Reversal of roles, my past two relationships

A string of events that led me to grow as a person was during 2021-2022. My first relationship was during my senior year of high school. At the end of the semester a girl in my art class had asked me out. The girl said that she had been crushing on me but was waiting for me to make a move, which I never would’ve done because I hadn’t even noticed her in class. I said yes when she asked me out, which was a dumb decision because I didn’t know if my feelings for her was that of excitement or real. I was excited for my first relationship and to be the first out of my friend group to be confessed to, the attention from the opposite sex even if you have no feelings for them. I let her lead the relationship, but she wanted me to take the initiative. She would always want me to text her, but I never knew what to talk about. Looking back, maybe I just wasn’t interested in her. It seemed like my interest in her was dying out. It showed in our conversations, I came across as blunt and cold. I decided to end things when she accused me of cheating and didn’t let me explain myself. The reason why she thought I was cheating on her was that I started following my friends and classmates on Instagram. 

A few weeks go by and the second semester had started. I went out with a few of my friends and bumped into my friend’s cousin at the movie theater. We stood outside the theater talking about Spiderman no way home and that’s how I met her. I stood back because I’m extremely introverted. My friends and I have this server and we often hang out on call and play games together. My friend’s cousin’s brother decided to send me a friend request and that led me to send a friend request to my friend’s cousin. The topic of my friend’s cousin came up one day, and my other friend mentioned that she didn’t remember him but remembered someone who was wearing a tan jacket. Then I found out from her that she has tunnel vision, and on that day she was focused on me. That made me feel so good about myself, but it didn’t prepare me for what’s about to happen. I started talking to her and I had a crush on her ever since that first time I met her in the movie theater. I complimented her and she asked “are you flirting with me?” and I answered “maybe”, that led to us becoming intimate with each other. 

Although I had a crush on her, I was never someone who acted on those feelings and everything that happened was spontaneous. No thought had been put behind those actions and that led to where I am right now. A month went by of us being intimate with each other and the spring semester of college started. She became busy with school and work. We talked less and I could see her losing interest in me as she began to hang out with her friends and coworkers. I started to get jealous, how could I not? Instead of paying attention to me she was out for most of the day and went to sleep right when she came home. Things became rocky with her and we had many falling outs, most of the time I begged her to give me another chance but everything must come to an end. She decided to end things when jealous me decided to unfollow her on Instagram because she was using a male friend’s picture as her profile picture. I said, “Didn’t want to see some random dude as your profile picture”. I realized that this was better for me after a few months of heartbreak. She was too busy for me, and I was too immature for her. During those few months I would listen to her “sad” playlist and those amplified my emotions. At some point I would start crying to those songs.

The song Love Die Young, I never realized that words could mean so much till these two relationships. The song Love Die Young by Eric Nam is about how young love never lasts, burnouts, and mental health. The second chorus of the song “I wonder where the love goes. When Pleasure turns to pain. When the memories fade away. Can you tell me what happens?” Eric Nam explains that this is about burnout. But my interpretation of this is that when you like somebody their action pleases you, when you lose feeling for that person, everything they do annoys you. I related to this lyric a lot because in both of my relationships, someone lost their patience and fondness for the other person. The pre-chorus, “A little pressure is all it takes. Should’ve known we’d shatter that we’d break, break”,  is about overworking yourself, the stress, the pressure and that all you need is breaking point. I relate to this lyric because towards the end of my past relationships, there was a conflict that finally ended things. The main chorus of the song “Please don’t let this love die young” is about Eric Nam’s love for his work and although he is suffering from burnout, he doesn’t want to stop doing what he loves. My interpretation of this lyric is the desperation of not wanting to let go and begging the other person to stay. I can relate to this because I also had begged my ex to stay. This song represented the amount of grief you could cause someone in a relationship and the fact that your efforts may not be recognized. The effort for me was learning, catering, and selflessness. To be the perfect boyfriend for her.

The song I don’t miss you by Eric Nam is about break ups, how one person loves the other more and moving on. The verse “I hear you speaking. Your words lost their meaning. And I’m so done with dealing. Dealing with you” is about a person’s patience running out and no longer finding meaning in the words of the other person. The chorus of the song “I don’t miss you. Don’t miss me too” is the person telling their ex to move on. This lyric resonated with me because I had experienced being on both sides; the side where I told my ex to move on and the side where I was told to move on. That there was someone better for us. The verses “You’ll find someone who’s perfect. Perfect for you”, “ But it just ain’t me. Don’t mind if you just hate me” and “Take back this time you’re wasting. And spend it on you” are all lyrics trying to get the other person to move on. The post chorus “It’s not easy to let go. Of what we had. We lost that feeling. It’s over. We can’t go back. We could try to work it out. But tell me what’s the use in that? ‘Cause I don’t miss you” explains how the person has no intention of trying to get things back to the way it was because they had truly lost all feelings they had. 

The songs that I cried to because I related to the lyrics, made me realize that feelings could be felt in literature. How each person could relate to the lyrics and have their own interpretations for these lyrics. The fact that words can connect our experiences and we can document it so that others can experience it as well. I realized that my first relationship and my second relationship were kind of similar, the way the roles were swapped.  I learnt how it felt to be on the receiving end of those cold and blunt words. How the feelings were so one sided and how it felt to look for attention only to be greeted by coldness or aggression. These made me grow as a person, helped me in my language and literacy by making me realize the power words held. How I should be careful in the way I worded my intentions and how being able to convey my thoughts properly is a big help in relationships.