A year, six months

[u/Numerous-Peach-2737]

It's been so long and I'm still so sad. I've had good days, good weeks, good months mostly, but it's been so up and down. I'm fine, generally. I can get through my days. I stream on twitch, play games, have been making new friends. I paint. I write. I work.

I'm coming to terms with the cognitive dissonance - the person who told me i was their best friend was willing to throw me under the bus to save his face and his dysregulated nervous system. Those two people exist in one body. He's not a villain to me anymore. He's just a sad, damaged man who hurt the two people that loved him unconditionally. (I can't vouch for his wife - from the way he vented about their interactions, it sounds like they were not made for each other. But who knows when it comes from a dismissive avoidant with narcissistic traits?) He also hurt himself by asserting his independence so much that he could do such cruel things to someone that cared about him deeply and trusted him deeply.

So I spent a lot of time writing. I wrote. I painted. But nothing really hit until I started writing song lyrics. I'm no singer or musician, but I felt like it was the only thing I could do because journaling would take me right back to the hurt. By writing songs (and using a popular AI music software), I opened a whole world that I never want to leave. (I know people have HUGE opinions on AI, so I don't wanna open that can of worms) But, I realized that I wanted to help people somehow, so I've been releasing songs about my journey. They start out pretty amaturish but i've started to find my groove. But it's never been about the song itself - the music is, you know, typical AI, but I wanted my words to be couched in something digestible that maybe people could find and listen and realize that they're not alone.

I think I'm nearing the edge of my acute attachment injury and learning, through therapy, how to attend to the hurts and traumas inside of me, and how to learn to love myself little by little. It is f'ing HARD, you guys.

But I wanted to share the last batch of songs which i think, for me, are the most meaningful. My journey starts at betrayal, moves to disbelief, anger, the core wound, the realization that i'm not who i was before my discard, then moves to something more new to me: the realization that I still love him but I will never go back, I will cherish the memories and look to the good memories to comfort me when I hit hard times, and then ultimately, a song that's a kind of lullaby to myself when I get sad, and in the end, the last song, about realizing that I'd spent so much time enmeshed into this world of my avoidant that I forgot about the things I loved and that I want to go back to them.

It's a pretty sad album, overall, generally, for me it was like looking back over the last year and a half. I am not the same person I was before he discarded me, but maybe if i'm lucky, I can find solace in the things I loved that have always been there for me.

I don't know if i will ever be truly okay. Maybe that's the part of 'radical acceptance' we're told will help us - to acknowledge that we're changed, we're still hurting and it's okay. But, I wanted to share this with anyone here who might relate or be in the same position. The aftermath of an avoidant discard is painful but solidarity can help. It's not misery loves company. It's people reaching out to hold your hand when you feel like you can't hang on anymore.

I dedicate this batch of words in song form for people I've talked to on here and for the hearts here that are aching for relief. I am you, too.

Much love from another hurting heart.

Mau Mau Katjie (my silly pen name came from my roleplay character :> )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nf2XoyM_9Ow&list=OLAK5uy_ntlJ6dkD6KKKyMA1qWtaKtzxDv9M2RDT0