Tag Archives: breaking up

relationshipping

Happy September, year 3

year 3
The winds have changed in Tokyo, seemingly overnight.
The skies that were muffled in grey and dropping rain show fall’s turn and reveal a remarkably clear blue sky; the inescapable light reiterates that I live on an island.

America is about back-to-school excitement amidst a Labor Day weekend as Japan doggedly goes back to its school/work routine now that summer vacations are undeniably over.

I sit and contemplate what to write.

It’s quiet.
Insanely quiet for a city that is the most populous in the world.  The sliding doors are open to let in crisp, post-rain air and I have yet to hear a car honk but I can hear their tires on the pavement.

It’s been 2 years in this city, on this island.
I told myself I would wait 2 years before I cast judgment on Tokyo because:
Year 1 would be new and full of adjustments: culture shock, exploration, figuring out everything (turns out I would focus more on figuring out my relationship as S transitions).
Year 2 would allow for a sinking in of the former (or The Breakup Year).

Year 3… seems to have a full-circle theme.
I consider a recent Saturday: S and I go out to a trans party-event, we meet up with our respective good friends and the person I’m seeing is welcomed by S.  This last bit is huge, as friendliness between them has been a HELL. OF. A challenge, with 100% animosity coming from S for quite a while.  Regardless of the why, the turnaround is a notable event.  The last time S and I were out together it was disastrous so this night is significant progress.

We move on.

The arc of a new story has broken, as evidenced by impending events:
S’s BF will visit from the states, during which time I will check in to a separate apartment and check out a new Tokyo hood.
New significant people, new locations and potential moves begin to beckon.

Current mood: curious and anxious for future tidings.

 

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trans talk

She gets jealous

jealous post

and it’s really fucking cute.

But also, the fuck?!
This is unexpected.  When she was my boyfriend, he didn’t have an iota of jealousy in him.  I tested his J-meter: nada.

So what gives?
Becoming female.  With boyfriend.

He’s a really good guy, one who doesn’t shy from expressing feelings of love and hurt.  He freely compliments her physical and mental everything as he feels it, which is pretty damn often…so sweet, new love.  Insecurity doesn’t exist, yet as soon as she hears another female in the background, a knee-jerk response articulates: Who’s that?  She surprises herself with this iteration— a serious first— but in that moment her heart can’t help but feel a possessive tug and a quick flash-beat of disquiet.

As she tells me this, I can’t help but quietly wow at the psychological change I’m witnessing; for a split second my emotional whirlpool produces a thin line of sadness, reminiscing that I never did trigger this kind of possessive want from him.  But that was a different time, a different relationship, a different person.  I snap out of my flashback moment and smile; the woman before me is a changed individual, indeed.

Which leads me to another funny-cute moment of late.

S is really popular with the boys, especially Americans from the West Coast.
“So he’d fly me out to visit him.”
“Wow, S…he’s really into you.”
“Yeah…but I’m not so into him.”
“Oh?”
“Umm…squirmy gaze avoidance…”

I wait.
This is going to be good as she’s rarely shy around me.

“He’s trans.”

Oh.  Interesting.

“Except he doesn’t even fully realize it yet but he totally is.  I think that’s partly why he likes me so much.”

Head cocked, slow smile, raised eyebrow.

“Shut up, Rumi!”

I continue to look at her, put my hands up and shrug to show amused non-judgment.

“Look, I can’t be with a transsexual.  I have no interest.  Plus…he has the whole coming out and transition process ahead of him and…I just…can’t.  He needs so much support, I’d feel like I was his…mother.”

At this point I’m outright smirking as S tells me to shut it for the nth time.
We can’t help but bust out laughing as she’s heard those exact words come out of my mouth when we were going through a painful break up.

“I get it, Rumi.  I thought I did then but I really get it.”

I get that life is often full-circle but shit, I wasn’t expecting that one just yet.
Sure does give me a smile moment…significant changes.

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relationshipping

The flip-side

Truth or tactA heartbroken me walks home from a party.
It’s a long walk.  But when your heart is alternately in your throat and drag-flopping on the pavement with every step, an hour is a fast pass.

I’m still in love with my ex.  We got married a few weeks ago so I could stay in the country and tonight we’re finally going out for the first time as friends, to celebrate the marriage.  The other day she saw me getting sentimental about marriage and set me straight with, “You know this is just a visa marriage, right?”  I kept staring at the screen then, nodding, “yeah.”

