A Piece Of My Heart

The Best and Worst of Myself

Write a detailed description of how your significant other has made you a better person.



Write a detailed description of how your significant other has made you a worse person.

So, I put the first half of this prompt for the "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS"  out into the world last night and immediately fell asleep, only to wake up to find it had been defiled altered via Elle - on hiatus and the "JAFBG" . At first I laughed, and then I thought to myself… How could I not take on this challenge?

I don’t talk very openly about my SO online, but there are several pieces in my portfolio and this blog about him and our relationship. (side note, one of those items just won a cool thing, so woop!)

First, some background… Anyone who’s known me on here for a long time knows that I opened my account in 2011 when I was 16 years old. Oophta. That’s a tough age. I was in high school then. Met another member on here and, because WDC was basically my entire social life, he and I became close. I went to college, still considering myself in a relationship with this bro from across the country, and then my world split wide open. I wasn’t alone on a literal island anymore. I wanted freedom, and then the “relationship” revealed itself to be controlling. I won’t say that the relationship turned controlling, because of course it always had been, but I was just stupid and naïve. Shit went down, I rebelled, he threatened to reveal things about me to my grandparents, I cut him out but he flipped it as if he were the one separating himself from me who he said had suddenly become “destructive.”

I was finishing my freshman year of college then. Summer that year was … bonkers. Self-destructive, chaotic, fragile, dangerous (there are items about that time in my port as well). That’s when I went MIA from WDC. For four years I was “away.” I say “away,” because I wasn’t really gone. I did check in. Every day. The newsfeed was always open in a tab on my phone and it was part of my morning ritual to check the WDC happenings. Anyway, life went on, I enjoyed being a rebel while it lasted, but then I was done. It was as if I remembered who the girl was that I had been before all this.

Thinking about coming back to WDC left me with a bitter taste in my mouth because of the person I had found on here who had so radically changed my life. It felt too soon to go back in case something wrong about me still lingered there. So I stayed away through the rest of my undergraduate degree. It was probably a good idea too – I focused on my studies and set myself up for the career I am in now. During my rebellion when I began to realize I was hurting myself and wanted it to be all over, I found the man who is now my SO. He’s the one who pulled me out of that life and gave me stability and a place to retreat to when I wasn’t feeling like myself.

It started with him bringing me Target bags filled with DayQuil, Ibuprofen, candy, and stuffed animals when I was sick. He took care of me, showing genuine concern rather than something self-serving and fake, and made me feel safe from myself. With him, I didn’t have to be as strong as I was pretending to be. I didn’t have to tough it out or prove how capable I was to anyone. We dated while I finished school and then I moved in with him. I was starting my new job about that time. We got a dog together. Only then did I start to feel safe and confident enough to come back to WDC, which I did in August of 2018 (just over a year ago).

In that four year break, I had barely written anything creatively, so it came as a great surprise to me when I found how much my writing style had changed and improved. When I was young on this site, I believed I would always be a “novice” writer. Of course, there is still a TON more to learn, but now I feel happy to share my writing. I’m not embarrassed by it and I’ve had the experiences that lend themselves well to emotional writing. That’s what I’ve found I excel at. When an emotion begs to be written, that’s what I write about. Often, those emotions are tied to the worst and best times in my life so far. As I have grown as a person, my ability to capture emotions in writing has improved and I am now able to use my writing as an outlet, but I would not feel comfortable enough to do so if I wasn’t in the stable place I am now. I’ve learned how to release my emotions through my writing to keep myself sane and happy instead of letting everything build up inside to the point of breaking (or rebellion).

Gee… this is such a long explanation and I haven’t even answered the prompts yet, so … let’s try to get to that.

Also, everything you read above was originally written in one huge paragraph. I’m going back now to fix it Okay … onwards!

My SO has made me a better person by allowing me the space to be calm. He’s given me the stability I couldn’t build for myself. He’s kept my mind still when it would have raced without his guidance. His presence in me takes away stress and quiets my internal chaos. When I worry, he holds me and says it’s okay. He says that we will figure it out. He reminds me that I am capable and smart. He trusts my abilities when I do not. He builds my confidence in myself and assures me that my “end of the world” isn’t as bad as I think.

He allows me to laugh my obnoxious laugh, smile with all my teeth, snort, burp, and fart without embarrassment. He makes me giggle just being around his humor. He knows how to make me happy, and if I’m happy, I can’t be the sad/destructive person I was before.

He taught me the value of generosity and selflessness. He makes me eager to be the best person I can be, if not for myself, at least for him. I want him to be proud of me and therefore seek to be proud of myself. I am driven to succeed for the benefit of us rather than just me.

He’s shown me what it means to be a good daughter. He reminds me to call my mom (because he calls his every day), and reminds me to take my grandparents to dinner while they are still around. He cares about my family and gets me out of my head enough to remind me to care about them too.

I suppose I could go on and on in this way about my SO, but I don’t want to forget about the second prompt from Elle. Already, as I’m thinking of the ways I’m a worse person because of my SO, it feels silly to describe them after the floaty and joyful paragraphs preceding this one… but, I can’t go back now!

Before meeting my boyfriend, I was very willing to see the best in people. Now, I’m more cynical in that I can easily imagine ways that people aren’t who they say they are. I tend to believe people will lie, cheat, and steal more often than I believe they will do the “right” thing. It takes me longer to trust people, but I believe this is partly due to my own experiences and growth rather than solely due to my SO’s influence, if that makes sense. I may have gotten this way with or without him, but he’s still seen more of the world than me and doesn’t hold back when sharing his opinions, biases, or stereotypes.

The other way I believe I have changed for the worse because of my boyfriend is that I’ve become more isolated. By that I mean that I have few people I can call “friends” and never “go out” as someone else my age might. I dread get-togethers or other “parties,” unless I am with my boyfriend. If we are going together, that’s a whole different story. But now that I have him, I don’t have the desire to meet other people to hang out with as friends. His friendship is all the friendship I need. I want to be alone or I want to be with him. I think having friends might be nice, but I don’t want to put in the energy to make them if I already have the one I want. I know this is partly my introverted nature, and I’m cool with it, but I wonder sometimes how my life might be different if I had hobbies or friends outside of my relationship. That said, I’d be more at risk of getting into trouble, so maybe lacking friends is for the best.

Whew … Well, that was a journey. If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading!

See ya!
-Emily