However, life goes on.

Always.

Hands shaking, breathtaking

Photos from a distant town

Breaking down

You’re all around me

Float and fly and crash and burn

And say it’s all a game

Crush the ashes in your fist

And blow it all away

Sense memory pulls me back

Skin burning, upturning

All the plans I’ve put in place

Empty space

This loss surrounds me

Float and fly and crash and burn

And say it’s all a game

Crush the ashes in your fist

And blow it all away

Contact highs from ages past

Heart drumming, unbecoming

Urges that beg me to fall

This last call

To now become free

Is this everything you wanted?

Is this everything you dreamed?

Is this everything you bargained for

When nothing’s what it seems

Crash and burn and twist and turn

Now nothing is the same

Crush my hopes beneath your feet

And throw them all away

So this time I wasn’t the one who moved out. He did. And now I’m living alone, in a foreign country – and I love it. We moved to New Zealand together five months ago, and I have learned more about myself in the last couple of months that I did in the past five years at home.

I’m learning who I am when I’m not attached to someone else. And that I should be proud of that. I’m learning that I can look after myself perfectly well without anyone’s help. But that if someone genuinely offers help, accepting it doesn’t make me weak. I’m learning that people actually like me as a person and want to be my friend. I’m learning that I don’t need a partner to feel complete. I’m learning that I can sleep alone in my flat at night and feel safe. I’m learning how to say no to people when I want to, instead of always doing what others want me to do.

I’m starting to finally work out what I want from life, instead of just going along with what the other person wants, or what other people tell me I should want. It feels good. It feels right.

I feel like I’m finally getting somewhere.

After all I’ve been through I can cope with anything

Open eyes collecting clouds that darken in the day

Clasping hands in shadows that we try to keep at bay

I’m everyone’s but no-one’s and must reap what I sew

Feeling lost and lost in thoughts that twist forever slow

Mechanisms of defence are fair in love and war

Tell me just what it will take to even up the score

Cages with transparent bars locked tight from the inside

Trying hard to separate the real truths from the lies

Broken toys and puppet strings that fall slack to the floor

After all is said and done I’m always wanting more

i can’t remember ever being this happy before.

life has opened up for me in a way that i didn’t realise was possible.

everything is amazing

but as one door closes, another opens.

today is the start of my new life.

i think i’m moving out tomorrow.

i found a room in a share house with two other girls, it seems okay i guess. not really a home but at least somewhere to stay.

i told him all of this last night… everything, all the things i’ve been thinking and feeling, how i feel like i’ve tried every other possible way of fixing things between us and that nothing is working. and that living apart is the only other thing i can think of trying.

he didn’t get angry. he didn’t get upset. he just seemed tired… of all of this. he said that he’s sorry that i’m unhappy, but that he doesn’t know how to change that. and that he doesn’t think that living apart will help, but he can sort of understand how i might think that.

and then he said that he doesn’t expect me to stay with him, because he doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to give me what i want. and that maybe he’s just not the right person for me. but that despite that, he still wants to be with me.

even though i’ve been thinking these things, it still hurts a lot to hear them said out loud. especially coming from him.

i put so much into my relationships. i try so hard, for so long, to make them work. i probably stay in them far longer than i really should, because i keep hoping that against all the odds, things will somehow work out in the end. even when i know deep down that it’s extremely unlikely, i still hope.

i can’t help it.

and now i can’t eat. i can’t sleep. i feel sick in every part of me. i’m terrified that i might be making the wrong decision. what if there isn’t really a problem with the relationship… what if i’m the problem?

i just feel so lost.

i want to live. not just exist. truly live.

i want to wake to the dawn touching my eyelids through an open window. i want to feel rain on my skin. i want to feel like nature is swallowing me whole.

i want to open myself up to the world and allow everything to come rushing in.

i want to walk into the waves and no longer be afraid of them. i want the salt to sting my lips and remind me that I’m right here, right now, and for that moment to be all that matters.

i want a space of my own where i can just be me. i want fairy lights over my bed, tiny points of light that only serve to make the darkness deeper. i want to find out who i am when i’m alone.

i’ve let him control my life for far too long. i’ve let him drain my happiness, my confidence.  i’ve let him drag me down with him, into the shadows where he wants to stay. i’ve tried for so long to pull him back up into the light with me but you can’t help someone who truly doesn’t want to be helped.

i want to face the pain and the loss and the sadness and still be okay, still realise that despite it all, I’m still here, and that’s what counts.

i want to start living again.

i just need to take that step out  into the unknown.

now that he thinks everything is back to normal and there’s no danger of me leaving, he’s lapsed back into the old behaviours. this is why i stayed after he said those things a month ago and everything went crazy and suddenly my life was up in the air – i almost left then, but i gave him the benefit of the doubt and stayed to see if anything would really change, or if he’d revert to being nasty to me after the crisis period was over.

even though i kind of knew this would happen, it still makes me sad. i always have so much hope that things might get better, in almost any given situation, that it takes me a long time to face reality.

but now i’m seeing things for what they really are. and i’ve tried so hard, for so long, but nothing is changing.

and i know it’s up to me to make the decision. to make the next move.

i’m just so scared.

last night i slept in a smoke-filled room and dreamed of flash floods. the hot ache of newly tattooed skin hummed in my mind throughout it all. i fell asleep in the middle of a sentence, talking about something mundane to the blonde girl who lay beside me.

these nights away keep me afloat. they clear my mind.

i come home the next morning and he’s too busy watching TV to talk to me after the first hello.

is there anything left apart from familiarity? is this just because it’s convenient? am i really so boring?

i wish i knew for sure.