You were right to end it here. He’s not going to kill himself; even if he does, that’s not your fault. You have given so much of yourself you’ve hardly got any left. You can’t keep offering yourself away like this; it’s not going to help. He doesn’t want to be better. That’s his choice. Leaving is yours, and it’s such a good one; I promise.
Some days are going to be better than others. There will be days when dark smoke fills every inch of you, and you’ll want to crumble and burn. But there will also be days you’ll feel as light as the air in a Summer’s afternoon. And these days are so good, and these days will grow until one day the darkness will only be a faded memory. Recovery is hard but it will be worth it. I’m still getting there, but there’s so much to smile about. You will rediscover life’s radiating beams of adventure through those dark, smoky skies, an abundance of relationships will be regrown and your confidence will finally flourish. Hope for the future dances in the air as you are going to come so far in such a short time. It will honestly surprise you.
Yes, that’s right. You have to recover because what he has been doing to you truly is wrong: so, so wrong. It’s been an ordeal and your friend was right to define it as torture. You haven’t been imagining this, and his attempts to make you feel this way have only been part of the process. You’ll see it clearer every day as the smoke dissipates. One day you’ll be laughing with your friends and it won’t hurt so much. Then one day you’ll be so close to living your dreams, encompassed by a life you could barely even imagine before and it will not hurt at all.
I know you feel sick with the torture, the pain, the confusion. But I know you also hope that maybe now, finally, you can be ecstatic. You are so right to hope because you will be. Trust me, from this lighter place I know.
I know it feels like he is turning people against you but it won’t be long before you don’t care. These people don’t matter. They’re his friends. By association, they’re not even worth it. And you are going to make new friendships; you are already reviving old ones. Soon, their opinions will mean nothing to you.
You were whole and happy before him, and you will be whole and happy again. You are not defined as a victim; one day you won’t even define yourself as a survivor. People grow and change all the time and we are growing and changing so much; twirling up towards these brighter skies. One day what happened won’t even matter. We’ll look back on it with no emotion because it is the past and we are at peace with it. That already happens most days now.
So keep going, you’re doing well. It’s going to be hard but there’s a part of you, a part of all of us, that desperately desires to live, to shine so bright it will illuminate your entire world. It will get you through, it has so far, and on the good days you will realise how far you’ve come. You have achieved so much. It will surprise you when you discover what you can do when your world is not lit by rows of flames, but by your own inner sunlight, and oh how it shines. I look forward to you seeing these illuminating times because things are about to get so much brighter in a way that will not hurt.
Samantha Kirkwood is a 19 year old aspiring writer from Scotland. She has an HNC in Professional Writing Skills and has been published twice so far; first in a local poetry anthology and recently in MF Collective. She dreams of inspiring positive change through her writing, entertaining readers and travelling the world. Her poetry can be viewed at www.samanthawritespoetry.
