A lot of you hear me talk a lot about Frank, my husband, and how wonderful he is. Or you hear me talk about my abuse relationship and how terrible that was. But today I want to talk about the guy I was with before meeting Frank, a young man who taught me a lot about myself due to our very flawed relationship.
Not to mention names, we’ll call him Ess. Ess is actually a good friend of mine today still, and we were friends before we started dating. We were sort of brought together by a friend who matched us up of sorts, but our relationship was in peril right from the start. Ess, we could say, has a bit of a drinking problem, or did when we were together, and I have CPTSD. Right from the beginning, we were dependent on each other, but in different ways, and there was no trust in our relationship. We sought to blame each other a lot, control each other, and we weren’t happy. I realise today that we weren’t in love with each other, but at the time, I had settled and I thought that was what it was to be in a long term relationship. We were comfortable. We were roommates, we were buddies, it was more convenient to stay together.
When I met Frank, I at first ignored my feelings and paid no attention to him. This was around the time Ess and I had grown a bit emotionally estranged. We stopped being intimate long before I met Frank, and we stopped cuddling in bed. We just existed as an entity, a couple, but neither of us was truly in it.
There was a moment where Ess got drunk and again I took care of him, worried he would fall and hurt himself in the shower, and he became aggressive towards me, nothing major, but enough to scare himself. At that moment I decided that my love life was going to change. I thought that meant HE would change, but I’M the one who changed. Then I really noticed Frank, and realised there truly was something there. Ess and I took a break of sorts, unofficially, he would sleep on the sofa, and I went on my first date with Frank. Ess moved out. And shortly after, I told him about my new boyfriend.
Ess has met Frank previously and his main concern was that I was with someone who would treat me well. He was glad it was Frank I was with now and not some hobo drug addict (Yes, I did date a hobo addict once.). Ess is not a bad guy, you see, and his problems are probably due to certain things he lived in his childhood which caused him some wounds growing up. I know what these things are and am very sympathetic to him. This break up had been very gradual over time, but long overdue. When I told Ess about the slight overlap, he admitted to me that it had been TWO years where he wanted to leave me and had not had the guts to do it, because of attachment confusing him. He told me that he was happy I had not let attachment prevent me from finding the happiness and he hoped I had found my one true love. (Ess is married too today, by the way.)
The attachment had caused me some confusion during my transition from one relationship to the other. At one point, I needed a good couple of weeks without seeing either guy, just to work out what my feelings truly were. I was honest with Frank about my attachment to Ess because we had been together for four years. Frank respected my boundaries, and waited patiently until I was ready for us to commit to each other for real.
What my relationship with Ess taught me was that without trust, we try to control, and that was not what I wanted with Frank. And to have trust, we need honesty, and to be honest, means to communicate. The three pillars which are the foundation of my relationship with Frank exist thanks to my relationship with Ess. With Ess I learnt about my CPTSD and about my triggers, he helped me become aware. So I told Frank what it was I was going through and how it was getting worse at that time. I also needed us to establish certain definitions “Commitment to me means…” “Monogamy to me means…” And we expressed needs and desires and fears and laid it all out on the table before committing to each other on the long term.
I am forever grateful towards Ess for having been there for me during a transitional phase in my life, where I learnt to respect myself more and understand what I wanted in a relationship and in my life. He was there for me in ways others were not, despite our fights, despite his drinking, despite closing up, and I learnt so much about myself in that relationship. The minute we were officially over, we were finally honest with each other. It’s strange because it was not a quick break up, it was not a smooth transition, it was difficult at the time, but we are both with people we truly love now, we have both evolved, and it was the best thing for our friendship, to break up.