(names are changed in this story)

This is a love story that isn’t really a love story at all.

Perhaps it is more of an obsession story. Funny though, it didn’t start that way or end that way. But the middle is pure obsession.

It was freshman year of college, the first semester. I was on my way to see my long-term boyfriend at the time, Jack, in his dorm and in steps Ned. Ned stops me and asks me to vote for whos room I think is the coolest out of his and his friends.

Option A: a business majors very professional room, B: regular bachelor pad dorm room style, and C: a dorm room with this magnificent beach and sunset mural on the wall with a very relaxed vibe including a hammock in the room. I choose C. Which turned out to be Ned’s.

I continued up to the second floor to see Jack. Not giving Ned a second thought.

A few weeks later my friend, Bunny and I decide to go to a party that we heard about. We brought Jack. There is a commotion as everyone announces that “toilet seat” has arrived… which turned out to be Ned. Ned asked me if Jack was my boyfriend or my brother because he couldn’t tell.

Bunny and Ned shared the same major and became friends, which naturally meant that we became friends as well.

I eventually broke up with Jack when he continued to call my clothes “slut shirts” and threatened to kill himself if I ever broke up with him. At that point, it had to be over. I wasn’t responsible for his life and I wouldn’t take that on.

Ned wanted to hang out all the time. He was fun most of the time. Though, it took months and months and months before I looked at him other than a friend. But once my eyes saw him differently, so did my heart, and my body and man oh man, I was hooked. And so was he.

It was intense and all sorts of butterflies and giggles and the sweetest kind of love. Until I heard him deny us to a friend. That changed it all. I couldn’t go back to what was. At this time I didn’t understand that a different type of trust could be built and how forgiveness really worked. I crumbled inside.

And it triggered an insecurity that I didn’t even know I had.

I felt stupid, embarrassed, not good enough, ugly. And then it was like I had this jealous beast inside of me that he was eager to feed. And he did. He fed it often. In very clever and unique ways.

This was the beginning of the end and the cycle of dysfunction began. It grew slow and steady.

I had confronted him about what he said and he, of course, sweet-talked his way into convincing me that he loved me and wanted to be with me. And I all Bambi eyed, believed. And let’s not forget the power in a kiss.

With time the dynamics got even more confusing. He would attempt to isolate me from my friends, including Bunny, who was the best friend in the world to me, by telling me that NO ONE liked to be around me. That I made everyone feel really uncomfortable because I was the most sensitive person in the entire world.

This confused me at first and I wanted to fight off the thoughts that it could be true.  However, I was pretty easy to convince. Back at this time in my life, I truly wondered if I was loveable and good enough.

Ned would say the weirdest things to me to cut me down and yet, I stayed.

Because I also loved the side of him that was fun, supportive, that made me laugh… and of course, his kiss and the way I felt in his arms. I felt special when I was with him. That I was his and he was mine.

I also had some of the best experiences of my life at that time, with him. He is a part of almost all of my stories from when I went to college for my bachelors. Ned also had so much good and I knew he was battling his own challenges. His mom was really sick and she died.

This allowed me to give him so many passes. What kind of ass can’t look past cruel behavior when someone has a parent that died? I wouldn’t be that person. So I stayed and felt myself disappear into that crazy girlfriend, constantly needing reassurance from a guy that happily fed my jealousy and insecurity.

Until I was done.

I remember the day perfectly. It was a couple of weeks before my birthday and he had just gotten back from a cruise. He picked me up for lunch. We went to KFC. As we were talking over lunch, I could see his smile widen and his eyes light up and he went in for a dig.

He began to tell me about this lady on the cruise who loved to dance with him and press her chest against his. My heart dropped, but in a different way this time. Another shift happened. And I was done with hoping the romantic stuff between us would work out. The view from my eyes was no longer the same. The obsession had been cured.

It literally felt like this guy woke up in the mornings and would think to himself, “how can I hurt Steph today?” And then he would put it in action.

Two weeks later or so, I agreed to go on a blind date. Zip turned out to be a fantastic boyfriend. And we dated up until I moved to Connecticut for Americorps. My friendship with Ned began to drift away.  A few months after I started dating Zip, Ned moved  out of state.

We stayed in touch for a few years, however, our friendship gradually faded out.

Now when I think of that time and think of some of the memories, I feel embarrassed by who I was in that relationship. One time, I even jumped out of his truck on a gravel road on a way to a friend’s house while we were going 25 mph. I didn’t think I could get hurt (luckily, I only suffered some major bruising).  The only thing I was thinking about was getting away from his words that were suffocating me and I wanted to survive. It was the only way I could think to get away from him.

Even though I feel silly for who I was in moments in that relationship, I know that it was a valuable lesson in my life. I needed that experience to be who I am today. To release judgment and embrace understanding.

I get how we can get sucked into somebody that once we are deeply infatuated, and unhealthy behaviors are present, it begins to feel like we are getting eaten alive and our life is frozen in time and desperation sets in with the mixed feelings of love and hate and confusion.

We have no contact now. And when he does come to mind, I don’t carry any anger or negativity with me and I wish him happiness and for all of his goals to be achieved. What a wild ride we had.

And I know I learned so much about myself, love, and relationships after spending three yo-yo years with him and then a weird dance of a friendship for a few years that followed.

There is no point in wishing that I had ended it sooner.  I stayed as long as it took to realize that I mattered more than my desire for his love.

I hope for you, the reader who can relate to this story,

that you will be strong enough to walk away from a relationship where the love feels like knives and it is confusing as can be. As I heard Glennon Doyle say this week on her insta stories, “if you have to choose between a relationship and saving your soul, always save your soul.”

You are worth the greatest love story of your life.

Love and hugs,

Steph