Mistakes made with Sam
This episode won’t be easy for me to write because I’m talking about a previous relationship I had. Also if you have been through breakups or any that you got a better understanding of once you were out of them and been addicted to something you shouldn’t have while in them like sex then this episode could be triggering for you.
Let’s go down the rabbit hole to a time when I messed up big time, and when I say the big time I mean in probably every I possibly could have with my family and with one of my friendships. We’re going to go back to March of 2019 when I started to date someone that I liked quite a bit but my family was concerned about some things about him because of how the relationship got off to a rocky start.
You won’t recognize this Jennifer because she’s like night and day to who I am now. I don’t even recognize her looking back. It got off to a rocky start because I didn’t tell my parents that I was going to have Sam call Sam over to the house while they were out of town. He thought it was allowed, but I knew it wasn’t. But I did it anyway because I wanted to meet him. I kept this up for about 5 days. And my parents found out because of us having a ring doorbell which will show you who comes to your front door and certain areas close to the door. I thought if he entered through the backyard that they wouldn’t know about it, but I didn’t know about the doorbell piece until my brother came to visit a couple of weeks later to try to help with the situation between my parents and me.
The situation had only gotten rocky because I had invited Sam over without their permission when they were out of town. If I hadn’t done that and waited until they were back to meet him then things would have been very very very and extremely different. My parents were willing to have him over for dinner because they wanted to get to know him. I was surprised that they were willing to do this even though I had broken their rules about having someone over to the house while they were out of town and without their permission. Let’s fast forward a month after I’ve been dating Sam and I decide to move in with him and his family which consists of a younger brother, and his dad. Also, two of his cousins and one of his cousin’s girlfriends lived in the same house as his dad and brother.
I learned that Sam had told his family about me having NLD and being sexually abused. I didn’t know how detailed he went into these topics. After all, I didn’t feel comfortable asking because I wasn’t sure who he was going to share it with. Or what other information he would share without my permission or consent. This was big for me because not everyone in my extended family believed and may not still believe my side of the story that I told about the sexual abuse. I still try to wrap my head around this even though I have known this for about 13 years now.
Sam also had a mental disorder (quote) “schizophrenia a long-term mental disorder of a type involving a breakdown in the relation between thought, emotion, and behavior, leading to faulty perception, inappropriate actions and feelings, withdrawal from reality and personal relationships into fantasy and delusion, and a sense of mental fragmentation. (in general use) a mentality or approach characterized by inconsistent or contradictory elements." Gibraltar's schizophrenia continues to be fed by colonial pride" (Definitions from Oxford Language) (end quote)
This made things worse because Sam didn’t take his schizophrenia seriously like he should have which affected how seriously he took my learning challenge. I know that schizophrenia and NLD are different but because Sam didn’t take what he had seriously by not taking prescriptions to help him and he didn’t let therapy help him either he didn’t think my NLD was a big deal. This was extremely false. Many of you know if you have NLD or know someone who does and has been listening to this podcast for a while.
Also, he didn’t like his construction job of fixing and repairing drills because he wanted to be a nurse but couldn’t because he hadn’t attended college. He didn’t like talking about his job which affected me because I was working in a job that I liked and wanted to talk about. I could only talk about my job to his dad because he found it interesting but I usually did this only for a short while because if Sam was present I knew he would lose interest.
I did make many mistakes in this relationship. One of the ones I made had to do with my friend Geoff. I was wanting to have lunch with Geoff but Sam didn’t believe me when I told him that Geoff and I were just friends and there was nothing romantic between us. Consequently, I lost Geoff as a friend.
But recently last year I was able to get Geoff back as a friend because I reached out to him over Facebook. I did this by unblocking him around 3 am when I woke up and was thinking about him and couldn’t go back to sleep. I sent him a long message that I would like to read to you (yes I do have permission from Geoff to share what we talked about that day): “Hey long no chat. One of the several mistakes I made in my first relationship was losing you as a friend. I thought of that last night like I have many times and wondered if you would forgive me for what I did and texted you on that day that we were supposed to have lunch last year. I’m not sure if you will forgive me but I wanted to try to let you know that I’m sorry about what I did. I miss having you as a friend and would love to have you back if I can. But I’ll also understand if I can’t. There are many things we’ll need to catch up on but that’s for you to decide. Anyway, I’m going back to sleep now that got that all off my mind, heart, chest, and spirit. I know I’m asking for a big thing but I do remember what you said to me about forgiveness for the forgiver, not the other person. I’m probably not remembering it exactly.”
