| The Dumper's Lament Spring 2004 When a relationship ends, few people, especially the one dumped, ever think that the dumper also feels pain. This story is for them. I'm a dumper, and I'm one for many reasons. I've dumped out of boredom, out of meanness, and once out of fear for my life. I've dumped preemptively, when I've determined that the boy in question is not as adoring as he once was and could therefore be contemplating our ending. But I have also dumped for more legitimate reasons, because I realized that a given partner and I did not share the same values, or the same views of relationships, or because I grew tired of doing most of the giving and very little of the taking. I became a dumper early on because in the deepest parts of my psyche I could not handle the notion of being dumped. It happened once, and that was enough for me. At some point, in high school, I think, I realized that in many cases my motives had more to do with me and my standards and crazy bullshit than it did with the poor schlub himself. And so I became sensitive to the feelings of humiliation and rejection that go with being dumped. And from then on I tried, even when I was dumping for trivial reasons, to be nice about it. Heartless, but nice. But you know, there have been times when it has really hurt to be the dumper. Times when I didn't necessarily want to do it. Times when it boiled down to doing it at that moment even if I wasn't ready rather than waiting until later, when it would hurt much more. I have to numb out and put on an immovable demeanor to do it, but inside I have been in pain, sad, and reeling from the guilt of what I'm doing. Because I know that once I start, there's no turning back. I won't be talked out of it; there aren't enough excuses, explanations or promises that can make me change my mind. Because anything he says will be dismissed as either an act of desperation, or, as is more often the case, as coming too little, too late. And by the time I do it, I've been working up the nerve for quite some time. (Funny aside: my break-up with a boring, cold-dead-fish-type of boy occurred in the middle of a fight -- online, no less -- and he later invited me out to talk things out. Imagine my amusement -- and annoyance -- when he told me he was giving me "a chance" to get back with him, since I had so hastily ended things in anger. It was my most gleeful breakup ever). None of this is to say that I think I have such a lasting or dramatic affect on any of these guys. I would say that 95% of them felt no pain and no sadness. But there is that 5%, and I know they felt the break-up keenly, because I, too, felt it. When the feelings are real, when time has made you grow closer, when you think something so good can last -- and then it's snuffed out in one instant -- whether you're being snuffed or you're the one snuffing, it hurts. How do you get that across to someone when you've hurt them so badly and they want nothing more to do with you? I don't blame them for feeling like they can't be my friend, but it upsets me that they would think that they meant nothing to me, or that the breakup was easy for me. I, too, had my illusions and carried much hope during the relationship. In those relationships where I was very into the guy, where my feelings were genuine, the breakups happened because I saw fundamental problems that had no resolution, or something with a similar degree of seriousness. But I did not dump because I stopped caring about or liking the person. In my perfect world, the guy would be able to see where I was coming from and would want to be on good terms with me. No such luck. And we both lose out. |
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| Image copyright DC Comics 1979 |