Trauma Bond
CBC 2011 I met a man who would turn my world upside down in many ways. I remember it like it was yesterday, I was at Josephine minding my business and there he was bald and smiling like the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. I ignored him up until the point my friend said just go talk to him. So I did. He handed me a card ... a government lawyer ugh. I gave him my number.
Days pass and he finally asks me out on a date. We went to Chi-Cha Lounge and the date ran into the next day. Fast forward to spending days and weekends with him, taking the train with him into the city as he headed to work. I was down bad. Things were going great until he started saying little things that have stayed with me for years. When I told him my dream car was a G-Wagon, this man asked me who was going to buy that for me?! Me!? I am made of 90% ambition plus I'm Caribbean... I work for everything I have! How dare he.
Soon he started pulling away and that triggered me in a major way. I am the CIA of my friend group and knew it had to be a woman. This was the age of Twitter's hay day and I soon found out who had his attention with a simple tweet "Virgos drive me wild"... gotcha. I called him out on this and of course, it's the typical song and dance... I really want to make this work yada yada yada. We ultimately stopped talking except for one call on Christmas day when I was home alone with the worst food poisoning of my life. He told me to call an ambulance.
Months pass and I meet my now ex-boyfriend and enter into a 6 year relationship. The lawyer would occasionally hit me up and ask if I wanted to get pizza like I was an 18-year-old co-ed. Ummm... sir I am dating a chef, I eat coursed meals now, I'll pass on the pizza. Throughout the years it would be like this. Him hitting me up and me declining. Years passed and he had a kid. I thought this was so ironic because he thought I wanted to trap him. Me...a girl who has never wanted kids especially not with this man.
My ex and I split up in 2018. I spent the next 2 years in therapy trying to squash the anger and resentment that relationship left me with. Then here comes 2020 and Covid. The world came to a pause and we were all terrified and bored out of our minds. In August I get a DM or text asking to hang out. I dodge these messages for a while and I finally decide fuck it why not?
Once again one night turns into days. Next thing you know I'm helping this man construct a gazebo in his backyard and we spend the evenings around his fire pit drinking bottles of wine. I feel myself getting sucked back in. We're spending so much time together, he is constantly complimenting me and affirming me... I let my guard down. Things are going great for a couple of months, I am helping him with his book. Like workshopping scenarios, creating a spreadsheet of publishers... doing absolutely too much. I get a book credit...right after his family as he likes to remind me. Once again he starts pulling away. I start calling him out on his weird behavior and we decide it's best to no longer be intimate. We got into a huge argument one day and he asked me to come over because he wanted to talk it out. It's 12 am and I figure it's probably best to go home but he asks if I want to go upstairs. Like a jackass, I stayed over.
Fast-forward a couple of days later and we're being flirtatious. He's at the beach sending me pics of himself. Somehow the flirting turns into I told you not to touch me. I told you I didn't want to sleep with you. Me absolutely bewildered because he was the one who invited me to stay the night. Long story short this man implies I assaulted him. This shook me to my core. Like... I'm now on Lexapro shook.
One night I had a dream and I swear to God I popped up in the middle of the night and said he's back with his ex-girlfriend. I mosey over to ig and type in her ig handle and sure enough, she has taken a selfie in his kitchen. It all makes sense to me now. He cheated on his girlfriend with me that night and instead of taking ownership of it, he made me out to be the villain.
We obviously fell out of touch. He goes on a bday trip with his girlfriend and it's miserable. He sends me DM's on ig the entire time. They break up not too long after that trip and because I'm trauma bonded to this man we end up seeing each other again. Once again it's great until it's not. He starts pulling away again. I'm like hmmm who is it now. My friend sees him celebrating someone woman's bday at a local lounge. Like I said before I'm the CIA... I find her friend's ig stories. I ask him if he's seeing anyone and he lies and says no.
One night during adult relations he says something to the effect that I'm so much better than his girlfriend. That gave me pause. So now I'm like this man really has a girlfriend. Once again I catch him on a friend's ig stories with her. I said dude this is your girlfriend why are you lying?! He goes into love-bombing mode. You know I love you blah blah blah. I don't have a girlfriend. This goes on for maybe 2-3 weeks. One day he calls me and says he's been feeling funny in his nether regions and asks me if I've been sleeping with anyone else. I said just you...but you're obviously sleeping with other people. He retorts he's just been on a couple of dates and hasn't been intimate with other people but I obviously gave him this thing. I immediately go to the doctor and my results are inconclusive but I thank God it's curable. But this reaffirms his lies... as he had a full-blown positive result it was probably too early to detect in me.
I stop talking to him but he hits me up because he wants to talk about the obvious elephant or should I say STD in the room. We end up drunk and well here we go again. He takes his girlfriend he doesn't have to New York the very next day to go to a book thing. I caught a glimpse of her in his ig stories. I do something crazy... I sent her a DM on ig inquiring about the STD and if she got it from him too. She never responds.
The denial of the girlfriend goes on and on until one day, I see he's out with her on his stories and I call him out on it. He lies and says he's with his friend. Guess who walks into the restaurant I'm in with my friend. Gotcha. I buy them a shot...I tell him don't you ever think you can outsmart me because I am way smarter than he is and 10 steps ahead.
We stop talking AGAIN and somehow reconnect AGAIN after he tells me his broken up with her. He takes her to Jamaica for his birthday. I absolutely lost my shit on him. We stopped talking for months and I am the happiest I've been in a long time. So happy that I stopped taking Lexapro and everyone is telling me that I am glowing.
Somehow we reconnect. Once again it's perfect, we're getting drinks and going out for dinner, and he installs a toilet in my condo. He crashes at my place when his sewage line breaks. One day I was out with a friend and I texted him to see what he was doing and he said he was out with a friend. I was triggered because I thought he was with another woman and I got spicy with him and said come meet me and bring whoever he is with and we can pretend that we aren't sleeping with each other. He is getting more and more pissed. I text the friend he was with and tell her to bring him over. He caught a glimpse of her phone somehow and started texting me from her phone. The last message he sent to me was "Fuck You". Once again we stopped talking for months.
And then one day I woke up to a miss call from him. I ignore it. Then I get blackout drunk at brunch and send him a text asking him what he was doing. Here. We. Go. Again. The same cycle ensues. He's nice and charming, we have crazy good sex, and he's taking me out. One day we went out and he dropped me home I didn't think about it. Then he texted me to tell me he had Covid and I didn't see him for a couple of days. We go out when he's feeling better. We have a great time and he drops me home. I call him maybe 5 minutes after he drops me off and muster the strength up to ask if we aren't being intimate anymore. He tells me we will talk about it in the morning. The morning comes and I call him and start attempting to have a conversation. He is purposely dodging the question and then I say well I'll take that nonanswer as a yes we are no longer being intimate. He says believe what you want and hangs up.
So now I know he's seeing someone else and like clockwork he posts her. He always tries to play mind games with me when he's mad at me. I head over to Twitter because it's literally the SAME girl from way back in 2011. She has two Tweets " My Virgo turned 40. I am so grateful for him" and "But I'm with a Virgo man". Then the real kicker... "I've been on a date with this man for 4 days". Y'all why were the 4 days when he told me he had Covid. I got so pissed that once again I DMed another woman about this man like a crazy bitch. She'll never respond and I will pray for her mental health.
I wrote all of this to basically document the crazy stuff that I have been through with this narcissistic man as a reminder to never go back. No matter how charming he seems, how much fun we have, or how good the sex is. He is toxic and I deserve better. I hope to come back to this post 10 years from now and laugh at this sad time in my life.
