Case of The Ex

l texted my ex.

I texted my ex, despite being told not to do so *numerous* times by my friends.

Boredom might be more dangerous than meth sometimes (disclaimer – I wouldn’t actually know. But let’s stay on the safe side of things: kids, say perhaps to drugs; but NEVER text your ex).

I follow an Instagram account called “Texts From Your Ex” and I spend about 86% of my day on “the gram” meme surfing- I should have known better not to reach out but I hadn’t heard from him since I started writing. I was aching with curiosity. Longing to know the answer to this burning question… Does he know about The Married Girl on Bumble?

“You’re an embarrassment. How could I have ever loved you? How do you so freely share the deepest, darkest details of your life on the internet? Do you have no shame? Do whatever the fuck you want, just don’t tell the whole world about it! Sleep around, date all the white guys you need to feel good about yourself. You’ve lived here for most of your life and you’re pathetic for wanting to date so desperately. What are you trying to prove to yourself? You have no self-worth.”

-“Jeez… you’re being a total downer right now. I should have just started watching the new season of Queer Eye instead of texting you. Or maybe had gone for some swiping action or even cleaned my room!!! What was I thinking?” I would have said that in a parallel universe but my sense of humor has always been foreign to him. Instead I simply replied “I think it’s important for me to tell my story. Writing is my passion and it’s therapeutic.”

You know what sucks? On some level it worked. His words made a dent. They broke something inside. My strong feminist facade couldn’t outshine my vast inner darkness, or the dimness of my insecurities and self-doubt. Those words made me second-guess myself and question everything I’ve done in the past year. He had that power over me for the duration of our marriage and I thought I had escaped it.

Why do I even care so much? What sort of validation am I looking to receive from him?

Then, on the same day (because my life is a romantic comedy -sans the romance) I got a Facebook reminder: a beautiful Persian poem I had shared on my wall around 7 years ago. Here’s my horrible attempt at trying to translate it:

“Hold onto the phone. My kisses are delayed. Here, time is a few hours ahead. Whenever you see the sun above your head, just know that I’m longing for you while the sun sets.”

Thanks to Facebook, I was confronted with what I had been running away from for so long: the truth that at some point I was desperately, and soul crushingly in love with the person I was going to marry.

How fucking bizarre! How fucking scary to think that the person you’d give your life for, could one day generate an endless amount of hate and resentment. How is it even possible to go from such pure feelings of love and romance, to a shit-show? When will it reach equilibrium? Will we ever?

I often thought as my relationship with my ex as two pieces of a puzzle that weren’t made for each other. Love wasn’t enough. Commitment wasn’t enough. We came in separate boxes and each of us belonged to a different piece altogether. We fought hard, went against what we knew was right, and both got hurt. We had to cut off, squish, and squeeze so much of ourselves in order to comfortably fit side-by-side, and by the time we did that, neither of us could recognize themselves in the mirror.

That’s why divorce and separation often feels so freeing. That’s why it’s so important to be with someone who is part of the bigger picture in their own, unique way. It’s never about finding the “perfect” fit – that’s some bullish marketing scheme. It’s about the craft, and it’s about patience. It’s about being yourself and it’s about giving meaning to the puzzle as a whole. It’s about being true to yourselves, and never having to cut corners.