20XX
Hey,
It's been barely two hours since we parted and here it is. Well, I have to write it down or I will forget how painfully excruciating it is to be told that the relationship that you've cherished for sixteen months is over.
It might slip my mind how important it is that you have to keep some love to yourself or else you will be left with nothing when the person that you cared about suddenly decides that he wants to live without you.
I know that no matter how many explanations or how many conversations may pass but your decision is final. So I'll give you what you want now. Here's to your freedom.
Since this is my letter, let me take you back to the first time we fell in love.
Do you remember when you asked me out on that fateful day on 2009? I said yes because I wanted to give you a chance. It's been less than three weeks since I was not-so-gently rejected through an ambiguous text by your older brother so I was apprehensive of falling in love again.
But you were a genuinely nice guy who seemed like someone who won't hurt me anymore. You were sweet, gentle and quiet.
When I first looked at you, I was shocked because you seemed to have walked out of my own romance novels. Didn't you know that you seemed to be everything that I ever wanted? You were perfect for me and I wanted to be perfect for you too. But I've never dated anyone who was my opposite before so I was never sure where I stood...
So that's where we started. We met up, talked, texted, kissed and spent idle hours wrapped up in each other's world.
Slowly, when you told me that you wanted to make me happy, I fell happily in love. I trusted you whole-heartedly. I told myself that I will have no regrets so I will give everything up for you. I will love you to to an inch of my life so that I will never ever wonder if I didn't do everything on my part.
It was in me to have an eagerness to make a couple, a desire to truly love. I loved you so much that I fought popular opinion about our mismatch. I defended you from every snide comment, every barbed remark. It hurt but I didn't care.
I continued not to care when you started to take me for granted, treat me coldly and stop making the effort to see me. I stubbornly refused. I had to hold on to our relationship because I wanted to believe that everything will be fine. You'll turn back into my handsome prince who loved me back with all of his heart.
All of my friends understood that I was a hopeless romantic so they didn't say anything about my descent into madness... and my madness was you.
When I woke up, I was still a part of a couple. In the span of thirty minutes, I became alone.
I didn't know how to feel when you told me that you wanted to take a break. You wanted what is popularly known as a "cool-off". I cried and I protested. I waited for you to get up and to hug me and tell me, "hey, it's okay. Please don't cry."
But you just watched me and waited for me to gain my composure, absolutely detached. You didn't save me from the humiliation as your family walked in and out of the room. You didn't tell me that you loved me more than I ever loved you while I raged on.
You looked sad and helpless and hopeless. I know that my face is the same. But my heart is being torn apart piece by piece with each single word that comes from your lips. You really wanted it so I stepped back.
I refuse to be selfish. So even if I'm crying as I write this letter, I am still refusing to be selfish by giving you what you truly want which is space or freedom or absolutely no distractions. If being selfless and humble means being quiet and unobtrusive then that will be me. Because that's what you wanted me to be.
For a woman who has almost defined herself solely through her relationship, this is the most painful blow that can fall.
Perhaps you are being kind by giving me the freedom to rediscover myself. (I know who I am, thank you.)
Maybe you want me to succeed in my career. (I already am.)
Or perhaps you just wanted to get away from me. (Please, God, that's not true.)
I don't really know anything anymore. You claim to understand how I feel but you don't. You really don't. You might be wondering what's the point but here it is: I love you so much but you don't appreciate that.
Who knows what will happen in three weeks? Humans are absurdly gifted in forgetfulness and remembrance.
Perhaps I'm still in love with you. Or perhaps I might have even forgotten why I loved you in the first place. But at least this will exist as a reminder of who I was as a woman in love.
All I know is that I have to get up, brush myself off and forge onward amidst the tears and heartbreak. I am going to be like Queen Katherine of Aragon, constant and loyal to her cause.
I will promise to think of you as a friend. I will promise that I will stop depending on you or caring for you more than my life itself. I will promise that I will start writing again, start jogging again and start making friends again.
But I will not promise that I will shield myself from other people who might admire me, care about me and love me in spite of myself. I will instead seek to find some peace and quiet in my solitary journey in order to regain myself.
Maybe one day I might look at our memories fondly and thank you for the experience. Or maybe we're together again when that happens. I'm hoping but I'm not going to live on that.
For now, I will go ahead and cry. This is just too painful to write.
(Originally posted in my Facebook account.)
