I'm Glad I Loved You

"I think we should break up."
That's what you said to me after explaining that your therapist thinks you should get rid of the stress in your life.
It's ironic though...
That on that day, around a week ago,
I was excited about having finally convinced you to go into therapy a few weeks prior.
In the moment you said those words,
I was in bed, taking a nap, and had just been woken up...
So I thought I was dreaming.
But then you sat beside me and told me those words again.
My world shattered.
I wanted to be dreaming.
But there you were, hand on my shoulder,
leaving me.
I cried.
Now, people will ask, "Why didn't you fight for him to stay?"
Well, it's simple...
I knew that you would leave me.
You were becoming distant and staying out late...
You were obviously thinking about it long before the day you left.
So how do you convince someone to stay where they don't want to be?
Your happiness was always more important to me than my own.
It was always a top priority to me...
Even when when it killed me.
I just wanted you to be happy,
regardless of what it made me feel.
So I got up.
I took off your dog tags and your rings...
And I gave them to you.
I sat on the couch and cried as you packed your things and left.
Now, I've realized some things since you left me.
Like, I've started to avoid saying your real name,
Almost as if to desensitize myself to your absence.
I can't move on either,
Because I still feel like I'm cheating on you.
Your resignation from my world has almost left me an empty shell,
playing at life.
I'll tell people I'm okay even though I'm not.
I'm pretending to move on but I always manage to find an excuse not to.
All while pretending that you never existed.
Maybe because it's easier than admitting that I still love you.
I don't even try to avoid things that you enjoyed.
I still keep an eye out for your favorite color...
Or an ear out for your favorite songs...
Almost as if you never left.
It still hurts, but I feel as if I deserve it for not being enough,
or for letting you walk away from me.
The pain is always there,
But I like it.
I like the pain of our memories because I feel like if I feel pain,
then I must be guilty of something...
So I must deserve it.
I know that you weren't perfect.
I never accused you of being perfect.
I don't worship or idolize your memory.
I just drown in it.
I drown until I'm choking on tears that I was too weak to choke back
I drown in thoughts of you that claw their way out of the deepest reaches of my heart.
Sometimes, I love the feeling of the water filling up my lungs,
as your memory takes a momentary toll on me.
But in these moments,
I have to be sure that I'm alone.
Because your memory blocks out all functionality.
I can barely breath when I'm drowning in my pain.
But it's only what I deserve,
Right?
You see, I've tried to move on.
But they don't compare to you.
Their touch doesn't feel the same.
Their laughter and their attempts at flirting only makes me think of what I've lost when I lost you.
I'm only an addict.
Fixed on a love that used to be.
Stuck in a home that was.
Living with ideas of what could have been.
I'm an addict with with a craving of what no longer exists.
Time without you has hurt,
And it has killed me with each passing moment.
And when you asked me to take you back....
After all the pain I've been going through since you left...
After all the memories I had spent days trying to create,
Of a love that ended before they could come to fruition.
You will never realize how happy I was when you asked to come home...
How ecstatic I was that you wanted me back...
...
So I said no.