My first love was everything all at once. It was the kind of love you never come back from because you never try to, never want to and could not imagine abandoning. He was the kind of boy you fight for and the kind of love you die for.
As cliché as this all sounds, we were only 16 and the world was ours. I remember sitting in his white pickup driving around town with my boots on the dash and our hands interlocked. The music was so loud that the left speaker blew and the sound of our singing/screaming combination left us deaf in both ears. Strands of twinkle lights draped across the indigo sky, claiming the summer night, and I sat back, looked up at those bright stars, took a deep breath and thanked God for the boy sitting next to me. This was most days: complete and utter bliss, just the two of us.
However, there was a third. She was the ignorance that my bliss pleaded not to have. She was the stress my composure was tested for. She was always there in the background, relentlessly trying to take my foreground.
She claimed that my boyfriend was hers, that he was her best friend first and foremost and that I was nothing but a disposable fling. But fling or not, a girl needs to know when to back off and let a relationship be a natural and beautiful thing without interference.
This girl had no idea.
She was once my best friend and the reason I met the love of my life; but she quickly became the cause of two breakups and countless emotional breakdowns. While I thought our friendship was strong, the tables began to turn and for an entire year I dealt with her annoyances. I dealt with her tickling him in front of me and noticed them sneaking around behind my back with her as the ringleader. She would answer the door to his house and would show up unannounced, which lead to me turning into the third wheel when she decided to crash our dates. Imagine the jealousy and the rage that I felt. How could she be right, that I really was second to her? The mind games were outrageous. I felt as if I was just the idiot being played in this twisted love triangle. To cope with my grief and stress, I turned to sports.
However in the cold month of February one year, the final straw was drawn. I had left for a sports tournament up in Boston, MA. Curious, I asked my boyfriend what he would be doing that night while I was gone. The answer I received stopped my heart, then gave me the adrenaline to restart it and send a string of raging texts to my boyfriend.
He was going to dinner with Her. Alone. They had plans to go to a fancy, dress-pants for him, a nice skirt for her type of place. She was paying because she was proud of him for getting a good grade and wanted to take him out to celebrate.
That is when I pulled the plug on my “perfect” relationship that had actually fallen into the puppet strings of her control. How could she make me feel like such a bad girlfriend? I was not there to celebrate with him, I was not there to coddle him and hold his hand as I felt I should. These were the mind games. 30 seconds later, the text went out to her that we were not friends, and to him that we were not a couple. I had at least found enough self-respect to stand up for myself.
The funny thing was, one month later, as he looked upon his life and realized that he had given me up for her, I got the phone call to take him back. I did on one condition: that he had to forget her. I suppose to some that would be harsh and cliché, but to equate that with the tears that streamed out of my eyes for an entire year almost every night, I would say I was easy on him.
Aside from my continual personal problems, I am sure that I am not alone in this situation. Shake your head if you can relate to having some girl break your relationship up for you. Stand up if your ex-best-friend wanted to screw your boyfriend (or did for that matter). Put your middle fingers in the air if she caused you mental pain in any way.
There is no cure for this perpetual hurt, but there are ways to conquer the jealousy and anger it locks up in you. Truth be told, I am still trying these out for myself, but maybe we can do them together. Read next week for some approaches to the seven stages of grief in this scenario.