That man LOVED Me…. does someone in particular come to min when I say that? Who’s face did you picture when you heard those words?

For me it’s an easy answer. There is only one answer. One face, one person I see, one name I whisper in answer.

He was never the type to try to hurt me. He wasn’t on any get back shit, or one to throw petty digs in the heat of an argument. He loved me. He always sought to uplift me, to help me. Now that’s not to say he didn’t have a temper… but his intentions for me were always good. Whether we ended up together or not he wanted me to be a better woman….. only problem was his definition and my definition of a “better woman” varied. He wanted me to be strong. Wanted me to learn to let my gaurd down. “You’re not a MAN, Damnit!” He used to yell at me when I was playing tough during a fight. “You’re a woman, you’re supposed to be soft.” He’d whisper as he caressed my face and held me after I let out a piece of my vulnerable side.

The thing is, I wasn’t “playing” tough. I had grown to be tough. I forget what it was to let my gaurd down and be the soft, submissive woman that didn’t have to carry the weight of the world on her shoulders. I had learned to carry my pain in a way that I didn’t have to feel it, a way that involved not thinking about it and continuing forward…. even if it was subconsciously dragging me down.

He changed that though. He broke down my wall brick by brick until there was no hard exterior left. He made me feel safe. He was my knight in shining armor. I was comfortable enough to openly cry in his arms….. smh, I don’t think I’ve ever done that before (or after) in my life.

Part of me hates him for that. He made me soft. He broke down my barriers and showed me what was on the other side and I loved what I saw. I loved how it felt……

I wish it hadn’t ended the way it had. I wish he would’ve just cheated. That’s what I thought it was at first. I’d throw a fit and leave…. but eventually I’d forgive him for cheating. Eventually, I might let him come back…..

I knew it was bad when he started picking fights with me. You know, the common cheaters ploy to start an argument, get us both mad, just to try and blind me from seeing what else you were up to. The sneaky shit…. the avoiding me because you’re pissed rather than the reality that you’re with someone else. I knew this act all to well… because I had done this same thing to him. Many times before. I won’t admit to being a cheater, but I did pick fights to have an excuse to not call. I did over shoot my anger because I wanted an excuse to do me.

He had never done this to me though. I had done it to him. Other men had done it to me. Yet even when I matter-of-factly told him about some of the fucked up shit I had pulled with not an ounce of remorse to be shown…. he never fired back. So when he finally did… years into this ordeal. I knew it was bad.

I just wish it wouldn’t have been THAT bad. I wish it would’ve been something more forgiveable. Something I wouldn’t hate him for for the rest of his life and mine. Something we could have moved past or gotten over with time. Not something that would turn my love for him to disgust. I’m sure he can say the same thing about me though….

He told me recently he hates when I do that “Ego” shit. It shocked me for a second because I don’t think of myself as that person. I don’t think I’m cocky. I’m…….humble? Naa, who am I kidding? I know I’m not humble. But I had to reflect on this for a few days to figure out why am I like this? I know I wasn’t always this way…..

Well, when I was growing up in a small town in Alabama and starting dating a black guy back years ago, that shit didn’t fly to well with my Father….Hell, with any of my family with “old south” blood running through their veins. He would literally tell me daily how I wasn’t going to be shit in life. Now, it wasn’t all based on my desire to date someone outside of my race, as my Father and I had never had a good relationship, but this was something he liked to throw in my face. “He’s going to get you pregnant and you’re going to live in a trailer the rest of your life raising bastard kids!” “You’re never going to go anywhere or have anything in life!” Coming from a grown ass man who literally had nothing in life but his once wealthy family cared too much about him and their grandkids to have them living on the street, this didn’t really sting that bad at that time. I was immune to his hatred and hypocritical bullshit by then anyways; but still, coming from a parent that is a discouraging thing for a teenager to hear. I knew I had to prove him wrong. That served as my motivation for many, many years and occasionally still does.

When I moved out on my own at 17 I refused to let my Father ever see my suffer. There were times I genuinely had nowhere to go but I’d never once ask to come back there. Once I got to the point where I was successful in life and surpassed anything he’d ever achieved, I wanted to make sure he knew it. Was I gloating? Yea, a little. I wanted him to see he was wrong. I wanted him to know I had done everything he said I couldn’t before I was even 21. I wanted him to realize the Lyfe I live is nothing like he said it’d be. Do I still feel good about that even as I am typing this now? Absolutely.

Ironically, that same guy my Father gave me such grief about was the same man who later did the same shit. According to him I “wouldn’t be shit without him.” and he “helped me become this successful.” He couldn’t let me take any credit for what I had built, even after living together and watching me work my ass off for 7 years straight. He told me time and time again how horrible my life would be after we separated; how downhill things would go. So now that I have traveled the world and literally lived my dreams and he has spent the last 2-3 years in prion and is currently unemployed in government housing with his baby momma and child do I feel good? Yea. Maybe it’s wrong but I feel good that I won. I don’t wish him any ill will but I hope he chokes on those words when he reflects back on how wrong he was.

Perhaps you are starting to catch on to the fact that I have had a lot of issues with the men in my life. I subconsciously feel a need to prove myself to any man I get involved with. I don’t need you. I did all this shit without you. It’s sick really, but I almost feel the need to compete with them. I also feel the need to never loose, and to me loosing would be downgrading or scaling back my lifestyle once they are no longer in it. When I dated — we went out a lot, bought VIP sections and bottles every weekend. Even though we both knew I wasn’t the one paying for that, once we parted ways I started doing it myself. I wasn’t gonna let him see me being regular waiting in line at the club! It’s ridiculous the money I spent to maintain that. But does it make me feel better that I did? That I was able to? Absolutely.

I have to learn to start doing things for me and not to prove shit to other people. That’s hard though, because I have done it for so long that the satisfaction I feel from proving it to them is genuinely what I’m after. I have to learn that it isn’t a competition between me and those that love me. I have to learn everyone doesn’t “look down” on me. Maybe the lesson I really need is to accept that I am successful, because even though I know I am, I still feel I haven’t done enough. I do still have “something to prove”……. to myself.