Can't Turn Back Now

Eric left today. Just a few minutes ago actually. I feel like my heart is broken in a million pieces, but at the same time I can't cry. My eyes are heavy, my breath is short, and I feel like I could lay down and cry hours of ocean but it won't come. I guess this is what the term "bittersweet" really feels like. I guess this is what it feels like to really leave someone... not like a highschool romance where when you leave or get dumped its dramatic and it feels like the entire world blows up. This feels more like... a piece of me is now gone. I feel... loss. I've never really felt loss before, and even though I've been talking about how Eric and I weren't working and how one of us would be leaving and this n that for months now, after all is said and done... now that everything is official I understand what it feels like to have really lost someone that you love. And I guess its bittersweet because I know I lost him a long, long time ago. I know that we both grew apart. We changed, and we weren't going to last forever that way. I accepted it, but I feel like wherever the man I fell in love with went, he took a piece of me with him and I've never experienced this before. We didn't even really say goodbye. He put the last of his belongings in the car and we just walked away. Its a crappy way to part, but I guess what hurts most is knowing that this situation has me emotionally split and now I have to pick up the pieces alone... I have to figure out where I'm supposed to go from here, and he is moving on to another security. He's moving on because he has a plan and he's going for it. I feel like I'm left with nothing except for half-assed optimism and ideas about where to go from here.

I've completely erased him.. all of his stuff he either took or threw in the garbage outside, all of the family pictures we took together are all rolled up and hid in the back far reaches of my closet. I put them as far away as I could... I don't want them. I don't want to see them. I can't bare to throw them out just yet though. Is that normal?

On the other hand... I can breathe easier for a while. I don't have to worry myself anymore about who he's with, what he's doing, why he cares so much more about everyone else... What I could have done better in order to make him want to stay. No more fighting, no more jealousy or suspicion... no more cleaning up after his messes, no more catering to him and what he wants, no more bending over backwards to get an ounce of approval that I worked so hard for, but never was able to earn. No more being hurt because I wasn't loved like I should have been... no more sleeping next to someone who was like a stranger to me. No more wishing that he'd just take me in his arms and tell me he loved me... no more wishing that he'd treat my son like his own, no more hoping for the best. Now I can finally be who and what I want to be without his judgement. Without his lack of support. For that, I finally can breathe.

I hope he does well in his life. I hope that he is able to find some peace because he has his own demons to battle. I hope that he finds someone he can really love with all of his heart, and that he finds success in whatever he does. I wished him a merry christmas and happy travels when he left, and I really do wish that for him.

Time to start picking up the pieces of my life and putting them back where they belong. Literally.