I used to feel hesitant calling myself a girlboss. I use the word ironically, but there’s a power to it. I felt like I couldn’t use it. That I wasn’t actually powerful. Because you tried so hard to take away my power.

I’d post these things on Instagram having to convince myself I believed them. You attempted to take away so much of who I was when we were together.

You made me feel powerless. I nearly had to beg you to spend time with me. You did the same shit over and over again even though I told you how upset it made me. You made me think I was the crazy one for expecting the bare minimum from you.

“Possibly”

This word haunts me. It was your response every time I asked you to hang out. Always a Maybe. Never a Yes. I was always a Maybe to you. Perhaps you’d find a different, better option. I was a backup plan. Never worth the commitment.

In my journal entries, I drove myself insane. It felt like I was always trying to figure out a way to make it work. I was so determined. I don’t know what my actual goal was. And I’d write about that a lot. How I didn’t know what it was that I actually wanted. You made me think the normal thing—us to be in an actual committed relationship—was so off the table that I needed to brainstorm and brainstorm a viable alternative for us.

At a certain point, I just don’t understand how you didn’t comprehend that all the tears I shed were your fault. You made me think I was overacting. I think one time you told me that just because you hurt my feelings and made me cry, it wasn’t your job to change your behavior. What?

You refused to ever accept any blame for your actions. I had to beg you to say sorry to me. While I sat on FaceTime with you sobbing, I had to beg for your apology. After hours of this, you’d finally come around. Give in. Say “Sorry.” This was probably just a way for you to finally end the conversation, as you never acted any differently. We had the same conversations over and over again. And I still kept thinking that maybe this time it would be different. I’d tell my friends surface level details of whatever our disagreement was about. Enough details so that they’d understand you had hurt me, but not enough details so that they’d outwardly disagree (I’m sure they did internally) with me when I said that this time it was different. I always painted a more positive picture of you than you ever deserved.

What scares me is that I don’t think you think you treated me badly. I think you’re probably genuinely confused why I blocked you on every single platform. And that’s really, really scary.