Thursday, October 31, 2013

Giving What You Need to Someone Else

I got a random text tonight from a guy I have known since I was very young, Jake. It said...
Hey it's Jake. Hope your [sic] doing well. Just wanted to send some love your way.
It's interesting because I have been having one of those weeks, as I just said to my friend Maggie, that makes me feel like I am going to be single forever. Even though on the surface the text of the text was sweet, given the backstory of what happened between Jake and me, I wasn't going to reply, but then I realized that even though I didn't want to - in a weird way, it was probably what he needed, and so I wrote...
Hey Jake. Thanks for the note. Hope you're doing well.
I know you might be thinking that it sounded a little cold - but I am really hoping he doesn't take the opportunity to start up a dialogue, I just didn't want to ignore him because...being ignored sucks.

What happened between Jake and I is an interesting story - we went to elementary school together but I moved away after the 4th grade. Fast forward 20 years we randomly ran into each other at a bar in West Hollywood and with the help of having been friends on Facebook all these years, were able to recognize each other.

We started spending time together, as friends. Over a period of about three weeks, we spent a lot of time together and began to get really close (again, I stress, platonically) but then things took a strange and stressful turn. As it turns out, Jake is a diagnosed bipolar and was not taking his meds. He began to slip into a severe manic episode and refused to get help. He began to alienate his family and his friends - which, as it turns out, is why he was being so clingy with me.

When I sided with his family and friends and told him that he needed to get help he hit me with a barrage of messages telling me what a terrible person I am and that I am evil for the span of an entire day only to completely change his tune and tell me he loves me and call me endlessly the next day. I realized this was obviously all attributable to his illness but didn't respond to any of his messages - both the bad and the good - and chose to just cut him out of my life. (It seems harsh, but I had only reconnected with him three weeks prior, and as my mom told me, it was far from my responsibility to take this on).

He did call me to tell me he had voluntarily checked himself into a hospital to get help - and I was happy to hear that, but again, I had already made the decision to be done, so I didn't call him back. That is where things left off in March. I have no desire to invite Jake back into my life, but it's 7 months later and he's clearly still thinking about me.

I would be lying if I said that my decision to reply to Jake was entirely selfless...

It's been over 2 months since Parker broke things off with me. And as much as I wish I was and as humiliating as it is to admit, I'm not over it. I could go into the details of my inner monologue on whether or not I am really still hung up on him, the idea of him, or just the idea of a potential man in my life - the truth is, I'm not sure, but that's irrelevant to my point.

What is relevant is that he has completely ignored every attempt I have made to reach out to him, with one exception (the first time), since the day things ended. To me, that is so cold, and makes me feel really awful. Yes, I sent him kind of a crazy email, but in my defense I was really sad - and it wasn't mean-crazy, it was nice-crazy.

Two weeks ago when I finally got a job, (Side note: WOOT WOOT!!!) I sent him a text to let him know since we had talked SO much about it, and I didn't even get a cursory congrats text. I don't get it. Is he just going to pretend that I don't exist? It is so weird to me that he could just stop caring so completely, so quickly. I don't know why I keep trying - but I care if he still cares. I know it's a tad pathetic (especially because my facebook "recon" indicates he is already seeing someone else, of course). I need to accept a fact I so desperately want to disprove, but it's not gonna happen. The disproving part, I mean. I hope the acceptance part will happen sooner rather than later.

And so, it is because I have been hurt by this behavior so much, that I decided to give to Jake what Parker will never give to me: acknowledgement, compassion, closure.

It's making me feel better...for today.

2 comments:

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