Ouch.

But I’m excited; we haven’t gone out together in this new city yet and I’ve been looking forward to getting ready with her.  It’s a good way to break friendship ground.

Then she asks if it’d be cool if we meet up at the party instead because this guy that she’s been non-stop texting just asked her to dinner.  Goddammit she’s into him.  It’s been like two days since they’ve started talking but I can tell she likes him, probably more than she even knows or is willing to admit.

“If that’s what you want to do…”
“Are you sure?”
Of course I’m not sure but I’m not supposed to have to tell her that.  She’s supposed to know that we had plans to go to this thing together.

“Just…go.”

Before she’s even out the door, the tears fall fast, heavy and loud.
I try to will her to come back but with every stupid second that hollows me out I have to face that she’s gone.

***

I scan the room for her, as her friends have been asking where she is.
She’s never been one to be on time exactly but if she says she’s going to be there, she will.  Finally she comes up to me, bright smile and looking as fucking beautiful as ever.  Damn her.
…and him.  Great.  Of course he’s here.  I hate him on sight.

I get interviewed by the promoters of the club, my trusty friend helping to translate every so often.  I’m proud of myself for answering most of the questions in my non-native tongue first time out.  I scan the room in-between chatting it up with random folks here and there.  I can’t help but wonder where she is, I want to tell her about my interview.

I see her.
On. His. Lap.
Making out.

***

I’m tired of attempting to answer where the hell she disappeared to.  I have no idea but saying that is an embarrassing admittance that— that I don’t know where she is, like I used to.  She isn’t holding herself accountable to me.  I hate this realization.

I’m spent.  I’ve drunk but I’m not drunk.  I’m hurt.  I cry.  I had such expectations of this night; one of celebrating a new chapter for us, married best friends who love the hell out of each other.  This was supposed to be the most fun night yet.  We used to have such a blast going out, getting drunk, talking and laughing…god we used to laugh hard together.

Memories start to flood and the tears flood even harder to keep up with the flashback onslaught: falling in love, moving in together, knowing this is the person I want to spend the rest of my life with, trave— and I have to sit because feeling the heart break can’t be done standing solo.  I sit on a curb in the early fucking morning.  I sob.

Of course I don’t hear his footsteps.  I don’t hear or notice anything until I feel the back of my head jammed forward onto some guy’s dick.  He forces my mouth open and rams it in.  If I had a gag reflex it’d be in full revolt but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to vomit.  Except I can’t because the shock, my empty emotional self, this whole fucking night has left me void.

I don’t care anymore.
I didn’t think it could get worse.
It got worse.

***

Eventually I tell her about the assault.
She’s shocked and feels absolutely terrible.  She cries for me and keeps apologizing as she feels indirectly responsible.  She asks if I need to talk to anyone, that I should talk to someone; of course she’s available but she understands if I just want to get as far away from her as possible after the hurt she’s caused.

“I’m more hurt by you and your actions than having to suck some guy off.”
“Oh.”

Yeah.

Living with the ex?
Sure, that can be a rough ride but getting over her is plenty hard enough.

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relationshipping

I lose

my best friend every time a major relationship ends.

They’re kind-of annoying as shit to deal with— as am I— because we’re simultaneously trying to sort our own shit with our heads pretty far up our individual asses.
And those lingering details…

Who gets which car?
Joint purchases?
Debt?
Ha.

The shit overwhelms at moments and I deal by listening to band du jour on repeat and smoking dope until the banking day is over.  I procrastinate until I can’t, otherwise I’ll bust a vein in my pretty face from a massive panic attack threatening coronary.  I breathe, get my coffee and pull up the calculator.  Let’s go.  Okay, not so bad.  These digits aren’t too bad.  Oh fuck.  There’s another set of cards.  And loans.  And car payments.  And insurance.  And just…more shit.  Life costs.  Ten years of shared life is damn expensive.  Oh crap this is going to take— just add.  Keep adding.  Finally.  Moment of grand total truth.

So I suck at math.
I don’t really know what a budget is.
Whenever I’m at break up point, I have left the finances in the hands of the other so I have NO IDEA what debt situation awaits me.
My saving grace is I hate being ingratiated because that makes me breathe not so well, my brain gets spinny-cloudy and I’m incredibly impatient about getting my freedom back.

