Something happened today that upset me. It wasn't aimed at me personally, but because I'm in a similar position I felt it.

So let's start from the beginning. Yes, I'm dating online. Yes, I didn't really know the guy IRL before he actually asked me out. Yes, I have met him. This is my confessions. I'm not shamed by admitting that the person I'm dating, this wonderful person, I met online and got to know through hours of talking before ever seeing how he looked like.

Great, now that the pressing questions are answered, we can address the rest of the story. How can we judge someone and say it's not real because it's online? Isn't that just the new version of the long-distance relationship? Would you break it off just because someone you love moved to another country? Or would you tell that person they didn't love you if they were not willing to stay in your country?

Yes, there's no hugs, no kisses, no holding hands. And trust me, neither of us don't want that, we both miss it. But am I willing to break up with the person that made the last year and a bit heaven because of the offchance of me perhaps meeting someone IN MY COUNTRY that I would want to spend the rest of eternity with? When in 28 years of my life on this Earth it hasn't happened?

Yet people suggested this to someone. Insinuated that what she had was not real. All because it's online. We have social networks, keep in touch with family and friends through email and skype and messengers...does that make them not our friends anymore?

How can you afford to say that when everything we do is online, from banking, to checking what friends have been up to, to relaxing with puzzles or youtube or whatever interests you, how can you say that dating someone online isn't "real"? Where does the distinction come in?

I'm happy with my guy, and he makes me happy, despite not being able to rub my feet when they are sore after a rough day at work. He's the guy I plan on spending the rest of my life with.

And people that tell me what I have with him is not real...they can go take a nice long walk in my size 42 steel-point safety boots in the desert (and yes, I've done that this week)

 

1. I am addicted to Coca Cola. For real. I get withdrawal symptoms when I try to cut it out of my life. I get shaky, get headaches, I’m grumpy, and I can’t eat anything. It was horrible. It was the longest week of my life L
2. I like polka dots, circles and stripes. Especially on my soft furnishings, towels and bags.
3. My favourite set of colours is blue, lime green, turquoise, sun yellow, bright orange and neon pink.
4. I only wear pink when I’m in love.
5. I’ve always liked blue. I liked baby blue/pale blue as a little one, progressed to navy in primary school, went to dirty French navy blue in high school, had a passing fling with turquoise, and I like pure royal blue currently.
6. I have a phobia of phones; answering them or using them to phone. After lots of therapy and practise I drop calls only 50% of the time.
7. My lucky number is 7.
8. Four things I never leave home without, ever!: My Oakleys Five sunglasses (I’m light sensitive) , my lip treatment (my lips get dry easily), a pen (I always want to write down something) and my mp3 player (can’t imagine going somewhere without music).
9. I am very shy....very very shy.
10. I hate chocolate. But I’m addicted to fruit jellies.
11. I last ate a toffee when I was 16. The toffee pulled out part of a tooth. Never again.
12. I’m a morning person. Except when someone wakes me up real early. They better have coffee ready.
13. I delivered newspapers for 2 years while studying. Often this means I barely got home at four in the morning after a night out before getting on a bicycle to drunkenly swerve in the streets.
14. I believe in fairies, dragons, aliens and Murphy’s law.
15. I would do anything to avoid taken a picture off. Ducking and diving when possible, but when caught, I will do the best I can, pull in my stomach and smile my Chucky smile.
16. I love daisies, or any other bright yellow or orange flowers.
17. I seldom wear jewellery, since I feel constricted in it, and I take it off soon after putting it on.
18. I would walk barefoot whenever I could get away with it. And yes, I try my luck at work too
19. I know precisely how long it takes for me to make dinner, shower, make-up, do my hair, anything else I do on a regular basis. I love measuring time, length, heat, anything that can be measured
20. I love fixing stuff. In extreme cases where there is nothing to fix, I will break stuff so I have something to fix

