You’re Breaking My Heart

For as long as I can remember people have been telling me not to wear my heart on my sleeve, don’t be so sensitive, etc. My heart got broken so easily. I wish I could say that as an adult I was all wise and knowing, and in some respects, I am. But dealing with a broken heart? Not-so-much.

There has only been one man truly broke my heart before I met and married my awesome husband. He was an ass and made me feel like I wasn’t worth anything. The funny thing about this situation is my heart was more broken in the relationship than out of it. Once I realized I needed to be done with the cycle of emotional abuse, well, it hurt to be alone but not nearly as much as it hurt to be in it. I’ve never looked back.

What I struggle with is when my heart is broken over the loss of friendships. I’m not good at dealing with betrayal or disappointment, nor am I good at letting toxic friendships go easily. When I commit to a friendship, I commit. My biggest problem is realizing when I am the only one really being a friend and not getting anything back from the other side.  The result? I am a lot more cynical and cautious then I used to be.

A couple examples of my broken heart over friendships…

In elementary school I befriend a girl named Joy when we both participated in a musical our local High School was putting on, The King & I. She and I were two of the King’s children. She was a year older and beautiful, bubbly, and charismatic. She and I were so close during that entire production. We went to different schools but I couldn’t wait to get to middle school when she and I would be reunited again. And we were. We were still in different grades but theater reunited us again and at first, it was great. But you know how middle school girls go.  One of her friends wanted to know why she was friends with a lower-grade girl and that was it. She wrote me a note, passed it to me in the hallway and it said “We’re not good friends like you think we are. Stop talking to me.” I was crushed. And it took me a long time to find some confidence again. And by long time, read all of middle school. See everyone found out what she had written in that note and I was mocked mercilessly. And it all sort of snowballed. I have no really good memories of middle school with the exception of my algebra teacher’s awesome way of getting us to remember everything. I digress. I realize now that this was nothing in the grande scheme of things in my life. But at the time it was larger than life, as all middle school emotions are at the time.

In recent years I lost an entire circle of friends over one woman lying about a conversation she and I had in private, at her bequest. There was a lot of controversy going on in the organization, and she sought me out for suggestions on how to improve the situation. And I gave them. (And I OWNED what *I* said later.) But well, someone had to take the fall in order for an equilibrium to materialize and she took her feelings and projected them as things I said and did. NOT TRUE.  This betrayal shattered me, rocked me to my core. These people, they knew me; knew me for 12 years at the time. They had seen me grow from an 18 year old freshman in college to a business professional, a wife, a mother. They came to my wedding. We exchanged Christmas cards (you (if you are reading this) want proof? I SAVE holiday cards people. I. SAVE. THEM.) These were people I looked up to as mentors, older siblings, friends, no… family of my heart. And they chose to believe a lie. Looking back without rose-colored glasses, well, I can’t say I blame some of them for believing the lie. It was told to them by a master social ladder climbing manipulator. But it still doesn’t make my heart hurt any less to rationalize a betrayal of my loyalty.  I trusted these people. I defended these people. I gave so much to these people. Others in the organization have told me to get over it and go back. Today I tell you I can’t. I won’t. The distance is no longer my path to travel. And clearly if those in charge cared to see me back, they would have called.

So I didn’t deal well with this last heart break. I defined a very large portion of myself by my involvement with this group of people. And when most of them were gone and I was pregnant, then home with a second baby who was so completely different than the first and didn’t sleep for 13 months, and then I lost my job (in another messy firestorm of chaos), to say I fell apart would be an understatement. Save a few wonderful, patient girlfriends who believed me and loved me, and my husband, I had little support system. I distinctly remember one evening early this year after a long argument with my husband, mostly over my depression and lack of communication skills, collapsing on the kitchen floor, putting my forehead on the cold tile and saying over and over that I hated myself.  I hated who I had become.  I was all over the place emotionally. I didn’t know who I was, I didn’t think I had any identity other than my children, and I was (still am) overweight (because when I’m depressed, I eat). I knew that part of the real me was still alive, just so utterly lost. About a month later I got a job working from home full time, doing something I truly enjoy, and I had something that was just mine, not anyone else’s. I remembered I had a brain, that I was talented and smart and could produce something other than pureed peas or mismatched socks in the clean laundry basket. A week or so after I got my job I started my blog and found a place to hear my voice again. Feeling inspired and moderately mentally healthy, I chanced reaching out to some people in that group again thinking that surely time would lessened the heat of the confrontation. It had not, and it was kind of two steps forward, one step back for me emotionally. But, in a lot of ways it was what I needed. It brought a lot of closure I needed and since then I’ve been in such a better place.

One thing I can say though now is that despite the emotional pain, I really am honestly thankful for the lessons I learned when my heart was bleeding out and I was forced figure out who I was, how I got there, and had to decide who I *wanted* to be and how I needed to get there. I refuse to lay down and let others define me. I define me. And sometimes I get off track, but know that my heart, my integrity, my sense, my core,  they hold me relatively steady. And so far, I’ve always landed back on my feet, with my head on straight, my eyes forward and my heart opened back up to the possibilities of greatness I know is out there.