My real saving grace?
We didn’t buy a house together.
In America, getting divorced is so much easier than unjoining a house purchase.
We did one undeniably smart thing— yea!

You’d think I’d learn from the first time around.

I repeat my mantra, not only to myself but to him:
No cohabitating, no joining finances.
No cohabitating, no joining finances.

No cohabitating, no joining finances.

I maintain this.
For three months.

Then he falls on hard times and it’s easier to stay in the same house but more than anything, I can’t see past love, laughter, commitment, and an ever tightening vision of a permanent future.

I tell myself:
Even if it all goes to shit, I’ve done this before.  If I can untangle 10 years, I can work through however this may end.  But he’s also really kind and I know he won’t lie to me or screw me over financially so…what’s there to fear?

Not shit, really.
The headache and annoyance of separating seems like a disrespectful and shallow thing to consider when there’s true care, consideration and love present.

Years pass.

Then we break up.

When we’re young we hesitate to date our best friends because the potential double loss of best friend and lover is a big risk.
But I tell myself the greater the risk of hurt and loss, the greater the love.
So of course I run that risk.

Then I realize there’s even more to lose: we had become each other’s family.

The ending is damn hard.  And lonely.
But always worth the risk.

 

 

 

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relationshipping

The joke

My eyeballs need cocaine

is on me.
Again.

So there’s nothing like time and distance to get over someone.
I excise the other from my life to move on.
It really helps.

I think I’ve got recovering from heartbreak down— yea!
I create emotional distance through physical distance.
I make sure our worlds don’t collide and my brain-heart is trained: the second I sniff voluntary distance (from me or the other), emotional detachment follows.

As usual, when I’m pretty confident that I can get through one emotional puzzle, the universe throws a giant hamster ball in my path.
I get a conundrum wrapped in the guise of a three-part love present.

1) I fall for someone.
2) I fall hard.
3) It’s. Long. Distance.

Of course it is.
Motherfucker.

I have trained my instincts so well that this situation is a mindfuck.
What— get close to someone when they’re countless miles and time zones away?
Are we really establishing a foundation over text?!
This sounds stupid and I shake my head at myself.

Except for the damn love, people.

And we meet so seldom that every time feels like the first time.
What am I doing?

Usually I fall in love and into a relationship like the oldest lesbian U-Haul joke we all know.
I need to learn how to pace myself in a relationship but I don’t know if this— the complete opposite— is the answer.
But it sure as hell is a lesson in a different kind of patience.

I tell myself to stay in the moment and relax when we meet even though my brain knows the moment has a very short lifespan.  There are so many thoughts, stories, feelings of the mundane and extraordinary I want to share but when I’m confronted with T minus 150 minutes and counting— I am rendered mute because my heart beats in time to the tick-tick-tock of the countdown clock.  And what are words when I can actually touch this person?  Because we’ve been wording 6,000 times over for the past too many days.

I give in to the clock; I acknowledge but don’t begrudge its presence.
I experience the moment since this moment is what I have.

I am grateful.
And excited.

And terrified.

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relationshipping

Denial vengeance

Inpatientis a thing and it is NOT fun.

We go to the show and my <10-day ex tells me, “The singer’s totally checking you out.”
“Really?!!”

That’s awesome for my self-esteem.  I look over to their merch stand and as I make eye contact with the singer, she walks to the bathroom.  My ex follows her.

They emerge some minutes later and my ex tells me about her conversation with the cute singer:
I told her I liked their set, that we came from Memphis to see them.   She asked who ‘we’ meant, I pointed to you and said, my girlfriend.

Oh.

Except we’re broken up.  And you have a crush.

My ex continues:
Since we’re not going to have sex, I’m going to see *** (her crush).

Slam my heart against the wall a little harder, why don’t you?  Just like that my ex has simultaneously cock-blocked someone I could have some random fun with AND informed me that she’ll be driving two hours to see her crush, leaving me no way to get around this small unknown town for the night.  Awesome.

It’s a damn shitty, gross feeling to know that as I’m sweating stale beer and starving, my ex is out talking to, kissing? fucking?! her crush.  Love has no rules and new love doesn’t suffer fools gladly; it is too young, wild and headstrong to pause for words like consideration and other people’s feelings.

Insomnia hits.  My stomach growls because I want greasy, hot, melty food (preferably of the starchy variety) to sop up my show alcohol, but I can’t NOT think about my ex potentially fucking her new someone and that instantly nauseates me.  I stare blankly at the TV.

