never been to therapy, I'd never had a counselor.
I'd always dreamed of that, but never felt like I had access to it.
But realized through the college that I could see someone and it would be covered, so it would be free.
And when I went to this counselor, I was pretty wrecked.
I was kind of like a shell, right?
I'd been so stressed with even just like, again, keeping up with life, right?
Keeping up with my own health, my own well-being, my student loans, paying my rent, doing this insane program with all of these projects, and then all this drama of this relationship.
I was just empty and I was like, I need to get out of this.
And so that's what I told the counselor.
And I said, he has a key to my apartment, and I just need to get that key back.
It's Christmas break, I've got two weeks away.
I just don't want him showing up.
And it's not that.
Like, when I think of that, I was afraid.
I wasn't afraid that he would physically harm me in any way.
And I don't think he ever would.
That was not the dynamic that we had.
So when I say I was afraid, I need to get my key back, like, is he gonna show up at my apartment?
I was just afraid again of what would happen, of having that extreme conflict, of having someone coming at me and almost denying my reality, or putting things back in my face and turning my words around, and being in this really deep state of confusion.
I was really afraid of that, and I just didn't want him to show up.
I didn't want to be around him.
So I worked with the counselor to help hold more boundaries, and it just felt good to talk to someone about that.
I will say, this is like an aside, but the counselor did ask me about my sex life in a really kind of odd way the first time I saw him.
And because it was my first counseling experience, I didn't know if it was appropriate or not.
It just kind of threw me off.
And in the context of what we were talking about, it felt like it came out of nowhere.
And I remember feeling like, oh, I don't know now if I feel comfortable with this person.
Like, I'm coming here to share this experience of feeling unsafe.
And now I'm with this counselor, and I'm also feeling a little unsafe.
So I just mentioned that because it's always stuck with me again as well.
And it did deter me from going back.
I think I saw him one more time.
I'm not sure, but there's something about the way that he asked it that didn't feel relevant.
But again, I'm like, I'm not a counselor, and maybe he's worried that I'm being sexually abused, or there's other things happening, so it could have been relevant.
But yeah, I just remember not feeling safe, and then feeling doubly not safe.
So that was an aside.
Anyway, so that time was really about surviving.
We did break up, and then at that point, I'd been kind of so all over the place, I'd become really isolated.
I had almost like alienated what I felt like, you know, the people who were close in my life, because they were there for me, but they'd also see me go through all of this.
And it's a really tough spot to be in, because I kept creating in a way, this drama over and over again, and I knew how unhealthy it was to be with this person, and yet I kept choosing to do it again and again.
And they would be there for that, and try and help me through it, and be like, don't go back to him, or here, we'll help make you stronger, or those kind of things.
And then in the end, I would end up making these decisions and going straight back into this really unhealthy space where I wasn't well.
So I felt like I had been more alienated, and I was embarrassed.
I was so embarrassed, because again, I didn't know when I would see even friends at school, like they know him, can I talk about this?
If I'm talking about it, how do they feel?
How do they see me?
How do they see him?
It just was so messy.
And I felt like I didn't recognize myself, because I was doing and saying things from a place of desperation versus who I thought I was, or how I felt on the inside, that I had this inner strength and awareness.
I felt like that had been really stripped away.
And I had really spent most of my time, honestly, just being exhausted and confused, just working on this relationship.
Like it was so much work.
And I could kind of understand how bad it was.
But I also, there was a sense of addiction to it.
Like I felt very addicted.
It was like I had abandoned myself so much.
And because of the way our dynamic worked, I felt like it came into question.
I questioned my worth.
I questioned my confidence.
And then I also needed him to build me up, because he would.
He would say something really cruel, and then he'd be extremely kind, and loving, and supportive, and fun.
So I was starting to hate myself, because I kept abandoning myself again and again, and then asking him to kind of fill that hole, that need that I had to feel good.
I couldn't find it in myself anymore.
So I was addicted to him and to that pattern.
It had created this space in my life where I felt really afraid.
