Learning to Live Without Him — 2
A friend of mine who recently went through a difficult break up and is currently in the process of healing from it asked to share her story and the lessons she’s learning through the healing process. I happily obliged as I think there’s a lot we can learn from her experiences. However, in spite of my pleas that she append her name, she refused and opted to share anonymously instead. The story will come in a 2 part series which I’ll share every week for the next 2 weeks. I hope you enjoy & learn from her experiences.
NOTE : To maintain the integrity of the story, I am sharing as is and have only edited for typos.
Also, all the names have obviously been changed 😊
LEARNING TO LIVE WITHOUT HIM
I travelled three days later. My first stop was Asaba. I met up with two of my friends Ada and Ngozi. Ngozi came from in Enugu so we could all have a good weekend together. Good weekend it was. Need I go into details? We hardly slept all weekend. From the movies, to the club, to a restaurant, to a make up studio… and it goes on. It was all I had hoped for and more.
We hardly had time to talk about Ken and my break up throughout the weekend. On few occasions, I’ll see something or hear a music that’ll remind me of him and I’ll say to my friends that this particular thing reminded me of him. They’ll usually just give me a look that said “that’s not why we are here”, or say “forget him”. I knew that they didn’t want to bring it up for the best reasons, and honestly that wasn’t why we were there. Still, I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. Did I want to talk about it? Or did I just want to ‘let life happen’?
We ended the weekend in church on Sunday morning, after which Ngozi and I headed back to Enugu.
TAKING A TIME OUT
I had always wanted to do this for sometime. However, some factors prevented me. Sometimes, it is exactly what we need. To take a pause, away from our usual life. To think, to have a nice time. To exist in a world where nothing really happens, where our daily goal is to do whatever makes us happy. I literally had to dig deep into my savings to do this, but I did anyway.
Sometimes we want to wait for our big break so we can go on exquisite trips. We forget that there is almost always somewhere we can afford that gives us even as much happiness. That place for me is Enugu. Sometimes we work so hard, save a lot of money (or not so much, depending) and never really get to enjoy the money work so hard for. We just keep working to make money and forget to actually live, and what is life if we are not living it to the fullest? What is life if we are not pausing to think about how far we’ve come with it and where exactly we are headed?
On getting to Enugu, I woke up every morning and planned my day in my head. Once Ngozi left for work, I would do chores, have breakfast, rest for a while and then I’m off to make me happy. I was either going to the mall to have ice cream or shop for something; going to a buka to get abacha or another native food; going to the all new base to have pizza; going to have drinks; visiting a friend or doing whatever the hell I felt like. Whatever made me happy, I did, as long as it did not hurt anyone. I made sure to be the focus in my life even in something as minor as having a good time, I made sure to be the lead actor. Of course I paid a price, but it was worth every bit of it.
CHOOSING ME
"The ultimate life is one that brings you ultimate comfort and others, as less as possible discomfort" someone once said that to me over drinks. I’ve always been the one who goes overboard once I care about someone. I’ve always derived happiness from seeing people happy, I’ve always been scared of loosing people and scared of people even, and people have always taken advantage of it. Once they saw my fears, they preyed on it. So I started to hide so people don’t see how vulnerable I can be. In his case, I hid for a while but at some point I got comfortable and let it out and he did the exact same thing.
Often times we assume people will treat us the way we treat them. The truth is that the average human being is selfish and the world we live in encourages it.
So I learnt that my job is to make 'me' happy, first. especially when it comes to relationships. I have the most amazing friends. We all do the most for each other.
Love is meant to be sacrifice, but I will not sacrifice something that is fundamental to my happiness. Those are the ones that hurt the most, because someday I will expect the other person to do the same and their actions would say "did I beg you?".
