Be Young And Stupid

I’m feeling really young and stupid right now…and it’s for staying with my boyfriend. 

We’ve got to schedule time just to have a Skype date. I don’t even know how the next three/four years apart are going to be. 

He just informed me that maybe he’ll have one or two weeks time to spend with me in between the semester and his Summer internship. Three weeks in December. Four days for Thanksgiving. I hope one week for Spring break. That totals a little less than 6 weeks per year that I’ll see my boyfriend. The man I’m supposed to know and love and marry one day. 

I’m wondering now not if it’s “worth it,” but if we’ll even make it with so little time together. Things don’t even seem so real, and the time apart just in the last month given these thoughts has made me feel single again…as if I shared no commitment or attachment to anyone at all—least of all him. How are you supposed to feel close and stay close to someone that you spend 6 weeks with per year? I’m tempted to say that I can’t. 

Yet my tears and my worries and my fear all tell me that I’m scared to lose him and I’m worried it will get hard. I love him, and it’s scary to always be so far away trying to show that—mostly because it feels like I’m trying to prove my love for him instead.

And one day, he just lost sight.
He lost sight of what was important, of his priorities, and of me. And it was so scary.
It’s taken hours of figuring out, but finally, we are getting back on track. I guess this is the relationship stuff I like anyway: where you learn you can actually figure things out together. Without that, you’re fucked.

-I think it was a mistake being promoted
-I’m nervous about being happy because no one else in my family is and I know that they’re somehow jealous when I talk about things with us.
-Me and best friend are going on a road trip today. I need it.
-You’re my everything. I know you told me not to let it get like that, because I can’t need someone who can’t be there. But it’s like that, and now I don’t know what to do.
-I’m sad. I try not to be. But I feel you missing from me.

My boyfriend went to the doctor for more testing today. They think he may have colon cancer or a different type of cancer. He has a colonoscopy in three weeks.
I worry that something really bad is going to happen. What happens if he leaves for school again and he gets really sick? I’m so worried over this. He is too, and he’s never worried about anything. What am I really supposed to do?

My boyfriend went to the doctor for more testing today. They think he may have colon cancer or a different type of cancer. He has a colonoscopy in three weeks.
I worry that something really bad is going to happen. What happens if he leaves for school again and he gets really sick? I’m so worried over this. He is too, and he’s never worried about anything. What am I really supposed to do?

He goes to the doctor tomorrow. More symptoms. He says it’s not bad. It doesn’t hurt so much. He’s not angry, or upset, or any of the things that I was when I had my first outbreak. He just loves me and doesn’t want me to hate myself even though I do.
I was supposed to be protecting him and I didn’t.
What’s worse is that my anger towards my exboyfriend who gave me herpes has been reignited slightly. I wish it wasn’t. But alas, why am I in this situation anyway?
I must take responsibility for what I did, and what is happening. I’m just so sorry.

I no longer shudder when I think of you. I don’t really think, well, anything when I think of you. I just picture you as a boy I once knew that I don’t anymore. And there is no more anger. No more hate. No more sadness. Especially no more grief. The grief was the last to go. But I did conquer it. I don’t pray for you so much anymore. It is only because you are such a distant memory. I always hope you’re doing well. I think maybe you are, sort of.
My life now is filled with friends and laughter and light, unlike the times we had. The times with you were also filled with laughter, but were overshadowed by pain and problems we had to solve. Always, there was a problem.
And now, it is light. It is easy. It is a good life to live.
I understand your purpose in my life. Without you, I wouldn’t be me. And now I can go be a better me, finally moving on.

I thought for sure you were there next to me this morning.
I rolled over, facing pillows, disappointed and alone.

With my current boyfriend. It’s amazing to think we’re so close to a year…kind of. I should have started calling him my boyfriend 270 days ago instead of testing him so much. I’m glad I did though. I know we’ll just have so many more days together.

At my destination, parents house. It’s a sad day. My brother went to the doctor today and they say he probably has herpes. Everyone has been crying. It’s like watching my life a year ago play out, but I’m watching him live it. I’m watching both him and his girlfriend go through each stage. Being in denial, being numb and in shock, and then just silent and thinking. No one is mad yet. No one is very outwardly upset. It’s killing me though because my brother, the very light of my life, is not okay, and I can’t do anything right now to make sure he’s okay.

There. I said it.
And his girlfriend is doing the same thing that my exboyfriend did to me—relinquish responsibility and accountability. She’s cold, mean, and defensive. My boyfriend was across the country when I was diagnosed. She’ll also be in a different state since my brother moved away. He needs her and she’s avoiding everything and saying it wasn’t her. My brother needs me, and he should never have this life. That girl and I will ride in a car for three hours today to go see him. She already knows that I have herpes, but I’ll be telling her exactly what she needs to do to help him, and how fucked up she’s being. I am so tired of seeing me and the people I love walked all over.

Had a dream last night that my exboyfriend lived in town again. His whole family was with me except for him. I miss them a lot, and in the dream I felt really good about having them there, probably because I miss my family. They told me that I should talk with him. But also, that I didn’t have to see him if I didn’t want to. I never saw him in the dream, but I was so worried, like it would altogether destroy me.

I get a better feeling about it all the time. He’s not going anywhere. I’ll get to love him for years.

I’ve seen good days. Unfortunately, I’ve seen a great deal of bad days. 

It’s been one year tomorrow since I was diagnosed with herpes. April Fool’s Day. 

“I was almost hoping you were joking. You were going to tell me it was an April Fool’s joke,” he had said to me when we talked about what we would do.

A year ago, I was ready to get married. I was ready to settle down and have kids. I would move to places I didn’t know and be excited for the change. I would help my future husband deal with his mental demons because I loved him. I would help to raise our family, and he would be a great dad, something he always wanted. We would have it. Two people who never had anything, we would have something together.

There is a difference between us though. I never had anything because of the people I let into my life. He never had anything because of the person he was. I helped to create opportunity for myself out of the worst circumstances, and he basked in the glory of unhappiness. 

This year, things are very different. The weather is the same, the physical place I’m in is the same, but it all feels very different. I love a boy, not out of pity, but out of the fact that I wake up every morning wondering what he even sees in me because he is the greatest person I’ve ever met. I love him and I’m actually very scared that he might leave one day, because I don’t know if I could do any better than him. I don’t want to marry him right now. I don’t want to have his babies right now. But I’m holding out hope that he’ll stick around long enough to have a future with me. And who knows what that future will hold.

A year ago, I really thought that herpes was going to change things for me. It was going to make me more broken, and unlovable. It didn’t. It made me reexamine myself and realize how much I could love, and how much I could be loved.

My goal here is to tell you that just because you have herpes—or HPV or anything else, or you’re just reading this on the off-chance that you find me interesting—doesn’t change anything entirely. It changes the details, the minor ones. It does not change who you are or what you can accomplish, or how your life will go. Life goes on. I’m living proof that it does. And life didn’t just go “on.” It went well.

He’ll be here for spring break. Over a month away, so I’ve got some serious work. I just want it to be the best thing ever. I can’t wait.