I didn't want to admit it, but I had lost myself to him. I loved him so much that I gave him all my energy and he transformed me into a monster, into a dead man among the living. For everything I put him in the foreground, always before myself, until I reached a point where I was no longer living my life, but in his shadow. To the one who never knew how to love me.
He never said a warm word to me, not even when we were sitting on the couch and spending a night together; he never hugged me close to him. And he said that was how he loved people, how he expressed love: coldly. But I never felt like a woman desired by him for so many years. I gave him time, love, compassion, understanding; I gave him self-confidence. He was God to me, as if my only goal was to make him happy and not myself. I didn't even count myself anymore. I wasn't there anymore. Ah, how stupid when I think about it...
And what did I gain in the end? Nothing but sleepless nights, thoughts that swirled in my head, anxiety, depression, tears and medication. I closed myself off as a person, I looked for the defect in myself and I had no eyes or mind to see that the defect lay in him. I begged him for time, to forgive me a little time from himself because I forgave him everything about me. And he did it very rarely, and the little he gave me seemed enough to me. What a fool…
I could see that I wasn't the same. I didn't shine around him, I just faded more and more. My body, my face, my hair, the glow I had as a woman, my smile all deteriorated; until in the end my soul also deteriorated completely. I lost myself as a woman. It wasn't like before when people looked at me and said, "Ah, what a beautiful woman!"; now they would say, "What happened to you, why did you do this?" But I didn't want to accept it, I didn't want to accept it until one night, ironically, I saw him sitting with someone and my brain began to speak to my heart that the time had come to think about myself again, to take control of myself.
I had begged him to go out, to meet up, and all I got was excuses. Where did all those sacrifices I made for him go? Where was I as a woman? Can we force someone to love us? No, of course not. We can't. And in the end he just said to me: "Thank you for everything, I will always respect you." As if I needed respect and that was enough for him. But I wanted him to love me, and that was never achieved.
Now I have started to love myself more and everything seems calmer, more beautiful to me. I no longer walk in his shadow. I am my own master and no one has the right to intimidate me and my feelings. The master of yourself is only you. You can elevate or diminish yourself. Do not allow yourself to be blinded by love and forget yourself. If you love yourself, then others will love you too.
Thank you, Anabel.
- Written for Anabel by an anonymous woman, for the “Untold Stories” column – the haven where we recount those moments when the heart wants to speak, whether about the good or the difficult, about the deepest feelings that we don't want to keep inside. If you too would like to share your story, write to us at [email protected] .
