The love I almost didn’t walk away from
“I need this to work out”
Those were the words that would enter my mind many times before I came to the conclusion that I needed to let it go.
If I could give one word of encouragement to anyone who was dating, I’d give them these two as it will be the biggest two pieces of advice, I will give my daughters.
Don’t date someone to fill a void. When I first started dating, still wounded, still insecure, still hurt I dated with the intention to fill a void. Not for myself but I was terrified of raising my girls without a father in the home. It was a void I felt the need to fill fast because I knew the pain all too well of what it’s like to have a absent father. I didn’t want that for my daughters. But the problem with dating with the intention to fill a void (well one of them) is that you only focus on the void that is being filled and not the toxicity that surrounds it.
Don’t date potential because potential is all you’ll get. When you date someone thinking what “they could be” or on their way of becoming you lose sight of who they are right now and who they are right now is the person you are dating and who you would marry with a big possibility of them never becoming the potential you have created in your mind. It’s not fair to you and honestly, it’s not fair to them either.
You date and look for the present quality you want in a lifelong partner, not a quality you believe you will one day see with prayer and patience.
The red flags were there. Not long after we started dating. the first few months? I was ghosted for a month (Yes, I know I should have walked away then!) He came back, offered to bring dinner like nothing happened and me? A hurt little pick me girl let him.
If I had learned anything about this relationship, my first post-divorce relationship it would be this. Romanticize life, but don’t romanticize relationships.
Because that is what kept me surviving this relationship for so long. I remained so focused on the little love story unfolding, I was so focused on the little sweet gestures instead of the big red flags. The red flags that came with withholding my phone during arguments, screaming in my face, throwing plates leaving them shattered on the ground, pushing me on my birthday, commenting on my weight, and blaming my ex-husband for leaving me when he did.
But I stayed, because I saw his potential. I stayed because I believed he could be the man he wanted to be. I stayed because I believed after each time it would be the last. I stayed because a life outside of another breakup seemed too unbearable. Telling my girls another man was going to be out of our lives made me feel like a failure. I stayed because I thought the fact that he chose me should be enough to stay.
But then I realized that just because someone “Chooses you” doesn’t mean they are right for you, good for you or even good to you.
I realized that setbacks aren’t failures if you learn from them and that it’s never too late to walk away and get back on course.
You will make a lot of mistakes on your journey to build and own your life. You will make wrong investments, choose the wrong people to walk beside you and so much more. But what you do in those setbacks is what makes the difference.
You could choose to stay in the setback because making it right and realizing you made a mistake would hurt your pride too much.
or you can step aside and get back on the right track. Turning that setback into a lesson and only that instead of a life sentence.
Friend if you are rebuilding your life and find yourself in a similar situation, maybe you're not in a toxic relationship but there is something else going on that is stealing your life away from you, keeping you from living your best days and finding peace in the life God has called you to live. I hope you choose the first. Often times it will feel like the most unnatural thing choosing peace over familiarity. But your legacy will thank you for it.
Until next time, One day at a time, mama.
