Poison Ivy

Infatuation, heartbreak, denial, and deceit, I lived it. Broken Souls make the best stories, right? Trusting souls will always lose their way. So, today I talk about poison ivy. I’ve said it before because I’ve done it and I’ve been hurt by it: never cause another pain because you are hurting.

I’ve had a string of relationships and a string of pain. I’ve had three amazing great loves and a lot of “like” loves. I’m coming clean with my life and stories I have buried. Of those three great loves, I was unfaithful to two of them.

How does one do that to someone they love? Heartbreak starts at a very young age. My first soul mate broke my heart multiple times. The first guy I fully trusted let me down. With growth and knowledge comes acceptance. So many years drove anger and pain by being let down by the same person that I was too young to comprehend how to cope. I buried most of the pain, but let it add fuel to my fire. I converted the anger into revenge verses healing and growing.

When you are 18 and had your heart broken buy the same guy; your guard goes up. You tend to have a hidden agenda going into every new relationship because you wait for that crash to come again. I was angry and broken. So my senior year, when that same boy reappeared, I was a shadow of love. My walls were up; I was vengeful, and I learned how to be deceitful. I was broken, and I learned I could do the same damage in my own pain. I cheated on him multiple times (with the same guy, which really doesn't matter). Then the side guy ghosted me, and I was angry again. Not only had I started to develop commitment issues, but even though what felt like heartache, I started to develop a type of rebound diversion; pushing my pain onto another. I used gained strengths of being beautiful and playing the game of teasing another's desires. It was the early 2000's, I had just learned from main stream media how to tease and taunt. It became a game.

The next guy ended to be a causality in my own war. Mark…you didn’t deserve what I put you through. You are one of my major regrets; you were a rebound and a space filler. There was a lot of ‘like’ moments, but my heart was protected, and we never connected like that. After a short 7 months, we ended without saying a word of it ending. We stopped reaching out to each other. We had ghosted each other and avoided each other for years to come. We still have not reconnected, even though social media let's me step back to fond memories of our time together.

My second love came the summer before my sophomore year in college. Instant love and attraction. My hard love; the love that I fought hard to keep but I constantly strayed from. I strayed a lot from him and the only excuse I had at the time was that I was lonely. See, he dropped out of college after his sophomore year; but he still stayed on the college schedule with me. During the fall, he would drive up from Ohio and stay with me through May. Then summer would come, and he would go home. I don’t even understand today why I ever thought that was right. Think about it; someone comes up and lives with you during the fall/winter months, and then leaves. I missed him when he was away, and in my heart, me stepping out was just to numb the pain of being alone. Long distance loves and pushing to keep them near can never last. He was my denial. I lost myself in that love. I learned how to make excuses in our relationship. In the end, after 3 ½ years of being on a roller coaster; it ended by us both walking away and never speaking to each other again. We never got that closure which led me to many years of bouncing from rebound to rebound trying to fill the vacancy in my heart. At the age of 26, I became numb.

Truthfully, I’ve been infatuated with chasing after love. In a way, I chased my parent’s passion. I often fell in defeat. I often caused pain because I hadn’t learned to cope. Every love I thought I had, was an illusion after those first two. They covered holes I didn't even remember digging. I chased the euphoria of a love I knew I wouldn’t want once I found it. What it broke down to is that I loved the chase and I hated the deceit. I fueled the anger in those moments of pain. I created a lot of ‘like’ loves and went through the motions of every broken heart. I think I eventually craved the pain of the break verses the actual relationships. I had started thriving in the chaos of each situation.

KC came along when I was a loose cannon. I had corrupted a couple good relationships with guys who were genuinely kind. I spent a lot of time trying to make that relationship work. And the pain of losing it felt like I was in love. KC taught me beauty in everything, however, he taught me karma does come around for those who chase chaos. He was my chaos and at the time, I really thought there was love in that relationship. But years later, I finally understood what it was, it was a close relationship. We both were there for each other in the worst of our times. We built each other up. But we weren’t meant for each other.

Then there was JK, he was the closest I had to a best friend as a guy. We had been friends since I was 20. He was a customer at the bar I worked at and was one of those individuals you never got tired of talking to. Every Tuesday, he would drive 45 minutes one way just to sit and keep me company. This is the only friendship I will ever mourn because I can’t get it back. I had spiraled, and I learned how to create pain. I turned into a Phoenix of emotions. Pure wrath. I destroyed and lost one of the best person’s I knew. My own pride and prejudice couldn’t let it go.

By my 30’s, I hit my last unconventional relationship. I’m thankful he was a mentor to me; I owe my life where I am at today because he took a chance on me. But, it was a borrowed relationship, it didn’t belong to me. In my mentality, I knew it never did. That’s why it was always easy to sabotage and break. I found the crack he had and made it bigger. I was in pain and I readily spouted off to create as much misery on him as I could. When we ended, I remember 3 months of pure hell and crying. Years later, I began to fully understand why I was so impacted. It’s not because I was in love. It wasn’t for the person. I finally understood the years I endured chasing the next poison. My heart, body and mind were broken; all because of me. I will forever owe him gratitude, but I’m thankful that friendship washed away.

Have you ever realized the love we thought was supposed to be there just occupied our time until we met our own North Star? That’s where I found my last love. He started off as a fix that I couldn’t get enough of. For those who lived those first 3 months in our bubble, you knew how quickly my world shattered with our break-up. This break-up wasn’t like the rest. This was not a loss of pride or knowing the loneliness was coming back. No, this was different. It was like that first heart break when I was 16; it was like being let down when I was 17; it was losing my friend when I was 26…I loss the person I never put on a show for. I was 100% myself; I lost my guard. He was the reason I changed. The lust of the poison ivy faded from me. I grew up. I was disappointed I lost a strong relationship I went all in for. It’s the first time I didn’t want to give up and move on to the next conquest. I chose to be patient; very few knew the circumstances of why we broke up (especially my family) because I knew it wasn’t the end for us. He’s the reason I cut back the vines around my heart.

The morale is very simply. It's always going to be a struggling growing up while your sexuality is running in chaos. We can be burned by poison ivy every year because we tend to forget what to watch for. One day, you will begin to understand and acknowledge how to prevent yourself from slipping back into those vines of confusion. And if you do...be prepared for a lot of calamine lotion.