Don’t Break His Heart Trying To Heal Your Own

Christian Acosta

You don’t care about him, not really anyway. He’s the guy you tell your friends about minimally, the guy you refer to as just a friend, the guy who you would deny to everyone you’re talking to. He’s the guy you need there when you’re lonely, the guy you’ll call when you’re drunk and have no one else to go home with. He’s the guy you need attention from when you’re lacking it from elsewhere. He’s the guy you call when your heart gets broken and one day he’s going to realize that.

Maybe he won’t care, or maybe he will.

Maybe he will get upset about it; tell you that you strung his heart along and that you played him. Or maybe he will just say “fuck you, I didn’t need you anyway” then go home with another girl the next night.

And you will feel broken, betrayed and hurt. But why? You were embarrassed by him, you didn’t show him off, you didn’t want to date him but you miss the attention he’d give you.

You miss the way he made you feel like you were special, you miss not having him to talk to because no matter how much you convinced yourself and everyone else around you that he meant nothing to you – you lied.

You didn’t see what you had at first because you convinced yourself he wasn’t the one for you. You convinced yourself that he was all wrong, that he could never make you happy, that he was too easy and too available but he was good for attention. You convinced yourself that he was always going to be your backup plan.

And then he’s gone. And you think you miss him but you really don’t.

You don’t actually miss you – you miss the idea of what you could have been, you miss the attention, you miss the secret of your “relationship.” You don’t miss even, really, as much as you might think you do.

Now you’re left with a void, you have to find a way to fill that attention you’re lacking. You have to fill it with someone new, unless you can find the strength to fill it alone.

You’ll jump into the next set of arms that are open in your direction. You’ll go for someone you could never see a future with, someone who you think will just help pass the time. You go for someone who’s easy, who you know will think you’re too good for him, someone you think you can manipulate and control. You go for someone who you know you’ll outgrow because that stops you from getting your heart broken, or so you think.

It’s the same cycle all over again. You stay until you find someone else to crawl into bed with on a drunk Saturday night. You find someone else to keep you company when you’re bored, someone to text when you’re lonely, someone to compliment you for your Snapchats.

You look for someone to numb the pain you’re feeling inside and that’s really all you’re doing. You’re using him as a band-aid and when he leaves, which he will, you feel the pain of the wound being exposed again. It’s healed a little but it still hurts, so you grab another band-aid. You cover it up with another vice. 

You struggle but you don’t want to acknowledge it, you don’t want to accept it. So you just keep finding someone new. You just keep convincing yourself you don’t need anyone, that you’re just talking to him to pass the time.

You hurt him in the process because you’re only worrying about yourself.

You don’t care if you lead him on or break his heart as long as yours isn’t breaking, and that’s the problem.

You hurt others to try to protect yourself and all that gets you is alone, and I’m just waiting for the day that you can see that. Broken hearts shouldn’t break other hearts just to temporarily fill their voids.

He deserves better and so you do, but you need to stop jumping into the arms of anyone who will give you attention as a temporary band-aid. It’s only a temporary high and it can’t heal your broken heart – only you can do that. 

Put down your phone, stop talking to people you don’t really care about,  stop looking for ways to fill the void in your heart and start working on loving yourself. Start working on healing. Start working on becoming whole again on your own because you’re enough on your own. Thought Catalog Logo Mark

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