His response was: “I've imagined from time to time what I'd do or say if you ever tried to get back into contact with me. It wasn't kind - those reactions were born of spite. But that's not who I am. I'm not one to meet a genuine apology with a sneer. I've given second chances to people who've done worse than you.” My response: “Sorry it took me a while to respond. I'm at work. I guess this means that you’re accepting my apology?” His response: “It does.” My response: “Thank you for making me feel better by saying that you gave second chances to people who did worse than me. Thank you so much for accepting it. You don’t know how much that means to me.”
His response: “There was one girl, Emily, who bullied me throughout elementary and middle school. When she messaged me about a year after high school to say that she regretted her actions, I forgave her. She put me through years of aggravation. You fucked up once. Big fuck up to be sure - it hurt that you didn't trust me to be looking out for you - but it was one time.” My response: “Yes I know it was once and I know I hurt and I’m sorry I did that. I should have trusted you more than my ex because I knew you longer than him. Sorry, that happened to Emily.” His response: “Well, now you know. Hormones make fools of us all.” My response: “If you want to chat about what we have surpassed since last year and now let me know, please. Yes, that’s very true and so does romantic love.”
As I went on to fill Geoff in on what I had surpassed in the last year I found out that even though we hadn’t talked for a while it didn’t feel like that because he made me feel so comfortable by letting me talk to him about anything I wanted to just like we used to do. I had missed talking with him because he’s like a second brother to me, that's how close we are to each other. I feel blessed to have Geoff back. I also feel blessed that when I was with my friends Natalie and Jeannine that they weren’t affected by the relationship because I handle that relationship differently. I didn’t spend any time with Natalie when I was with Sam so I thought she would have been affected the same as Geoff but she said that “She was happy for me while I was with him and was sad when it ended.”
Jeannine wasn’t affected by it because we hung out every Sunday at church after I would have been at Sam’s house the day before. I’m truly blessed to have these 3 close friends that are like siblings to me. I can’t begin to thank them enough for supporting me with NVLD and the sexual abuse all the years they have been my friends. I hope that they feel supported whenever I try to support them when they’re going through something difficult for them to go through personally.
Another mistake I made was lying to Sam about having a good amount of credit cards while in a relationship with him. My parents and brother knew about it but he didn’t. I eventually told him but that wasn’t until we had already broken up which happened in early August 2019. I also lied to Sam about other things that I thought were okay to lie about but he didn’t and I think that was due to his schizophrenia.
The first lie I told Sam was about my parents knowing his address. I thought this was okay because I wanted them to know just in case I needed them to ever pick me up. They never came by his dad’s house anyways because I never asked them to. But I felt better that they knew his address just in case. He learned about this lie the day before I went to go to my first surf lesson with my brother Johnathon. Sam was hurt by my lying because he thought he could trust me with private information. He gave me an ultimatum that day that if I stopped lying he wouldn’t break up with me. I thought about telling him about the credit card debt but I wasn’t sure how he would take it and if he would understand it because of not being independent himself.
The next day I had a surfing lesson with my brother. We talked about the conversation with Sam. This wasn’t an easy conversation because I didn’t like what I had done. It was easier because my brother and I were closer than Sam and I were so I knew I could trust my brother. The next day when I was at work I got vertigo which was probably caused by having a really bad migraine, being light-headed, and having gotten a lot of water in my ears the previous day from surfing. I vomited for an hour and a half that day. That was a terrible day. My brother had to rush me to the ER and I threw up on the way there. My parents came even though I didn’t think they would because of my relationship with them not being good and them having dinner with some friends. I forgot to remember that they still loved me like hell even though I was treating them extremely badly.