3:30, 4, 4:30AM.

Thank god my little compadre pooker is with me; her familiar muzzle and warm little body comforts me.  I hug my little Izzy dog and we try to sleep.

5:30, 6, 6:30AM.

Sleep never comes but my ex comes back to drive us home.

She looks exhausted and I almost offer to drive the first bit so she can crash but I just. don’t. have. it. in. me.

I think a fuck of a lot the whole way home.

We had a remarkable decade

but

I have no regrets of an ending of us.

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relationshipping, the sex

The last time

Inpatientis a mindfuck.

I never know that the last sex will be the last sex.
It’s a hollow shock once realization hits.

***

We break up.
Oh, right, we did buy those tickets for the show next week.
In another state, hotel room for the night.
We decide to go.
Ol’ times sake.

We sit at a famed meat-and-three joint on the road to the show.  We’re quiet, but able to maintain conversation.  Things feel comfortable for the first time in our post-break-up world.  I look out the window, breathing in the cloudless Missouri sky; it’s a beautiful blue and suddenly—

Her: What?  What is it?  Why are you looking like that now?
Me: I’m just processing…you really want to know?
Her: Yeah, you got obviously sad and quiet all of a sudden.
Me: It just hit me that we’ve had our last sex.
Her: Silence.  Whoa this is weird; she’s never at a loss for words.
Me: What’s up?  Are you okay?
Her: I thought we’d have sex tonight, you know, because…it’d be the perfect ending.
Me: Seriously?!  But we’re broken up…and I need to process that and…I just…can’t.

She’s affected, which surprises me.
Slow tears roll down her face, which floors me.

Neither of us eat anything else and as I pay for the check she gets on her phone.
She’s texting her crush, who happens to live not so far from where the show is.

I can count the number of days we’ve been broken up.  She has a new crush.  Why the hell would I think she’d want to have a last sex?

She drives.
I think.

A meaningful last sex sounds sweet but sweet sentimentality like this is not a language I speak.  As she grieves over a last sex that won’t happen, I recall and play our last in my head.  Only because it was fairly recent am I able to remember any of the details: she came, I came and a plastic bottle, one-third full of orange-colored Vitamin Water stands on the edge of the platform bed.  Wow, that was our last time.  That the damn bottle of Vitamin Water is the most detailed part of last sex memory indicates how unremarkable it was.

***

A decade of sex: many firsts, orgasms, toys, locations, positions, the list goes on.
I believe in the decade of messy, innocent, funny, awkward, loving, real moments…not in a perfectly designed last memory as my heart still breaks.

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random love, relationshipping

Let’s jump ponds

Sex changesIt’s time for an adventure.

But why does anyone do an international move?
To find themselves
or to run away.

Before I started dating S, I knew I’d move from the American South but that was to be a decidedly domestic decision between my beloved NYC and possibly Philadelphia.

Then when S and I got serious, so did the international-ness of next destination- Spain or Japan.

Why Japan?

I used to give what I thought was a well thought-out answer:
I wanted to get in touch with my cultural roots.
I wanted to be in a big city again.
I wanted to be in a more creative city.

As the move-out date approaches after S comes out as trans, I begin to doubt.
I ask S on occasion, “We’re not pulling a geographic with this move, are we?”

She’s not.
She’s fulfilling her original goal of living abroad.
She’s had enough of America and her mostly very conservative and narrow-minded hometown.

But me?

I think if I name the thing I don’t want to be guilty of, it will keep it at bay. Except every time I want reassurance that I’m not running away, something in my gut sends an, uh-oh alert to my brain. As in, I’m definitely running away. Because these days more than simply wanting an adventure, I want to be in a new place. I want to consider my transsexual relationship away from the trappings of a small and (too) familiar town where everyone who finds out about S’s transsexuality has a pointed opinion they are not shy about sharing; usually it’s ultimately supportive (after many questions) but sometimes it’s downright mean.

A year and some months pass and I think about living in Japan.
I haven’t run away yet as I haven’t escaped the confrontations that come with a rigorous raking over of me and S’s future.
Case in point: we are no longer coupled and despite moments of wanting to jet on the immediate, I stay put. I work out the highs and lows of living in a far-off unfamiliar that still doesn’t feel like home. I’m also at peace knowing that I may not ever feel completely at home here; Tokyo was never intended as a final destination.

