The Ghosts of A Heartbroken Past
“Who hurt you? And why do you enjoy being toxic?” is a text message that came through my phone recently from a guy that is now just another memory.
Although I ended up blocking him, unblocking him, and cursing him out over that “innocent” question, I don’t consider myself toxic. Nor do I enjoy being toxic, that’s absurd.
I’ll put it to you like this: I’m no stranger to being heartbroken and I am no stranger to being a heart breaker.
It’s the ebb and flow of life. Never believe anyone who feels they’ve only been a victim and never a perpetrator of anything, to me that screams that they lack self-awareness and want to be painted as a saint. And well... that’s boring.
Unless you live under a rock, none of us should be strangers to heartbreak. Heartbreak can come from your relationship (or lack thereof) with family members or it can from love. In love, heartbreak should not be synonymous with trauma but for a lot of us, it is.
What is interesting to me is that every day I see or hear stories from women that have been through hell and back with men. Their hearts don’t turn cold. Instead, they still have the capacity to love these men no matter how terribly they were treated. And not your normal, minor things. But toxic, in the trenches type shit. Abuse, manipulation, cheating, all kinds of stuff. Was it love for real or just an unchecked attachment style and codependency?
I wish women were socialized to be more no-nonsense when it came to how we allow ourselves to be treated by men, but that’s another story for another day.
My earliest heartbreak from someone’s dusty ass son came young. Like 13yrs old young. Trying to love people more than I had the capacity to love myself was a disaster, but I pressed forward anyway. Even if it makes no logical sense, most of us just want to FEEL something from someone else, even if they are incapable of reciprocating it.
What’s always been mind boggling to me, is how no matter how many pieces my heart has been broken in, I still have the capacity to love. To feel. To share. Too many heartbreaks can cause us to turn cold but, me? I got warmer to some, and detached for others.
My love is sometimes easy to get but hard to keep. And I guess the latter is where my role in breaking hearts comes in at, because once I decide that I have stopped loving you, that’s it.
There is no convincing me to stay, I tend to not care how much you may love or like me. It’s like a switch gets hit once I make it up in my mind that you and I won’t be a thing anymore.
I used to carry years and years of pent up aggression towards past relationships but one day I decided that I actually don’t have exes anymore. I had to give myself permission to release.
Contrary to popular belief, I try to approach each romantic situation with a fresh heart and mind. And even though I keep meeting the same people in different bodies (cuz admit it, even if none of our romantic interests look alike, we all have a type) I try to treat each person with a sense of curiosity and allow myself to learn and explore them.
But a girl like me is both jaded and open at the same time. If this confuses you, imagine how much it confuses me
One thing I’ve learned over the years is that if you don’t heal, your heartbreaks can haunt you.