To give context, I am a stallion, (term coined by Megan Thee Stallion) and by definition I am a tall woman who knows how to make space for herself. I hold myself with a regard of being a “boss” and I am unapologetic when it comes to my work ethic, speaking my mind, and getting what I want. When this translates to my love life, I haven’t had the best luck.
As a tall girl, I can speak for most of us when I say that we look for tall men. Men who are taller than six foot specifically. And for me, I usually went for the tall athletic guys who played basketball and were well above six that range.
I am writing this for those tall girls specifically, so you don’t follow in my steps. The one boy who makes all of my friends ‘fake gag’ in disgust, is the cause of my fear of being ‘ghosted’ or ‘flaked on’ is that tall 6’6 basketball boy. That boy who I think of when ‘Thank you next’ by Ariana Grande comes on the radio, the boy that I use as the rubric to grade every other man who comes into my life to see if they should be cut off. The story is long with the ‘rubric’ (that’s our little code name for him). I’ve known him since I was 16 and finally quote on quote “pretty.” He was a guy I played basketball with, whom my father loved, supported, and considered a son, he was also the guy I first fell in love with. At 16, you don’t know anything, you’re still insecure and unknowledgeable when it comes to boundaries and being in love. At 16, I was all of the latter and even more, I was a doormat.
My first mistake was understanding truly why I liked him. To call myself out, he was an easy transition into dating, and he was that dreamy tall boy who played basketball (the boy that my teenage self always dreamed of dating). I never wanted to date the quarterback in high school, no, rather the starting point guard, the boy who was a shoe in to play basketball in college, the model student athlete. The fact that I already built my persona of a dream boy around ‘rubric’ was toxic and made me want him even more. From making up scenarios in my head, to texts that left me always feeling confused if we were dating, this was enough for my brain to associate him with feelings of happiness and wholeness.
I remember the feeling of his name as a notification on my phone screen.
I remember the feeling of my father talking about him constantly.
I remember the feeling of my heart shattering when he got his first girlfriend and it wasn’t me.
All these feelings were because I believed his words and not his actions. The daily “I miss you” text and “come visit me!” and “you’re the only girl for me” is not enough to show he wanted me. He never once SHOWED he cared, and that should have been enough to take the scissors out to cut him off. But I didn’t. Then 17-year-old me still didn’t know when to talk back, when to speak, when to understand I was being used. This led me to keep a friendship with him throughout my college years.
Now here is the climax to my story, and why I say this boy changed me, why he is my “rubric” and why I am writing this article in the first place. I did everything I just previously mentioned but AGAIN in college. I was still in love with him obviously, I’ve always kept the door slightly ajar with him, never fully closing it because he was still my, “dream come true tall basketball boyfriend”, even after hurting me.
I let him in my life again, but this time I thought I understood what it meant to be used and to be hurt because I was freshly out of a “situation ship” and he was freshly out of his first break up with the girl I’ve been jealous of since I was seventeen (just now I am honest with myself to admit it). I let him into the lives of my parents, I watched his basketball games with my family, his name became natural rolling off of my tongue during dinner conversations with my parents, my strict parents allowing me to drive late to see him play, his constant texts, his admittance for his love for me, his promises, his admittance to his teammates wanting to meet me…..
All ended up in hell.
“Yzzy I love you, you know that.”
“I miss you so much, Yzzy.”
“When are you going to visit?”
“I love you. Stay safe call me.”
We’re all broken promises. I found out I wasn’t the only one and I relived my 17-year-old heartbreak again. With the same boy. With the same mistakes I made when I was immature and insecure. Now here is the theme with my heartbreak. Don’t make a perfect boy in your head, he doesn’t exist, not physically anyway. He’s not going to look any certain way; he’s not going to play a certain sport. He’ll never be the Nathan Scott to your Haley James (one tree hill reference), which was what I wanted. And this is what’s hard for me: he will never be the perfect height.
Sigh. This is the hardest thing to admit. My 5’9 ish self, almost 5’10, wanted that dream boy.
So girls, don’t put your dream boy into a box that can be checked off with a few attributes that will help stroke your ego. Your dream man will not be someone you expect, physically and emotionally. He will not come into your life in a way that you expect either. Do not do this because it leads to heartbreak and self-insecurity.
Because of your ‘rubric,’ I finally learnt what loving myself means. What it truly means when you ‘love’ someone and how words don’t mean $h!t basically until you have actions to back them up. And because of you I am who I am today. A stallion, a bad ass, a WOMAN who can block you off everything, delete your number, doesn’t need to constantly look at your social media, and can look you in the eyes when I see you in person in passing and finally believe it when I say ‘I’m happy for you and I wish you the best’ and mean it without allowing you back into my life. I’m done with you, done with your fake words, your BS, and the false reality you created in my head that you loved me.
But because of you I know…I know when to cut people off, I no longer feel the ping of rejection, and nor do I feel the need of the presence of a boy like you to satisfy the insecure 16-year-old hidden in me.
I don’t need you. But it’s because of the death of my old self and the shedding of my insecurities showed me my toxic traits. So thank you for showing me the shadow of myself. Thank you for making me who I am today.
But never forget… It’s still screw you.