And I felt really afraid of being around him and also being without him.
And I really felt like he had power over me.
And that's what's so confusing, because at any time, I could easily leave the relationship.
Do you know what I mean?
I could easily be like, Sarah, just leave, just say no.
Just don't, don't be in this relationship.
And I had tried, and I have multiple times left the relationship.
But at the same time, I had really lost so much sense of myself, and in turn, even like my sanity, I really felt, I'm not sure if I've ever felt that messed up psychologically.
I felt like I didn't even understand sometimes what was happening, and I would find myself just feeling like a victim or like a martyr again and again.
And in a way, this is where I don't want to say this in the wrong way, because it's so subtle and it's so complicated.
Like there's so many factors at play.
But in a way, he did have this power over me.
And the power was invisible.
It was the power of like being the exact embodiment of my unhealed family patterns.
There was that at play.
And when I say that I could leave at any time, yes, I could.
But the truth is that like that choice didn't actually feel like a choice.
I felt like I didn't have that, even though I did.
And that's also, I'd say, when you know that there's like a deep unhealed trauma going on, is you're stuck in this pattern, and it feels like you don't have the choice to get out.
It feels like you are trapped.
So after that last breakup, we ran into each other and he'd gone, started going to therapy, and he was really hopeful and he said, hey, like, I'm going to be different.
Things are going to be different.
And ended up getting back together.
And so on it went.
We got back together and the drama continued.
And there was still like, I'd come across like open chat histories and random late night phone calls and mysterious meetups.
And there were certainly like other people in our relationship.
And I would bring this up, and then I would be told that I was delusional, or maybe I was overreacting, or every time something like this would happen, and it would be thrown back at me like you're crazy.
Why are you making this into a big deal?
What's your problem?
Then when we left school, like we finished our second year, it kind of went on like this.
It continued on.
We were together until a few months later, he ended up needing a break.
He's like, I need a break from the relationship.
I need to figure some things out.
And that actually felt like such relief.
I was like, wow, he's actually really looking at what he wants.
And I'm like, yes, like, it's not up to me.
Maybe he'll make a decision and he'll break up with me.
And I both wanted that and didn't want that, right?
Like, I loved this person.
This person was my best friend.
We had amazing times together.
He did care about me.
And we also had a really tragic and painful dynamic that was hurting me.
But yeah, after those two weeks, he ended up picking me.
He said, you know, I do want to be in a relationship.
And we spent the next five years together.
Now, things did calm down.
So after school, after those first two years, it felt like, you know, there was more of like a commitment.
There was less drama.
There was more focus on like actually building relationship together.
He went to counseling regularly.
I started going to counseling regularly.
We went to counseling together.
We did couples counseling and we just felt more committed.
We moved in together.
We ended up working with each other, you know, in various stints in our early careers.
We went on vacations and trips.
We did things with our families and attended different gatherings and we even adopted a dog at one point.
So we really, we built a life together.
But the complex part of this is that over that time, I still had a lot of inner conflict and I still felt this seeding of unease underneath everything.
That never went away.
And while it felt like things were more stable, like there was more commitment there and we were building this life and I wasn't seeing any other relationships.
There were no women calling at night or anything like that.
It was like things on the outside seemed one way, but then there was still this behavior there.
These little subtle moments where things were just off and what initially had caught me off guard, right?
In the beginning, when we first came together, that first comment that he made, that kind of thing had almost become normal now.
It had just become a part of the relationship and there were a range of things that he would do that ultimately, when I look back on it, would all serve the same purpose.
It was all this very subtle degrading of my confidence, of me trusting myself, of trusting my inner voice and my own knowing that would really pull me away from myself, pull me away from even my supports and my network and things that were tethering me and feeding me.
It pulled me all away, and it made me feel very beholden to him.
So I'm just going to pause here and split this into two parts.
So there'll be a part two where I'll go into the next five years of the relationship and get into a little bit more detail because we don't need a two hour long episode here.
So thank you so much for listening and holding space for me here, and I'll see you in the next one.