It's been barely two hours since we parted and here it is. Well, I have to write it down or I will forget how painfully excruciating it is to be told that the relationship that you've cherished for sixteen months is over.
It might slip my mind how important it is that you have to keep some love to yourself or else you will be left with nothing when the person that you cared about suddenly decides that he wants to live without you.
I know that no matter how many explanations or how many conversations may pass but your decision is final. So I'll give you what you want now. Here's to your freedom.
Since this is my letter, let me take you back to the first time we fell in love.
Do you remember when you asked me out on that fateful day on 2009? I said yes because I wanted to give you a chance. It's been less than three weeks since I was not-so-gently rejected through an ambiguous text by your older brother so I was apprehensive of falling in love again.
But you were a genuinely nice guy who seemed like someone who won't hurt me anymore. You were sweet, gentle and quiet.
When I first looked at you, I was shocked because you seemed to have walked out of my own romance novels. Didn't you know that you seemed to be everything that I ever wanted? You were perfect for me and I wanted to be perfect for you too. But I've never dated anyone who was my opposite before so I was never sure where I stood...
So that's where we started. We met up, talked, texted, kissed and spent idle hours wrapped up in each other's world.
Slowly, when you told me that you wanted to make me happy, I fell happily in love. I trusted you whole-heartedly. I told myself that I will have no regrets so I will give everything up for you. I will love you to to an inch of my life so that I will never ever wonder if I didn't do everything on my part.
It was in me to have an eagerness to make a couple, a desire to truly love. I loved you so much that I fought popular opinion about our mismatch. I defended you from every snide comment, every barbed remark. It hurt but I didn't care.
I continued not to care when you started to take me for granted, treat me coldly and stop making the effort to see me. I stubbornly refused. I had to hold on to our relationship because I wanted to believe that everything will be fine. You'll turn back into my handsome prince who loved me back with all of his heart.
All of my friends understood that I was a hopeless romantic so they didn't say anything about my descent into madness... and my madness was you.
When I woke up, I was still a part of a couple. In the span of thirty minutes, I became alone.
I didn't know how to feel when you told me that you wanted to take a break. You wanted what is popularly known as a "cool-off". I cried and I protested. I waited for you to get up and to hug me and tell me, "hey, it's okay. Please don't cry."
But you just watched me and waited for me to gain my composure, absolutely detached. You didn't save me from the humiliation as your family walked in and out of the room. You didn't tell me that you loved me more than I ever loved you while I raged on.
You looked sad and helpless and hopeless. I know that my face is the same. But my heart is being torn apart piece by piece with each single word that comes from your lips. You really wanted it so I stepped back.
I refuse to be selfish. So even if I'm crying as I write this letter, I am still refusing to be selfish by giving you what you truly want which is space or freedom or absolutely no distractions. If being selfless and humble means being quiet and unobtrusive then that will be me. Because that's what you wanted me to be.
For a woman who has almost defined herself solely through her relationship, this is the most painful blow that can fall.
Perhaps you are being kind by giving me the freedom to rediscover myself. (I know who I am, thank you.)
Maybe you want me to succeed in my career. (I already am.)
Or perhaps you just wanted to get away from me. (Please, God, that's not true.)
I don't really know anything anymore. You claim to understand how I feel but you don't. You really don't. You might be wondering what's the point but here it is: I love you so much but you don't appreciate that.
Who knows what will happen in three weeks? Humans are absurdly gifted in forgetfulness and remembrance.
Perhaps I'm still in love with you. Or perhaps I might have even forgotten why I loved you in the first place. But at least this will exist as a reminder of who I was as a woman in love.
All I know is that I have to get up, brush myself off and forge onward amidst the tears and heartbreak. I am going to be like Queen Katherine of Aragon, constant and loyal to her cause.
I will promise to think of you as a friend. I will promise that I will stop depending on you or caring for you more than my life itself. I will promise that I will start writing again, start jogging again and start making friends again.
But I will not promise that I will shield myself from other people who might admire me, care about me and love me in spite of myself. I will instead seek to find some peace and quiet in my solitary journey in order to regain myself.
Maybe one day I might look at our memories fondly and thank you for the experience. Or maybe we're together again when that happens. I'm hoping but I'm not going to live on that.
For now, I will go ahead and cry. This is just too painful to write.
(Originally posted in my Facebook account.)
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