I was doing some research online yesterday about the human brain relating to failed relationships. You see, getting over Uncle B has not been as easy as I had hoped it would be. A few months before Uncle B departed from my life, we were both going to separate therapists. It was sort of fun. We would tell each other what we had "learned" from our sessions and how we could relate that knowledge to our lives. Since March 2012, all of my sessions have been about Uncle B. His departure has brought about a number of issues in my life. I have been unable to process why I have been so uprooted by his departure. Yesterday's research has gotten me closer to an answer.
In order to understand why this has been so traumatic for me, there are two key elements everyone needs to understand. The first being elemental human nature. Humans are wired to bond with other humans. We like the sense of comfort and belonging other human beings bring to us. When Uncle B left, he took with him the closeness my heart felt for him. We had shared very intimate parts of our lives with each other. He was my confidante and near best friend. We shared our hopes, dreams, and fears with each other. Many of those things included each other. Our futures had become intertwined. When he left, all of those things and what I thought was my reality went with him. I loved him for every little flaw he had. He claimed that he loved me for all of mine.
Secondly, I've also learned that it was the way he left that is causing me the most stress. I've come to explain "Wendy" to people as "Logical Wendy" and "Emotional Wendy". "Logical Wendy" knows that she should hate Uncle B with every fiber of her being. "Logical Wendy" knows that had Uncle B been decent and human, he would have given her the courtesy (based on the closeness they had shared) of a face-to-face "break up". Most humans, with true human emotions, know that such an event would be life-changing for the other person and give them the respect of doing it in person and with a solid explanation. It is not adequate to share your deepest thoughts and secrets with someone for an entire year and then simply say, "I found someone else. Bye." A true man would realize that his decision is going to upset the other person, if she truly cared for him. He would face his actions like a man. Uncle B never did that. He started having a relationship with someone else during the same time he was telling me that he loved me. He lied. I knew all along, but I suppose a part of me wanted to hear it from him. He has never given me that verbal reason for why he left. "Logical Wendy" also sees that Uncle B has some horrible patterns in his life. What "Logical Wendy" has seen thus far in his new relationship is everything he would have had with me had I not been married. One of the final things Uncle B said to me in our last chats (yes...he seriously never has verbally spoken to me about our break up...great guy, right?) was in reference to my marriage. Thinking back to the first few months of our relationship, he did the same things he is doing with the new female. He wanted to run off with me. He quoted Robert Heinlein and gave me Heinlein books. He wanted to have kids (twins, a boy and a girl). He wanted to come home to me and home- cooked meals in our country home. He wanted lazy days cuddling on the sofa watching movies and just being together. Had I been single, we would have been living together within the first two or three months of knowing each other. But, "Logical Wendy" had some sensibilities about her and didn't give up my current life for this man who had nothing really to offer me but sweet words and dreams.
Then there is "Emotional Wendy". "Emotional Wendy" thinks that perhaps Uncle B actually loved her. She knows that he was extremely insecure. She knows that he would never be able to do something as manly as face a break-up in person. He had wanted to leave his wife since the beginning of their marriage yet he waited for her to make one tiny mistake before he left. That way, it wasn't he that was leaving, but it made her the bad guy. That wasn't fair to her. A great deal of the way his wife treated him was, surely, in response to his actions. "Emotional Wendy" knows that Uncle B is a little boy wrapped in the body of a man. "Emotional Wendy" cries for Uncle B because she wanted to help him. Uncle B doesn't know what a healthy marriage is being that he never grew up with one. "Emotional Wendy" wanted Uncle B to see what loving families are like. She wanted him to be a part of a family that loved him. She wanted him to meet her mom and dad and see what marriage is all about. He needed a strong male head-of-household to show him how to be a good husband and father. He knows how to bail on people. He knows how to lie. He knows how to evade. He knows how to be someone else while typing on the computer and another person in real life. He knows how to hide and be scared. He knows how to let others speak for him while he cowers behind a stronger person. He can't differentiate between being submissive in bed and real life. He can't stand up for himself. It hurts that when things were tough, he used me and then just transferred himself to someone else who was more available. He treats himself like property and not a human. "Emotional Wendy" knows that this is the key. He doesn't respect himself and therefore he doesn't know how to respect someone who loved him so. There, unfortunately, is something flawed in a person's mental wiring when they can do what he has done to me, the way he did it.
So, what now? I still cry every night for the friend that I lost. After a few days of chatting with Uncle B back in 2011, he made the statement that in 10 years we would look back and see how cute we were when we met. My therapist said something very profound. I am still crying over Uncle B. I have human feelings. I was actually in love with him. I still love him. This makes me a beautiful human being. This makes me the genuine one in the relationship because had I not cared, I would be over him and not grieving. This makes me a wonderful, caring, human being. Uncle B has shed no tears for me and in the aftermath has done some pretty cruel things (instrumented by his whacked-out new female). Therefore, he is the flawed one...the non-human.
