The longest week.

I am fucking exhausted.

Seriously fucking burnt out.

The last week has felt like the longest one in my life. So much has happened, and I’ve gone up and down so many times that I’ve lost count, and I really would like to get into my bed and disappear.

I suppose most important matters first. Over the weekend I called off my relationship with my girlfriend of about six months for good. We loved each other deeply, and I may never be loved so unconditionally again. We invested our entire selves into the relationship and each other (something I wasn’t ready for, in hindsight). We spent memorable times together and, although the relationship was somewhat short, we connected in a way that transcended most other relationships. In spite of these things, it wasn’t the sort of love that I desired. I loved her, and still love her, but not in the way that I want to love someone. I loved her for her care and comfort that she showed me, for her company and tastes, and for the intricacies that made her the person she is. But it became clear to me that I did not love her with the desire and passion that I wish for romance. I loved her in a way that one can love a friend, and, just six months in, that’s not how I wish to love someone. While we gave each other much good, we also drained each other of our characteristics that sustained us prior to the relationship. I drained her of her sense of security and confidence within herself, and she drained me of my independence and belief in my ability to make someone happy. We fought a lot, and brought each other to tears on many occasions, and by the end of our time together, there was a distinct air of uneasiness between us, as if we were ignoring the inherent hurt that we caused each other.

I suppose a great deal of my rationalisation is based around the idea that it was better to end it before it got any worse, before we invested more of ourselves in each other – better sooner than later. Our love had descended into hurt, perhaps because we cared about each other too much. And that’s why it was the most difficult thing I have ever had to do when I confronted the truths within myself and decided to sacrifice what we had built together. A great deal of my suffering is based around feelings of guilt. Guilt for perhaps not appreciating the full and unconditional love that had been afforded to me. Guilt for not simply being able to accept that love and return in a like manner. Why could I not do that? Why couldn’t I be happy? Did I sabotage myself?

When I explore myself a bit more (and maybe this will become clearer with time) I find that I didn’t sabotage myself. Our relationship was flawed in many situational ways, quite separate from any personal feelings of restlessness or unhappiness. Perhaps these situational factors exacerbated my feelings of restlessness, but I don’t think that amounts to self-sabotage. Maybe the relationship was sabotaged from within? Maybe it collapsed beneath its own mass. While I have a tendency to get lost inside my head at times, and question everything, I don’t feel that I pushed myself to be unhappy. I think that I would have been quite happy if the relationship was right for me. Any desires to long for independence, for others, difference, would’ve been quashed if the relationship was right for me.

So my guilt is borne out of hurting someone I care so deeply for. I am guilty because I have deprived someone of something that was right for THEM, in order to be able to find something that is right for ME. I feel guilty imagining her pain and suffering, her confusion, her longing for things to go back to how they were, and I also feel the desire for things to return to how they were. In moments of intense grief and sadness, I wish to return to the comfort that she provided me, to the idealised notion of ‘our relationship’, excluding all the pain and unhappiness that came with ‘our relationship’. It is foolish, but natural, for both her and I, in our grief, to forget how much we suffered within our relationship together. We forget how much we fought and how much was not right, and remember only the feelings of comfort and surface happiness – memories of outings together, nights spent watching movies, curling our bodies into one another in bed as we slept. Our souls are weighed down by those memories and images, and this manifests itself in our grief and suffering.

Alain de Botton in his book Essays in Love which I, heartbreakingly, read last week, refers to the metaphor of a camel. The camel represents our soul, and with such a traumatising experience, more weight is heaped onto the back of the camel as it tries to cross the desert. The camel slows and strains under the weight which forms as memories and images, smells and sounds that remind us of our lost love. The camel is pushed to its limits as the despair of such a situation takes hold, and it is almost unable to continue. But, with time, the camel is able to shake the weight from its back. The camel learns to forget. So as it walks the desert, the camel shakes off nearly every memory, piece by piece. The camel is better able to walk now as it loses this weight with time, and eventually, it shakes enough of the memories off its back and into the sand so that, while not completely forgetting the nature of the relationship, its memory becomes bearable to the soul. And so the soul is able to catch back up to the body.

Now, my camel is straining under the weight. It’s walking slowly. Very slowly. I feel guilt and pain imagining her camel, and at times I wish I could lift the weight off its back; to go to her and, out of the sheer pain of watching her suffer, put my arm around her and tell her it will be okay, that things will return to normal; to be able to see her smile again. But I know that to do such a thing would sacrifice my own sense of self. I would descend back into unhappiness and restlessness, and I personally don’t think any individual deserves to be with someone that cannot treat them as they rightly deserve. In a sense, we both need to endure this time of grief. I need to endure it in order to be able to achieve a better sense of self and continue my search for what is, in idealistic terms, right for me, and she needs to endure it in order to find a situation where she is loved and appreciated for all that she is, in the way that romantic love should be. And while she told me she will never love anybody the same as she has loved me, I sincerely hope that is not true, because I wish her nothing but happiness, and feel nothing but guilt and shame that I could not find true, lasting happiness within her.

To dumb this down – sad face. I feel really miserable. I’ve been so up and down since the weekend and have tried to avoid spending time without being in contact with someone (anyone) at all costs. For one of the few times in my life, I can’t stand being alone. And I guess I am rather perplexed as to why that is. I suppose we invested so much of ourselves in each other that even I have forgotten how to live my life alone. I miss company. I miss comfort. I suppose it will be a matter of time for me to be able to shake these feelings.

Feelings: Guilt (over hurting her); Grief (over the loss of the relationship and someone I cared about deeply from my life); Sadness (general); Longing (for a return to the safety of the idealised relationship); Anxiety (in hoping that things will improve with time); Worry (for her).

It’s enough to make me want to erect a huge billboard warning every passerby against getting in a relationship, to just live life on the periphery, to not let yourself into a vulnerable situation. Ah, the joys of the stoic. The unsustainable joys. I know within myself that it will be okay. I’ll move on. She’ll (I really hope) move on. We’ll see each other after some time has passed, exchange greetings, share a warm, but remote hug, look into each others eyes and, while still seeing the person we care for, know that they don’t need that care anymore. In most senses, suffering cannot last forever. Usually, it cannot last more than a few months, depending on the event. In the end, we all go back to normal, and life proceeds with new goals, new people, new surroundings. But for that time of suffering, life appears as a distant dream - a mirage to the weighed-down camel crossing the desert. It feels as if we will never live again. And while I can speak and think rationally, I still feel as if life is somewhere off in the distance.

In other news, work for uni is piling up a tiny bit. I’ve just been so restless of late and haven’t been able to remain focussed on my work. I really need to get my shit together. It’s getting dangerous.

I’m seeing a doctor in a couple of days for a mental assessment. It’s been a long time coming. I really should have had one a couple of years ago, as I’ve always grappled with feelings of depression and the like. My sister, who is terrific, will be guiding me through it all. I really hope these will be positive steps towards alleviating myself of a variety of things, because I need a hand. I really do.

Songs from the past week that have received a great deal of rotation:

• Galaxie 500 – ‘Don’t Let Our Youth Go To Waste’
• Cocteau Twins – ‘Pur’
• Spiritualized – ‘I Think I’m In Love’
• The Smiths – ‘How Soon Is Now?’
• Love Is All – ‘Busy Doing Nothing’

I suppose just trying to listen to a combination of gentle, sad songs, with some more uplifting ones thrown in there. Also, discovered a band named Faunts through a sample disc. Pretty excited to give them a go.

Okay. Sleep time. Let’s hope things look up.