-A Lie
I decided to focus on family, choosing to believe and have faith that everything else would fall into place. I wasn't comfortable-or good-at lying to her.
So, when Samantha surprised me one day by swallowing her pride and asking directly if a...
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All relationships begin with attraction. But why are we drawn to some and not to others? Looks and personality play a role, of course, yet there's often something deeper at work—a predisposition toward certain traits that feel inexplicably familiar. In every prior relationship, something clicked, a recognition of sorts, that made it feel right. Looking back, I realize this familiarity often mirrored the relationship I shared with my mom during my youth.
Something about Nina, and the pattern of her behavior, resonated with that familiarity. Despite being unsettling, it was also oddly soothing. There was something familiar in the arc of her emotions—riding out the storm with anticipation, craving the calm that always followed.
No relationship before or since has ever led to violence. I've spent countless hours reflecting, piecing together the events that transpired, and trying to understand what happened. I'm not looking to blame anyone. At this stage of my life, I'm far beyond pointing fingers. I just want clarity. But the bottom line is this: no explanation makes what happened acceptable.
After that night, I vowed to never lose control like that again. The guilt and shame of my actions, combined with the desperate resolve to ensure it never happened again, gave me strength. Over time, I came to understand that Nina had little control over her reactions, and so I learned to master my own.
I avoided circumstances that might trigger her, and when those situations were unavoidable, I either stayed silent or left. I refused to take the bait. She would taunt me, calling me weak and pathetic, but I already knew what weak and pathetic felt like. I wasn't going there again.
Nina and I tried to make it work. We continued our counseling sessions, and she explored various therapies and medications. But she hated the foggy numbness that came with the latter. I saw the loving, bubbly person she could be, and the medication's dulling effects made her seem like a shadow of herself. Her energy for life faded.
She performed for her daughters, but when they were gone, she spent hours on the couch watching TV, drained of vitality. Some nights, she never made it back to our bed. I'd find her asleep on the couch and cover her with a blanket before returning alone to our room. Although the medication brought her stability, it also robbed her of herself. Eventually, she stopped taking it.
Our relationship continued as fleeting stages of feast and famine. Her disorder and my desperate need not to fail again created a toxic codependency. I gorged during times of sustenance, fully aware the length of unrequited affection to follow. The periods of drought were, at best, lonesome, and at worst, intensely emotional and insanely chaotic. These poetic verses mask the ugly detail, now revealed, of our relationship. It was a three-year, turbulent ride that at times ascended the heavens, but, with increased frequency, crashed and resided at a depth much further south.
I felt like I lost my first love, and along the way, my dream. Nina didn't own the title or deserve all credit for this realization, and to grant her such might be considered a slight by my ex-wife. I imagine Samantha secretly cheered the end of the relationship that, although wasn't the sole reason for the death of our marriage, served as the catalyst.
Too sensitive—no other words better describe my struggles. Nina's cutting remarks still sting, her accusations of weakness and pathetic failure reverberating in my mind. Those words didn't just hurt; they resonated with wounds from my past.
