Reverb 10 - Day 5: Let Go

December 5 – Let Go. What (or whom) did you let go of this year? Why? (Author: Alice Bradley)

Fair warning: This post is one that I struggled with writing.

... I answered, "Yes".

Three days later, I found out that I was not pregnant. Seven days after that, I knew that I wanted to try to have a baby. He wasn't so sure.

He told me how he wasn't ready and that he wanted to get his business off the ground first. He wanted to be around for his child but knew that he currently didn't have the time to dedicate to a small life. He thought my motivations were wrong and that I was in this for selfish reasons. He was sure that we'd been given a blessing and that this was our opportunity to continue enjoying our lives.

I won't lie to you and tell you that I made it easy on him. I pleaded. I begged. I made every effort to negotiate. I told him that if he just helped me get pregnant that he could walk away. I offered to hire a lawyer to draft papers that would waive all his rights and responsibilities. All he had to do was say yes.

Instead, he scowled and said, "It would have been better if you had gotten pregnant and never told me at all". He suggested that I open the opportunity up to a variety of individuals. I say he was calling me a slut. He claims that he was trying to help me better my odds.

That's when I realized that I had to let him go. Three years of leaving and coming back had culminated in one of the most hurtful statements of my life. I knew that I didn't love him and it was painfully obvious that he didn't love me. At least not the way I needed him to.

I didn't yell. I didn't cry (much). I didn't throw anything. I stood up and told him that it was over. That we were over. There would be no more crying, no more begging, no more calling in the middle of the night. I told him that no amount of roses or messages sent through my mother could make us right.

He said that I would be back; that I always come back. And he was right about the girl that I was just 10 minutes before. But the woman that I became in that short time was a better woman that he'd ever deserve.