30 Days of Truth: Day 8

Pffft, easy. It would have to be the guy I was dating before I met Xander.  We’ll call him J…. J what?  Jerk? J-Douche? Jackoff? Jeeny weeny peeny?

Hey, any of the above apply.  Pretty much any negative description you could come up with apply. This guy was a dick, and you know the worst part?  I stayed with him for three years!  Don’t ask me why, I think at some point it was just because I didn’t want to prove all my family and friends right and admit my poor poor judgement in getting together with him in the first place.  It was me being stubborn.

No really, I can be stubborn, it’s true.

He lived on another island which was a fair drive from where I lived, and after months and months of us traveling back and forth I decided to move to his island. I’d vacationed there a lot with my family over the years so I knew I liked it there and I was able to get a transfer through work so I would have a job there right away.

OH, that was after my boss pleaded with me not to go.  Not only because I was a great employee and we got along really well, but also because she thought it was a big mistake to move in with him.  She didn’t like him and she never really made any bones about saying it.

I should have listened to her and saw this as a sign, but being me I went ahead and moved in with him anyway.

After we broke up my father told me the story of when I was moving out, and the conversation he and Jerkoff had in the driveway.

Dad: Take good care of my girl

Jerkoff: Well, that depends on her.

Story is, it took pretty much all the strength my mother could muster to hold my father in the house and stop him from going back out to throttle the guy.  I sort of wish they’d told me at the time but it probably wouldn’t have made any difference.  Although, I wouldn’t have been so surprised and disappointed when the first time he actually was meant to take care of me came around.

It was about three or four weeks after I’d moved, I was living in a two bedroom apartment with Jerkoff and his best friend Chris.  They worked together and had already been living together so they agreed that I would move in with them.

One day I started feeling really ill, it went on for a couple of days and one morning I noticed I had this thing that looked like a water blister under my left eye.  I was still working but it was getting to be a struggle because over that two or three days I started feeling really terrible. Then one day it got worse.  I was incredibly sick and knew something was really wrong.  Jerkoff and Chris were both at work and I didn’t feel well enough to drive… I also didn’t know where the hospital was.  I called him at work and asked if he could come home and take me to the hospital because I was really sick and was getting worried… he said no.

No real reason, just … no.

I begged him to come home and take me, told him he could just drop me off afterwards and go back to work. The answer was still no.

I had no cash on me for a cab, I had no friends there yet and I didn’t know wtf to do… so I went to the internet.  I logged onto an IRC chat room for the city I was living in and well, basically whined about my situation.  A girl on there told me to stay put and she’d be there in a few minutes.  Sure enough, not long after she was at my door to take me to the hospital.  That was the first day I met Kimmy, who I’m happy to say I’m still friends with today, almost 15 years later.

She took me to the hospital and stayed with me for the dreadful wait at outpatients, chatting and doing the get to know you thing.  Then stuck around to see the doctor with me and waited for the results.

I was 21 years old and I had the chicken pox.

If you’ve ever had the chicken pox as an adult, or knew someone who has, you’ll know what a special kind of hell it is.

So, I was diagnosed and ordered to go straight home and not leave the house for two weeks. Great.  This was going to be awesome. That was sarcasm.

Anyway, by the time that was all over and we got back to the house, Jerkoff and Chris were home from work and then it was on like Donkey Kong.

When I came home I was tired, I felt sick and I had no particular desire to speak to him.  I was ticked off and embarrassed that I had to get a complete stranger to take me to the hospital when he could have easily left work to take me. He, on the other hand, was acting like nothing had even happened, until he noticed the cold shoulder.  Then I was getting screamed at.  Suddenly I was the bitch, the idiot who was not being nice to him. HA!!

Yes, the nerve of me not lathering him with affection after sitting at the hospital all day with a stranger to find out I had the chicken pox. Dick.

He screamed and I screamed, and he got really nasty, so Chris yelled at him and then he yelled at Chris because… you know, he took my side. Honestly, who in their right mind wouldn’t?

Meanwhile, Kimmy had dragged me into the bathroom to try to calm me down cuz I was getting really woozy. Great introduction this poor girl had, but at least we made her day interesting.

So, that night we were at war so much so that I’m pretty sure I even passed out at one point just from sheer exhaustion from the days events and then all the fighting that followed.  In the end we just weren’t speaking and he got up the next morning and went to work.

You know who went out and got me my medications, rented movies and took a day off to hang out with me? Chris, our roommate and his best friend.  This guy who had known me only a few weeks, who had no real emotional investment or obligation to me at all took care of me while I was sick, while my boyfriend went on about his business and pretended it wasn’t happening.

This was at the beginning of our relationship and looking back I have absolutely no idea whatsoever why I let it go on as long as it did.  I was young? Crazy? Stupid?

Stockholm Syndrome, anyone?!

About a year later he and I packed our bags and made the two day drive to Toronto, where we decided we wanted to have a go at a bigger and better life.  We had arranged to stay with a member of my family, my father’s first cousin Karen.  She kindly agreed to let us stay with her and her family until we got on our feet, but it wasn’t long before the same troubles started.  At one point I believe she had a bit of a pow-wow with my parents and then sat me down and told me I was welcome to stay with her for as long as I wanted, she’d help me until I found a job and could get out on my own.. but he had to go.   She was very clear about how she felt about him and I knew the rest of my family was in agreement, but… I LOVED him!  No, I thought I did.  No wait, I don’t even think I thought I did, I just felt like I’d invested so much and thought I saw a side of him that everyone else didn’t.

I got out the paper and started searching for apartments, then we moved out.

The next year or so was a blur of constant negativity.  The longer I was with him the more I grew to despise him, but I felt stuck and my pride kept getting in the way.

I can’t really say I regret it because it’s a part of what lead me to where I am now. If I had left him and followed a different path I may never have ended up with Xander, and he is the best thing that ever happened to me… but I do regret having been so blindly stubborn and foolish where Jerkoff was concerned. It’s humiliating, looking back on it.

I should have listened to my parents, my boss, my friends, my cousin, my co-workers in Toronto, and everyone else who urged me to get away from him.  There wasn’t a soul I ever introduced to him that didn’t get a weird vibe from him… and you know it’s bad when people actually TELL you they don’t like the person you are with.

I have to own my part of things as well, I was a hothead even back then and he and I clashed like nobodies business.  Our temperaments weren’t at all compatible and that lead to a lot of hellish, hellish arguments.  Beyond that though, he was just… mean.  He had such a nasty streak in him that I didn’t really see clearly until long after we had split and I met Xander, someone who doesn’t have a mean bone in his body.

Anyway, when I think of the person who treated me like shit or made my life shit the most, it’s him.  A guy who made me feel an inch tall the entire time we were together and couldn’t man up if his life depended on it.

From what I’ve heard through the grapevine I’m glad we went our separate ways.  Not long after we split up he got another girl pregnant and denied the child was his, refusing to have anything to do with it.  That sounds like him.  The child is probably better off without him.

I remember a while back I was curious about what he was up to, as we all tend to be with ex’s from time to time.  I Googled him and found out he’s heavily into bodybuilding now, some of the Google results were for posts he’d made on forums for steroids. Lame.  I was laughing because we all know the stories about how that shit can shrink your junk, and trust me… this guy had nothing to spare.

No, seriously. It was like a button on a fur coat.

Oh, and Jerkoff, if you are reading this… this one’s for you!