Escaping

I was 20-ish and I'd just started working at an accounting firm in my hometown.  I had a really good friend and we would spend many a night in a local pool hall, trying to improve on my non-existent game, having beers and talking about nonsense in general.  I had stopped running about a year before and didn't particularly care about anything.

One night a guy caught my eye.  He just had something about him.  My friend's sister was there and she had caught his eye, which turned out just dandy.  I introduced the two of them and encouraged them to exchange phone numbers.  As it turns out, they went for a lunch date, but didn't quite hit it off and the next night that we saw him, I started chatting to him.

Long story short, I started seeing him on a rather casual basis and it took me 4 or 5 months to find out that he was also seeing someone else.  I don't know, something in me snapped a tad, but since I was spending more time with him that she was, and she never seemed to be at his place at night, it didn't particularly bother me.  Especially because of his false promises.  I guess I wanted to believe everything he was saying and just believe that I didn't, once again, misjudge a guy.  I hadn't had the best of luck with guys at this point of my life and I just once wanted to be right about someone's character.

Yes.  Stupid me.

One night, we were talking about something and the words escaped his lips :

'The worst mistake in life that I made was cheating on my girlfriend.... with you.'

Whatever snapped earlier, broke.  I was so angry that I left. I didn't say a word.  I just left.  I walked the 4 miles home.  I got home, showered, cried and got so incredibly upset with my stupidity that I wanted to hurt someone.

Later that day he phoned me, apologized, uttered a few more false promises.  And stupid and naive that I was, I believed every sodding word he fed me.

It took about 3 more times of him saying something along these lines, me walking home and then forgiving him again ... and one night, instead of walking home, I walked to a local bus stop and took the bus to as close as I could to my parent's house.  I packed a bag, showered, cried some more and realised somewhere inside that if I didn't get away from him, I was going to kill myself.

Now I have to mention something else.  During the last month and a half of this, he got me to try cocaine with him.  Not a lot at first, but the last couple of weeks it was probably 2 or 3 nights a week.  It was never something that really hooked me and I knew that it wasn't something I would have difficulty leaving behind.  Just another reason I had to get away from him.

I called my doctor and asked him to arrange for me to get a place in a local institution.  Then I got a ride to the institution and walked in.  Considering that I couldn't exactly put 'the abuse I'm suffering mentally from this relationship is going to drive me to suicide' on the form, I put down 'cocaine addiction'.  This meant that they would have to do a compulsory test.

I knew I would test positive.  I knew I wouldn't suffer withdrawal symptoms.  I knew that the first few days I would be sleeping away as they try to purify me.  I knew that I would not be able to go near this guy for the 2 following weeks, and then I would be supervised and not allowed to leave my supervisor 's(who turned out to be my parents) house for the following 6 months.  And he wasn't going to come near my house.

The doctor realised relatively quick that I didn't check myself in because I had an addiction to a drug.  More like an addiction to a destructive relationship.  But because I was honest with him during our sessions at the centre, he didn't tell anyone.  Its probably somewhere on my files, locked away where no-one else can see it.

I only took one negative from the whole experience though.  My best friend's mom worked in a local hospital and did some work for the institution.  She found out I was there and somehow found out the reason I was there.  Within 6 months most of my fair-weather friends were gone.  I guess its not a complete negative as I found out who my true friends were.  Even the person I saw as my best friend disappeared for a year before daring to talk to me.

I admit that it didn't bother me that much. 

I came out a stronger person and grew from the experience far more than anyone will ever know.