All I've ever had

Author's note: This is a personal reflection from a past relationship. Names/details changed.

I've recently become obsessed with online tarot readings. Do I actually believe? Not really. Yet there is something so hopeful in what they tell you. It makes me want to have a little faith when really there is none. My favorite reader is a gay Armenian who calls me cutie patootie and yummy peanut butter sandwich. He gives me a little dopamine hit when the darkness comes in hard.

These past months have been bleak. I've struggled to explain to people why I am still mourning and obsessing over a situation I left that was horrible for me. I see the truth of it, and there are no illusions of reconciliation or apologies, yet my mind couldn't let it go. I could feel the annoyance, and felt the shame, when I'd bring it all up time after time. I asked myself what it was I couldn't let go of and I finally figured it out.

This was all I've ever had. 

My ex-husband never gushed over me. Every card for every occasion said some version of "I know I don't say it but..." and then the writers of Hallmark would write a few nice things. He couldn't shut up but saying something affirming to me was the line he drew. Words are important to me, and I longed to hear something, anything, that said I was truly loved. What followed our marriage was a lot of awful dates, some brief periods with people I can't fathom even talking to now, a bad semi-relationship, and then him. 

He quickly figured out all I was starving to hear. He learned where I was desperate, needy, and weak, and presented himself as the miracle I never thought was possible. The entire relationship was built on a fantasy. It was volatile much sooner than I remembered. A brief moment that has left a deep wound, though slowly healing, is still painful and raw.

He got me with his words. He pushed until he broke me down enough to believe just maybe he loved me and was sincere. Discards came soon after, with intermittent reinforcement until the end. 

Yet I clung to the fantasy and the lies, as even with some of the most excruciating moments of my life, were great ones I'd never had. To let go of it, even though none of it was true, means I have never had anything. What I wanted so much had slipped right through my fingers and washed away as there was never actually anything to hold onto.

I spent months sobbing myself to sleep at night. Alcohol, weed, Valium I bought in Mexico, anything to stop feeling. Though I've finally been able to face my emotional storm, and feel more stable and in control, the voices of the past haunt me. 

While burning memories to release myself and the energy, I came upon a book he wrote in for my birthday. If I'd told anyone I would have been instructed not to read the words. But I wanted them. One last time. Because that's all I ever had.