If there is anything I require at all to make me happy and you are not willing to do it, face the door and stop occupying space in my life. If you ever want to leave, face the door. I have learnt that I am the prize here. I have learnt to do what makes me happy. I’m working on myself, my hurt, my goals. To become a better person for myself, for those who love me, for those who look up to me. I have learnt to never accept less than I deserve no matter the situation. I have learnt to choose me.
On one of the days I went out, I was crying and a guy approached me. He asked what the problem was, I couldn’t talk so he just handed me the paper towel he got me and asked me to punch in my phone number and I did.
When I got home that evening he called me and asked again why I was crying after exchanging pleasantries. I laughed and then said “because of man”. He said he knew. He said that only genuine love could make someone break down in a public place because of another person and that I should be happy I can still feel love because it is rare in our world of today. I smiled to myself and told him thank you. Then he called my name. When I answered he said “I lost my dad at a very young age and I thought I was going to die. What you are going through now I have gone through it. Not just from my dad but also from women I have loved, but the death of my dad taught me something and I’ll share with you” he said “my dear, no matter how much you love someone there is nobody you cannot live without.”
This hit the right nerves and it made me ask myself “why exactly do you think you can’t live without someone that is so sure they can live without you?”. If he was strong enough to let me go, then I am equally strong enough to go.
On that same day, a mutual friend of Ken and I said to me “no matter how much you think he loved you, he did not value you”. I am certain he saw the confusion on my face because he continued, “there is a line between love and value that makes a huge difference. You cannot teach someone to value you. You cannot pray it into someone. They can only see that you are worth it for themselves, and believe it when I say that you are more than worth it. But I don’t think you know it.”
LOVE, VALUE AND THE THIN LINE
He did not value me and even I did not value myself enough. The more I stayed the less he valued me and the less I valued myself. I have learnt to value myself, and I have also learnt that sometimes value plays a more important role than love in relationships.
With everyone I met. With every strong words they said, I grew stronger. I drew strength from the words they said to me, I drew strength from their smiles, from their kindness, from their belief in me. I started to see that people even thought better of me than I thought of myself. I knew that these people believed in me and I didn’t want to let them down. So with each day that passed, I made a decision to be stronger. It was hard. On some days, my heart broke all over again and I would break down and cry so hard. I would feel the pain all over again. Still I would pick myself up, wipe my tears and keep moving.
While I was in Enugu, I got an offer letter for my present job. I was so happy even though I knew I had to choose between the job and cutting my holiday short. Who was I kidding? Of course I was going back to Lagos.
On the day I was to return, I was at the bus park when a young handsome man walked in. I looked at him and thought ‘hmmmn cute’ and continued with my texting. After sometime, he came and sat right beside me and started to initiate a conversation. Once again in my mind I thought “cute but to be honest, I don’t have the strength to get to know anyone”. He kept talking and I just kept throwing aloof replies at him in other not to seem rude. However, I noticed that the few times I looked at him he avoided eye contact and I knew there was something about him. I would later find out he was a seminarian and it all made sense.
As our conversation went on, one thing led to another and my break up came up. Once again, he gave me his own words of wisdom but one thing stuck. He said “when God created you and put you on earth, He gave you everything you will ever need to go through this life. Do not be scared of anything, do not let anything bother you because you are well equipped to go through it”. Every time I remember that statement in everything I do, it gives me hope. It gives me hope because I know that I will pull through eventually.
OPENING UP
One thing that has helped in my healing process is talking about it. Sometimes we try to hide what we are going through. It is obviously not everyone we should tell our problems to. But sometimes, the more we talk about it the better we feel. So if we ever meet someone who we feel is open to listening to us we should definitely talk. Maybe not telling the entire long story but it’s okay to let people know we are going through something. Hearing the good things people had to say to me about me definitely helped me grow my esteem, it made me feel better. It made me want to remain the person I was as and not let my bad experience change me, instead to let it strengthen me.
I left Enugu feeling so much better. Thankfully I had to resume work immediately and that kept me busy a lot also. I was determined to let it all fuel my goal.
Xx.
