I\u2019ve been avoiding this post for just about a month now. It\u2019s the one that\u2019s been on my mind the most, and the one I\u2019m not supposed to talk about. But it\u2019s my birthday, and if the first 23 years have taught me anything, it\u2019s you do what you want on your birthday\u2014it\u2019s one of the few times you can get away with it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here it goes\u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n When you break up with someone it\u2019s sort of like being stripped of your identity. Even though you\u2019re the same person physically, you feel people don\u2019t view you the same\u2014that somehow you\u2019re different, damaged goods maybe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At least that\u2019s how I felt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n After nearly 2 years of dating, or rather being all-consumed by the same person, I found myself suddenly single, and within weeks, her suddenly not. It was undeniably over and I didn\u2019t have a single thing to show for it\u2014not a brand new object of my affection, not an imaginary faith to lean on, not even a string of post break-up Facebook photos to show. I had let friends of days gone by slip away while I had fallen deeper and deeper into a relationship destined for nowhere. Then suddenly, in a moment\u2019s notice, I had been exposed. I had been the one left behind. Slowly, I felt my sense of normalcy give way to the complete unknown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was angry. I was livid. I was devastated and paralyzed with hurt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How was I going to tell my friends? Better yet, what<\/em> was I going to tell them? How could I explain that she had found someone new already when I could barely even explain what was going on. I wasn\u2019t even sure we were broken up. Just a week earlier she had called to complain about her life, just like she always had. A week before that we went to lunch, she had even shown up at my house unexpectedly a few nights before that\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n How would her family treat me now? How would her friends treat me? What about the mutual friends? Well that was easy\u2014her friends took her side, my friends didn\u2019t care either way. And the mutual friends? Turns out there\u2019s no such thing. Then there was her dog. I loved that damn dog. We had been through hell and back together. I would have given the world to keep him. And then there was her. How do you go from talking about marriage with someone to pretending they don\u2019t exist?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Twenty-five days later, I\u2019ll tell you how.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You wake up early, fight an hour\u2019s worth of traffic to work, focusing on the music so closely you don\u2019t have time to think about her. You work hard enough that people start to take notice in a big way. You obsess over earning their respect. You up your gym time from three days a week to six. You drop your mile time by a minute. You go up in bench for consecutive weeks because it feels good to hurt. It\u2019s the only kind of hurt you allow yourself to feel. You go to the mall and pick out a new pair of Rainbow sandals, because let\u2019s face it, it was time. You get a haircut, one that says I\u2019m here to steal your girlfriend and if you\u2019re not careful your Mom, too. You switch your music from the typically whiny, emo, indie alt rock you normally listen to, to straight up Lil Wayne (before he went Jay Sean soft), Eminem, Gorilla Zoe and a little Rise Against mixed in for variety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You pick up when someone calls. When anyone calls. You don\u2019t wait for people to ask you to hang out on a Friday night. You call them and tell them where to meet you. On a Wednesday night. And then again on a Thursday. And especially<\/em> on Friday. But don\u2019t even think about sitting out on Saturday. You can sleep when you\u2019re dead. You call people you haven\u2019t talked to in years. You call people you don\u2019t expect to pick up and then you talk to them like you don\u2019t expect them to hang up. You live your life knowing that no matter what you are still you and that people will either appreciate you or not, but not because of the person you\u2019re dating. Not the ones worth keeping around at least.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As I\u2019m living this, there are good days and there are tough days. There is no such thing as a bad day\u2014I won\u2019t allow it. Each day comes and goes, and steadily I\u2019ve started to realize people don\u2019t treat me any differently just because it\u2019s now only \u201cme\u201d instead of \u201cwe.\u201d In fact, most people don\u2019t even seem to notice. Or in some cases they are just glad to have someone reaching out to them for once.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s ok to hurt when someone you love leaves your life. But it\u2019s not ok to let that hurt hold you back from your life. Unless it\u2019s your birthday\u2014it\u2019s one of the few times you can do what you want\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I\u2019ve been avoiding this post for just about a month now. It\u2019s the one that\u2019s been on my mind the most, and the one I\u2019m not supposed to talk about. But it\u2019s my birthday, and if the first 23 years have taught me anything, it\u2019s you do what you want on your birthday\u2014it\u2019s one of… Continue reading Life at the End of 23<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":798,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[13],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/798"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nathanbrooksthompson.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}