Relapse

Do you ever have those moments when it just sinks in how far you have to grow and how much you have left to learn? I’m talking about the kind of moment that comes after days, weeks, or even months in which you think you’ve figured a portion of your life out.

You think you’re doing fine; maybe even great.

Then suddenly it hist you just how stagnant you’ve really become. You realize that all the strides you’ve made, the huge steps you’ve taken, have led you back into the same mistake you always seem to convince yourself to make for a different reason every time.

What’s worse is that it’s always a mistake all of those close to you can see you’re making. They know exactly how it will end. You really do too. But you pretend you don’t.

The mistake brings the inevitable end and you say, “I saw this coming.” Because even though you hoped you didn’t see it; even though you closed your eyes so you really couldn’t see it; you could still sense it  as you crept closer to the same wall you seem to crash into again and again.

I knew it was coming. I didn’t want to see it. I went back to the same man I had so stoutly stood without for three months. In those three months I was healthier and better off than I had been in such a long time. But I let myself wander back into the stifling comfort of the same pattern and the same pervasive feelings.

I can say I do care about the boy. I have always cared about him. I have a true desire to see him happy. These are excuses for my blind belief in the repeated games he has played time and time again. These genuine intentions do make my relapse into the inevitable heartache a little easier to bear, but only a little.

Perhaps my slip back into the familiarity of the ease of his words is really just—or really should have just been– a reminder to me of his inevitable slip back into selfishness and cruelty. This only make things a little easier to swallow when I’ve been forcefully feeding myself the stories which will make me love-sick in the end.

I feel like a fool right now. I relapsed. It was out of the best intentions and feelings, but I still did.

I have a ways to go in my self-growth. But I can be damn sure that this relapse will be shorter and more beneficial to my sensibility and self-worth than any relapse was before.

–Written by Sandy Heights

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