What A Week

"You're the only one
Who really knew me at all
So take a look at me now
'Cause there's just an empty space"
from Mariah Carey's Against All Odds

Tonight this song came on Pandora and I hadn't heard it in a really long time. I remember listening to this song years ago and singing it without even thinking about what the lyrics could mean. The singer can't face that their ex is never going to come back to them. That's not at all what has made me listen to this song on repeat all night...just the four lines I quoted up there. I couldn't think of how to put into words how I've been feeling about this situation I've been dealing with since the Wednesday night before Thanksgiving. These words tell why I haven't slept at all. The first few nights I was still shocked that I was able to sleep some during the night. I have been awake since I woke up eleven in the morning on Sunday. It's now 3:46am on Wednesday.

"You're the only one who really knew me at all." He has been steadily in my life since the ninth grade. I got close to only a few girls in high school. What used to be my big group of best friends in middle school had been minimized to only two or three friends at a time. I couldn't manage a social life and a boyfriend and I didn't want to because I was experiencing "love" for the first time and wanted nothing more than to engage it and make it stronger. He was the person who I thought knew me the best because he had been my friend and my boyfriend. He had seen every side of me. Whenever he did anything that made me mad at him, he reminded me we needed it each other because we knew each other better than we knew ourselves. I believed it.

"So take a look at me now 'cause there's just an empty space." He told me on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving that he never loved me or truly cared about me but kept me around because I was the most vulnerable. Those words are what put me into shock for the first few days. Now, all I feel is empty. For all of those years I thought he knew me better than I knew myself and maybe he did, but I had no idea who he was. Someone who I thought was a big part of me suddenly became a complete stranger and made me feel violated and hollow. It made me realize that he never let me find out who I AM not who WE are.

My computer's battery has two minutes left on it or I would probably write more. Oh well, maybe I can sleep now.

It's time to find me.