I had my blood drawn and took a urine test. I was still dizzy while this was all happening. They gave me a pill to stop nausea which worked. It felt weird to have my blood drawn because I couldn’t see anything that was going on. I could only feel it since the world and room were spinning around me. I’m sharing this story because when I got back to my parent’s house and Sam met me there to drive me home he was very nice to me despite what had happened two days ago. He was concerned about me because he knew about my chronic migraines but had never known they could affect me like they just had. He was used to me sleeping for hours to cope with them but not vomiting at all. When we got back to his place I took a shower and laid down and slept because that’s all I wanted to do after having gone through what I just experienced. I had already eaten dinner at my parents’ house while waiting for Sam to pick me up.
The next day Sam made a special dinner for his younger brother to thank him for driving him to my parents’ house the previous day. Sam and I had some things in common; we both liked to cook, hike, fish, and be outdoors for hours. But he didn’t like to listen to country music, which I did. Consequently, I would listen to it whenever he wasn’t in the bedroom or when I was driving to work. This bothered me because my brother doesn’t like country music but he will let me play a couple of songs even when he’s in the same room as I’m in.
I want to share an article from the NVLD project that Amanda, who is “a Project Social Ambassador and learned about her NVLD as a teenager. She was under the impression it just meant that life is harder than the average teen but that it would get easier. That was 10 years ago. “I still have NVLD but now I also have a bachelor’s degree and depression. I don’t think I understand the impact the combination has on me, but I hope that we can explore this together through my posts.”
“NVLD and Breakups,” by Amanda: “I screwed up earlier this year. I was going through some personal issues relating to my mental health and needed to go to a special program to help me sort out those issues. We had been getting closer and were even talking about getting back together. I told him we would wait until I got out of my program to revisit the topic…. And when we did, we were on different wavelengths. (He wanted a family and I told him that I didn’t think it would be good for my health if I procreated… I told him that I had just gotten out of an intense therapy program and the postpartum stuff scares me. He has no idea it’s really because I’m afraid my NVLD would make the wife and mother thing harder.) Over time, he just wanted to help, and make sure that I was okay before we did anything further. Unfortunately, I mistook his friendship as a sign that he was ready to get back together. When he started pulling away, I would do anything in my book that I could to keep any sort of line of communication open. (Even though I kept telling him that I can’t be just friends with him, it would be too painful.) I would message him or text every day, talk about my day even if he didn’t ask, ask about his day, send memes, gifs, anything to start a conversation (and if I saw he read it but didn’t respond I’d just keep on going with a one-sided conversation hoping to spark some sort of interest. Geez, reading it in writing does sound kind of like a fangirl stalker).” Link for the article: https://nvld.org/nvld-breakups/.
I can relate to Amanda because after Sam and I broke up we made friends with benefits which were my choice but I regret doing this because it was harder for me to let him go. We did this for 5 months. I thought we were going to get back together but we didn’t because he found another girl. He found her while attending college. I was happy he was pursuing his dream but I was sad because I was losing someone that I had considered to be a close friend.
Another mistake I made was being too focused on my relationship with Sam that I had tunnel vision for basically 10 months. 5 months while we were together and 5 months while we were friends with benefits. This was a mistake because I didn’t see what went so wrong with my parent's and brother’s relationship.
Another mistake I made was not describing my relationship with my parents accurately to Sam while we were together. I made him think that we had a terrible relationship, that they yelled at me and that we fought a lot. And they didn’t let me do anything that a young adult wanted to do. When in reality they didn’t yell at me but were firm with me when they got frustrated or annoyed with me because I was being difficult. Or when I would break an agreement and would want to be rebellious. Sam made me rebellious. After all, I wanted to get a taste of being able to do whatever I wanted to do because I felt like I couldn’t do that even when I was in college. Because when I was in college I was a nerdy, dorky student because I wanted to do well in my classes especially when I found out I had NLD.