As for finding myself, that’s certainly happened and continues to, thank goodness. This life is an often funny and delightful little mindfuck in that just when I’ve figured something out, made the hard choice and breathed a sigh of, “Okay…that bit is finished,” I am shocked at what comes next.

So the next side of my never-ending relationship Rubik’s cube?
I’m just beginning to unpuzzle this one but it revolves around a specific notion of control as a new adventure begins…

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relationshipping

I say, Give me the real

The other day

so it’s only fair that I give back said real.

And currently, this is the real:
We each found love post (visa)marriage and it has been the hardest thing.

I’m not friends with my exes.  With one, we aren’t not friends but we certainly aren’t a presence in each other’s lives.  And to get to true peace of the end of what was basically a common-law marriage, I had to exercise a total break.

With my ex-GF/wife (whom I will refer to as S from here on out):
I choose to break up.
And it is the most difficult thing.

As S transitions, there is no less love but the rapid-heartbeat, make-me-melt love gives way to a more protective, almost maternal love.  It isn’t the end of a honeymoon phase as this is 1.8 years into our relationship.  Romantic love turns agape love.

I move on, emotionally, while she is still in love with me.
This then becomes the most difficult thing.

I feel guilty for moving on, I wish I could ignore my stupid heart.  I don’t break up unless it is undeniably time because that look- when I look into her beautiful eyes that read only such deep heartbreak…well, that breaks my heart every time.  And knowing that I’m the cause of an agonizing heartbreak makes me feel pretty damn rotten.  There’s just no getting out of any meaningful relationship without hurt.  The deeper the love, the more fucking massive the hurt.

She finds love, which confronts me with a slew of unexpected feelings.
And this makes me a most difficult person.

It’s not fair.  It being the inevitable grief that comes with a significant ending to an incomparably more significant relationship.  It’s not fair for either of us because grieving is just plain hard.  When I chose to break up with S, I knew I was shutting the door on unconditional love.  I could have someone who would love and cherish me no matter what, who wanted nothing more but a permanent future with me because that equaled a bright hope and happiness.  Stupid, stupid heart.

I am no longer her person.
Her face lights up so brightly, voice softens, mood transforms and her heart visibly melts when she receives a text or call from her love.
Before this incredible, new love, my loss wasn’t so palpable; as I moved on, she’s been working through one hell of a terrific heartbreak until her new beautiful person.

This isn’t jealousy.
S is a beautiful person through and through and I want love to do right by her, in a way that I could not.

This is the realness of feeling the loss of the love I gave up.

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relationshipping

Should I delete him?

Should I delete him

Asks my friend.
Me: Do you really want to get over him?

pause

Her: Yes.
Me: Then yes, delete.

I take one course of action to get over someone and thus far it has been 100% effective.
But I need to qualify that I have not been married with children.

The Rumi, aka Don’t Look Back, method:
1) Delete from contacts
2) Delete all text history
3) Delete or hide them from FB (and all other social media you share)
4) DO NOT respond to non-essential, emotional bullshit solicitations (i.e. requisite conversations about unjoining finances are an unfortunate necessity but responding to explanatory emails about his/her feelings blah, blah, absolutely not).

Too harsh?  What, like love-hurt isn’t?

Because this is what I know when it’s over but I’m not over them:
It fucking hurts.
The sorrow, the anger, the goddamn grief.

For instance, after a long-term relationship ended, my ex of not even a week was already dating someone, a specific someone they started talking to prior to our breakup.  That felt awesome: decade long relationship, one-week turnaround.  And a few weeks later, when their new someone came to our still-shared house to spend a lovely weekend with ex (because that new burgeoning love period is brimming over with so much damn infatuation), as my dumb luck would have it, I got to hear new someone be given a fat fucking orgasm by ex…goddammit y’all.

I thought I was doing so well.  I processed through writing as decade-long memories flooded me, Dylan on repeat in the background, and spent priceless time with invaluable friends who listened to me, quietly sat with me or simply joined me for a whiskey, give or take an occasional cry.

I thought I was getting a handle on the can’t-hardly-breathe stage and moving towards taking it week by week.

A few more weeks pass, my ex has left the state to live with said someone and I am told that they plan on getting married within a month.

Wow.

There’s an annoying last step that completes my method:
5) Time.

Sweet, slow, tortuous, curious thing, time passing.

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