About 9 years ago, I really liked this one guy who was my brothers band mate and would come home very frequently, we spoke a lot, hung out, had lots of fun together, jammed together and what not, little did both of us realise that our friendship was rising to the next level and neither of us wanted to talk about it because we didn’t know how it might affect us later, we didn’t want to lose our friendship but also certainly wanted to verbally communicate that we liked each other. I mentioned very casually to my brother that I liked his friend and my brother was taken aback, he didn’t speak with me for a few days and this was my first relationship, I didn’t know how to go about it as well.
A few months later we became a little more familiar with each other and our conversations lasted for many hours a day, texts like “How are you?”, “When next do I see you?”, “When are you coming home?” were our continuous, standard texts, and we were never bored of each other.
We were close to graduating, him from the engineering field and I from the Arts field and job hunting had become our primary focus. Both of us wanted a break from our current city, so we had applied at various organizations. He was placed at a very well reputed software company in Bangalore, while I was working at my current location.
We were now 5 years into the relationship, and our conversations became lesser, our texts were very rare and a lot that can’t be explained had changed. Our trust was shallow, doubts, fears, jealousy crept in, hasty words were common to hear. A sense of loneliness overshadowed me. We spoke about this to a few counsellors who really helped us and stood by us at all times but the change had to be within.
Loneliness in the relationship had become an everyday feeling. It was getting really hard and we began feeling insecure, we would communicate only if there were conflicts, harmony was disappearing by the day, there was no room for romance, making adjustments was the last resort which often felt like wasted time, and effort. My friends were happy that I was dating someone but they didn’t know the intensity of sadness that I held inside.
We built a barrier and our relationship wasn’t going to last if we continued this way, we said meaningless sorry’s, our words held no value, where acceptance was a no-no but strangely we were in a relationship only because we had to be in it since our families knew. How do we convey the utter disappointments in our relationships, was our point of concern.
By now we were 9 years into the relationship, I had moved to the same city that he was in, held on somehow until one day I woke up to the sheer shock of receiving a phone call from his mother who requested me not to get in touch with her son ever again, I was shocked I didn’t understand what was happening, I rang him many times but there was no response. I later found our through friends that he was cheating on me for physical intimacy. And I was so unaware of everything.
I needed help, I became very sad, disturbed and had sleepless nights, unanswered questions were a constant war in my mind. My family was worried. It was during this turbulent time that I sought for help through counselling, a positive way of moving forward without this person in my life anymore. It was hard, often very difficult since we come from a small city where everyone knew us. I was hesitant to meet common friends, scared to be seen in public gatherings, scared to have my brothers’ friends come home. Somehow everything left an immense amount of fear and this fear had a strong grip over me.
Counselling was my immediate relief and solace, and this counsellor made me realize that I’m worth more than this, that good things will come, she empathized with me, spoke out words of positivity in my life, bore up with the several questions I had, she saw me in my most difficult moments and helped me forgive allowing me to take charge of my life.
Today, I’m a happy person again. There is no more loneliness, there is no more fear, no more sleepless nights. I’m accepted for who I am and my stand remains solid.