Dear Regrets,
I wish I could voice you properly. I wish I could have resolved you, talked about you. I guess I regret not being able to do that. I regret regretting you. Digging you up again and doing the same thing that I did wrong the previous time. You are old friends, but I convinced myself that I won't regret my actions. That I won't live with you again. And yet, I fell for the sugarsweet words, wanted to believe so badly that he wasn't going to make me regret it. I can't blame him, I fooled myself, thought that he would always be there. I believed that he would do the honourable thing and return the love I gave him. I'm scared, I've lived with you so long in the past. I basically only got you to move out. And now you're back again at my invitation. I invited you back into my life with the guy I thought was different. Who I thought decent. Now I have to go through the whole healing process again. To minimise you, to make you seem less than you are, so that I could go on with my life. And I'm scared, yes, scared that I will fall for another's promises again. To fall in love again and believe him when he says he loves me.And to open the door to you again.

Dear Confusion,
I wish I could make you feel better. I wish I could make you feel okay about walking out of my life. Talking things out most definitely would have helped you. You were directly involved in the fight. The fights he picked with me. The things he said that I didn't understand, and which he never thought was worth talking about. The way he acted, the way he ignored me just made you balloon and grow. You were tinged with sadness, with anger, like swirling mud in a pond of water just after someone stepped in it pollutes the clear water. You struggled, trying to get out of the containment I built for you, trying to keep you restricted, trying to minimise the damage you did to me in your own confusion. Time and time again you broke out, prompting me in desperation to ask questions, questions that spawned new fights and more confusion, to demand answers, answers I never got. I still have you lurking there, but the thing is I'll never find out why he ignored me, blew up over small things, demanded that I tell him about things I think unimportant. Why he broke our rules yet got angry when I did the same in anger you caused. Could you please leave me alone? I have enough to think about without your pointless questions echoing in my head. I can't give you answers. Only he can, but he won't. You have to remember that's why I ended it.

Dear Inner Self,
You were the one that got hurt. You were the casualty in this war. I wish I listened to you, listened to the small voice telling me that something is wrong. I wanted to be in love so badly. To have someone that loved me. To feel that thrill. I squashed your voice, listening to his empty promises, his empty apologies. Maybe he truly believed he loved me, perhaps for the first month at least. Your voice became harder, more strident. You were screaming, forcing me to think about the questions you raised. You were the one telling me you're worth more. You were the one telling me that it's not right the way he treats you. I left it for too long. When I finally started fighting back, he was too deep in my life, he had too much of a hold on me. I thought that we could work it out. You asked whether I could see where he was trying. I ignored you, once again. I tried so hard to save the relationship. I thought someway I failed you by not being involved enough, by not giving enough. I gave more without expecting anything back, and thus I never got anything back. I'm sorry for the things he did to you. I'm sorry for allowing him to taint the idea of love for you. To make you hesitant to trust again that there might be goodness in people. I undid all the work that you went through to be ready for someone to love you. I'm sorry for not listening to your warnings, for not leaving earlier. But I did leave. I know you are mad, angry and talking to confusion too much. You aren't sad because you still believe that you are worth being treated right.

I'm the one being sad. Crying when it seems everything makes me think of him. Lying awake wondering whether I did the right thing. I'm the one dealing with all three of you. Trying to still talk to him. I know you despise me for not cutting him completely out of my life. For posting angry stuff, for screaming at him in the privacy of my home, for sending messages, texts. I know I have to stop, delete all his information from my life. Clean my mobile, clean my home, clean my GPS and go get my stuff from his place.

But I secretly hope that he can't forget me. That he keeps momentoes of me. That he thinks of me now and again when playing Tekken. That he realises that I would have given up everything and anything to be with him. Almost losing myself in the process. And that he would have to go far to find another one like me. One willing to accept him as he is, if he had been willing to work on the relationship. One willing to let him grow, to wait while he did it. One that truly loved him.

I still love him. But I love my sanity more...