Friday, March 19, 2010

Flashblack Friday #2

While looking for the elusive blanket photo from last weeks Flashback Friday I unearthed a box of photos and trinkets from my last boyfriend that I had hadn't seen in years. I actually thought I had gotten rid of it but when I lifted the lid off the pink cardboard box and saw the stack of photos with ribbon tired around them I was instantly glad that I had decided to save them. I can vaguely recall thinking at the time that I might want to look at them one day.

I started dating Blake right around my 19th birthday. Unfortunately for Blake this was also around the time when I really descended into depression and anxiety. When we met I was a functional girl, working as an admin assistant at the cable company. When we broke up three years later I was a housebound agoraphobic and 80 lbs heavier. It's a really hard period of my life to think about and I still have some guilt towards the way I treated Blake and his family.

Sometimes I think "If I could only go back..." but I can't. It is what it is. I try to keep in mind that I am the person I am today because of the lessons I learned during that period of my life. It was a long time ago now. It was nice to be able to look at the photos and feel happy at the good memories: our first apartment, our cat, our camping trips, our last apartment, the last photo of us together with him putting me in a headlock - how appropriate.

There was a time when I was terrified of running into him when I was out. We have a mutual friend so I know he's married with two children and doing well. I hope he's happy and I hope he's been able to forgive me so that if we ever run into each other we'll be able to say hi and introduce each other to our new families.

Here is our first picture together, taken in Polo Park Mall in 1998. So young!



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2 comments:

Tia Colleen said...

Was it hard, looking at the memories of you and him? Because just reading it, even though it wasn't anything that happened in my life, it was hard for me. Maybe its how you wrote it, which was so perfect by the way, that made me feel like I was right there, going through it with you.

Adrienne said...

It was easier than I thought it was going to be. I think because I'm really happy where I am now in my life and with Randy that gave me a bit of extra courage. I definitely have regrets still and hurts but they're nothing like it used to be.