Holly Riordan

You can’t get used to your person swooping in when something is wrong and playing the hero. You can’t rely on them to handle all of your problems for you. You can’t forget you are supposed to be a team.

Making slow, gradual progress is better than making no progress. Spending years working toward a goal is better than giving up on that goal completely.

You don’t owe your FWB anything, so if you take a few hours to answer their texts, it’s not a big deal. If you’re too busy to hang out for a few weeks, it’s not a big deal.

You’re used to your paranoia being correct. You’re used to your bad gut feelings paying off. You’re used to suspecting your person is fooling around behind your back and being proven right. 

They will swear they will never repeat their mistakes. They will look you dead in the eyes and promise it will be different this time. They will make you believe their latest mistake has knocked sense into them. They will trick you into thinking they’ve learned, they’ve grown, they’ve become a better person.

You keep misplacing your phone and keys and glasses. You keep zoning out while other people are talking. You keep thinking you’ve seen something or heard something that isn’t there.

They refuse to reflect on themselves. They refuse to apologize. They refuse to admit they’ve done anything wrong.

Instead of getting closure from your conversation, you might reopen old wounds. You might move two steps backward in your healing process.