I never expected to fall in love with Hugo. I thought he’d be just like all the other men that had briefly stepped into my life; have some fun, the minute there was talk of anything serious I’d leave, normally within a month or two. I was terrified of commitment, of anyone trying to get close. Scared that they’d see the real me. The me I hid so well from everyone else. But I let Hugo in and I fell in love.
It’s been hard letting go. I didn’t want to. I wanted to hold on to everything we dreamt up together. The life I was about to start living had been a dream of mine for such a long time. And the thought of my life without Hugo was unbearable. I had placed my faith in the world instead of in myself.
This past year I have been heartbroken and lost and I know now that I was meant to be. I tried to break up with Hugo two or three times when we were together, the last time because we both had said he was too young (he is two years younger than me) and this was all too much too soon. But he took me out for dinner and convinced me that we were doing the right thing; that we were meant to be. Our relationship was great but the timing wasn’t right and this broke me. Hugo broke me.
"Sometimes
We have to be
Broken
To be
Repaired."
- David Jones
I believed that I had to be married at 24, have kids at 26. I guess what I’ve learnt in the past year is that I don’t have to do any of that. That was what my parents had me believe. Now I know that I don’t ever have to get married if I don’t want to. A great friend of mine said to me the other day “Who gives a shit if you decide to get married. I mean, congratulations, you get to have sex with the same person for the rest of your life. Big deal.”. How I wish someone had said that to me a few years ago. I guess, now, to me getting married (at a young age) is a socially-forced goal that goes against my soul. I should have the right to get married when and if I want to, not when my parents or society tells me I should. At least that's one belief I've managed to change this year.
There are things that I have learnt this past year that I never would’ve learnt by being with Hugo; things that I could’ve only learnt by not mentally relying on Hugo to give me a sense of self. There have been choices that I have had to make when I was feeling absolutely lost and helpless.
I guess all I’ve truly lost is an idea. An idea of what may have been. An idea of what my future would be, or look like. That’s all. And that is something that I have really struggled with. I so wanted that life. I was ready for it - finally.
"Everything you are going through is preparing you for what you asked for..." - Unknown
My advice to you for when you find yourself lost is to see it as a wake up call to expand. Try things that you have never tried. Become someone that the old you wouldn’t even recognise. This isn’t happening to you as an accident. This is happening to you to put you back on the right path because you were lost and you didn’t even know it.
I am now free to do better. Free to do whatever I want. Don’t you want to be free?