[Atlanta - A week of sobbing]
Jim & I are getting together for lunch on Monday.
WHY !?! ... I hear you ask.
At my request, Jim is going to break up with me ... in person ... clearly.
Allow me to explain.
You see, Jim & I never actually broke up ... oh, we spoke ON THE PHONE once at the beginning of May about the possibility of "moving things to the friendship level" due to my return to England ... but I didn't react well and I begged him to wait at least until I'd applied for my UK visa. I thought we would speak about it more in person.
Only that never happened ...
Jim just vanished from my life!
I've not seen him since then. Short phone calls, far fewer text messages and an uneasy quiet ...
And to add insult to injury, I actually agreed to give him a bit of space so he could have 'Me Time'.
As I know now (thanks to my being contacted by two 'acquaintances' of Jim's on Tuesday), his 'Me Time' was spent first out & about living it up a bit and then off with his new boyfriend, a 24-year-old kid he met working in a local tat shop. They have spent every free minute together. They had a weekend away together in the mountains. Jim picks him up from work almost daily in his new sportscar. And those are just the details I know about ...
Cut back to me ... still thinking I am Jim's boyfriend ... now distraught that my return to England has been cancelled/delayed and my visa cannot be applied for any time soon.
So ... Jim wanted to break up because I might return to England soon ... only that isn't going to happen. He couldn't wait till I at least *applied* for a visa or had some sort of idea what our future options might be.
And then, after weeks of all but complete silence, I learn (from complete strangers ... keep that in mind!) that he has a new boyfriend half his age ... and a nasty (but curable?) 'bug' that will plague his life for some time.
This, dear readers, is why I spent all week sobbing!
I could not sleep at all Thursday night and then cried from 6 AM till 8 AM. I didn't know I had it in me to cry for that long a time.
Jim left *me* behind ... after all that talk & worry about me leaving him behind.
He did so in the most callous & cowardly way ... with lies & distance.
I am angry. I feel abandoned. I feel cheated out of a lot of things.
His new boyfriend will have Jim's post-school-year Summer of free time that *I* was looking forward to and promised.
Lisa, Jim's ex-wife, finally moved out of the house. I never got to go to Jim's house. His new boyfriend has been over several times ... *and* met all of Jim's kids.
And James ... Jim's oldest child (16) and the only one I've met. James is a sweet, caring and intelligent young man. I began to sob on the phone again once this week about saying goodbye to James. I cannot be sure why but I guess I had envisioned my future with Jim and as a step-parent to James. I asked Jim if I could write a goodbye letter to James and he said it would be okay.
The only nice thing I can say about Jim at this point is that he has been trying to appear as if he is taking it like a man since being caught out in a web of his own lies. He's admitted to everything, apologised and continues to talk to me whenever I feel the need.
Jim says the lies & deception were to spare my feelings. There may be a bit of truth to that (in Jim's mind, at least) but it was mostly about him being unable to deal with actually dumping me ... because THAT would make HIM uncomfortable.
The coward's way out certainly blew up in his face! He agrees.
Jim replaced me. Quickly. I guess that speaks obvious volumes about how much he really loved me. How else could I feel now?
He just couldn't be single for a moment and 'swung' to the next boyfriend. This, I feel, is a chronic problem in his life. He cannot be single or alone for even a month ... and even seems to overlap relationships to avoid loneliness (Michael ... then me ... then John, his new 'boy'). If it's not the truth, it is certainly damning circumstantial evidence.
Maybe if he'd taken time out, he might have found a bit of clarity and we would have known that my leaving for England soon was NOT going to happen.
We will never know now.
I loved that man more than many of you realised ... apparently, more than he realised. Jim was all I needed. He brought comfort, contentment and stability to my life when I first began this 'exile in America' and what grew out of that was beautiful. I was satisfied. I never cheated. I was happy with him and I meant every word on the day I told him that I would like to grow old with him.
He was everything I ever wanted in a man ... or so I believed.
The cloud of my possible departure loomed too greatly over Jim, I guess. Despite his mistakes and untruths, 'England' weighed heavily on him and he has cried a couple of times about my leaving in the past.
If he'd just waited another two weeks ... but he gave up on us too soon.
And I've been replaced. I am bothered. I am jealous. I am so very saddened.
I am not in a place yet where I can say life goes on or it wasn't meant to be ...
Our love has died ... and the pain I feel overwhelms me up to this minute.
Jim might have eventually lost me to England anyway ... but now he's lost my respect & trust, too.
Forgiveness will be a long, hard road ... but I won't let this negatively affect who I am. I will continue to be a happy, loving person ... only wiser and far less trusting!
It seems Jim NEVER stops looking ... even when he's happy in a relationship. How much is enough? Will it ever stop? If he never focuses on ONE person at a time, how will he ever find happiness with a partner?
I do wonder if the new kid knows what he's in for ...
Richard
