Chad and I are Breaking Up

It’s amazing how fast things change when you’re not paying attention. I never saw us breaking up. I let myself sink, no dive, into the idea that we were becoming a happy family. I have textbook daddy issues and as self-aware as I may be, I really didn’t see this coming.

Breaking Up with my Boyfriend

I was so desperate to have a complete family that I put the blinders on and didn’t see the signs. Chad was honest with me, and still I chose to ignore it.

You see, I have two children, Adam and Chesney. But I also cannot have any more children. And, to be honest, I don’t want anymore either. Chad always said he wanted kids but that he was happy with me. And all he ever wanted was to be happy so everything was fine.

While dating–as a single mom, it’s hard because it’s not like you’re going to include your kids right away–I was behaving like a single person. Meaning, a girl without kids. Sure, he knew since day one (really before even that since I’ve known him a while) that I have kids, don’t want and can’t have anymore… but he was getting to know just me. We fell in love. And, wow, I loved him completely.

But that’s the problem. He fell in love with me; I = me + 2 kids + shotty uterus + rescue cat + all the rest of my odd collection of family members. I failed to realize that he only fell in love with the ‘me’ part of that equation. I was so blinded by my feelings for him I didn’t see it. We were busy having fun. Vacationing together, going out when the kids were asleep… but not realistically having much ‘family’ time.

After getting more and more acquainted with being a family he realized that this can’t work for the long term. He wants his own kids.

Thankfully, we were not living together yet. But he was spending about 5 nights a week here. The kids were used to having him around and so was I. I am now haunted by things in my house. My DVR recorded all the shows we would only watch together. The bottle of wine we bought in Hawaii to share on our anniversary sits there unopened. It’s like my space is polluted with all these things now. At every glance my heart sinks and I choke on the sobs I don’t want my kids to see.

My calendar is riddled with all the plans we made together and it makes me so sad. It’s like detox. I have to mentally and physically remove him from my plans. I hate this so much.

I’m so mad at myself. I will now have to tell my kids–who fell in love with him just as I did–that it didn’t work. I plan on waiting as long as possible so there is a bit of weaning time where they haven’t seen him, and so that I have a little more time to heal and can control my emotions.

Pathetic. I wish I were stronger. This hurts so bad it’s sickening.

Mental trickery is the worst. While sleep is almost impossible, I managed to fall in long enough to have a dream last night. I dreamt that Chad was teaching me how to ski and I totally sucked. So we just fell into the snow together playing. Really?! WTF  Thanks a lot brain. I woke up smiling and then I remembered that it’s over.

I wish this road to healing wasn’t paved with shattered glass and that I had remembered my shoes.

My reason for posting this is to just be honest and outward with what we are going through. It is not meant to make Chad look bad. I understand what happened. It just sucks. I wish I could say we’ll stay friends, but I really don’t know if I can handle that. Plus, I kinda need to hate him right now.

Plus, I know people will wonder what happened and rather than repeat the story a hundred times… here it is. It just wasn’t meant to be.

But I am walking away from this with new knowledge. I failed to protect my children and myself by indulging in self-fulfilling blindness. For that, I am so sorry. All I can do now is learn from it and never let it happen again.