My parents gave me anything I wanted while I was with Sam probably because they didn’t want to fight with me anymore about it and wanted me to be happy ultimately. I thought I was happy many times when I was with Sam because he did make me happy, safe, protected, and loved but that only lasted for about a month. I did feel it other times when my lies didn’t cloud his emotions, but that didn’t last long. I couldn’t change this until he ended the friends for benefits in early January of 2020 and after I started therapy after the con artist experience. This is when I was able to start to get my parents and brother back by earning their trust and doing the hard, difficult work in therapy.
I learned that I don’t want to in the future to date someone that doesn’t have a strong handle on their sexual abuse or private challenges like a mental disorder or learning challenges. This is true because I know what it’s like to do the work to heal from sexual abuse and tackle challenges that are related to NLD. I also learned that I was addicted to the physical and hormonal aspects of sex so I did the friends-with-benefits thing which I shouldn’t have done. Would have been easier to let him go this past year if I hadn’t. I still think about him because I haven’t found anyone to fill the spot because of COVID and want to protect myself and my family from being infected.
The only time I contacted Sam was at the beginning of the COVID Quarantine because I was concerned about how his family was doing. I learned that we’re doing fine. I haven’t contacted him since even though I still think of him. I deleted his contact information a while ago to get rid of the temptation. I do admit that wasn’t an easy thing to do. I even recently got rid of a necklace and some gifts we gave each other because when I would see them in my room they would remind me of painful memories. I also learned that I need to be able to have someone that I can trust with anything I tell him. After all, I couldn’t have deep conversations with Sam as he wanted because I wasn’t sure what information he would share without my permission to his family or friends.
Following are songs that make me Think of Sam (“For Good” from Wicked and “The Rose” by Keala Settle, “Rules” by Dylan Scott, “What I Like About You” by Jonas Blue, Theresa Rex) “Miss Me More” by Kelsea Ballerina “Hard To Love” by Lee Brice, “Grace Wins” by Matthew West and “Caught in The Storm” by Smash Cast.
All the personal work I’ve been doing recently has paid off because during Thanksgiving of last year my family said that they were so happy and grateful for getting me back. It made me cry. After all, I knew how badly I treated them during the relationship because I could tell that I wasn’t close to my mom whenever I looked at her face on Sunday mornings. But now I can happily say that my relationship is closer than ever has been with my parents and brother. My family deserves my gratitude for how they responded to this rocky time in my past. Because they supported me through that time even though they didn’t like how rebellious I was, my actions and that I was being irresponsible. They have always been there for me through the thick and thin in my life no matter what. This means so much to me that it’s hard for me to know what to share with them because I don’t want to harm the relationship that we have now.
I have to thank myself for doing the hard work I did to create this podcast because I’ve been extremely vulnerable with you all. And you have been in return so thank you for being a wonderful audience to me. I have learned a lot about myself and individuals with NLD by doing this. I continue to learn more about NLD by doing this podcast too. I want to thank my family and friends for supporting me through the thin and very thick, even when it is as thick as mud because if I didn’t have the support system that I have I don’t know where I would be today.
My support has made me “Victorious” as Lina Hedlund sings in that song. I wouldn’t be where I am today if I didn’t have them. It would have been much harder for me to accomplish all the goals that I have without them. So thank you to infinity and beyond.
I can also say that I know it wasn’t meant to be with Sam because I believe that things happen for a reason and that Spirit knew that I needed to have a better relationship with my family. “Here are some tips to get through a breakup: Make it a no contact break up even when they say I want to stay friends I don’t want to be dead to you it’s in everyone’s best interest to have space to process everything. Don’t use food to cope: If you forget to eat when you are stressed, try and set timers throughout the day to eat a little something. On the contrary, if you use food to cope, try not to do a healthy activity to prevent yourself from eating everything on-site just because you are sad and stressed. Seriously, don't reach out to them. It will only be more painful and harder to rip the band-aid off in the end (especially if they were your biggest emotional support). Reach out to friends and family for support. If you see mental health counselors increase your appointments for a while”
I and others who have NVLD have a harder time in romantic relationships than neurotypicals do because of the many things that I talked about in this episode. Whether it’s because you have a hard time reading social cues, describing what NVLD is, or knowing when to tell your significant other about it, I and others who are trying to date or want to and have NVLD still have these issues along with countless others today.
