I Do Not Have To Like You to Love You

My mum and a friend are visiting me in London, a surprise, all the way from Canada. My mum keeps trying to pay for things and my partner gets upset. She tells me she just wants to treat everyone to a nice meal without battling over the bill. I pass this along and the next time we go for dinner there is no battle, my partner pays and we all thank her. Afterwards, walking to the Underground from the restaurant, she’s upset about something. She walks fast, ahead of all of us. I have to run to catch her, to ask her what’s wrong. She tells me: “I can’t believe they didn’t even offer to pay. How incredibly rude!”

I cooked dinner, knowing she will be home late, knowing also that it will be a relief for her to come in and see a meal prepared. I go to greet her when I hear her key in the door, ready to welcome her with a kiss, a hug. She is agitated, holding a glass bottle in her hand. Someone has left it on the brick wall out front. She swears, calling the unknown person who left it there really awful names. We live in London, I think. It’s just a bottle. People litter all the time. At least it isn’t broken. She is so angry, so livid. I am confused and don’t know what to say or do. I don’t get why it has to be such a big deal, but I know, even though it makes my gut clench and feels inauthentic to who I am, I must nod in agreement and make all the right noises when she talks about, “…the fucking twat who left this for me to clean up.”

A friend comes over for dinner. We talk about films. My partner is cooking, popping off to the kitchen so it’s often just me and our friend talking, sitting in the garden. The food is amazing, the kind of thing she loves to prepare. It’s a perfect way to spend a summer evening. Afterwards, when our friend has left and we are cleaning up, she clenches her jaw and won’t look me in the eye. She seems angry, but I don’t understand why. We had a lovely dinner. It was fun, easy, with good food. She likes cooking and turned down my multiple offers to help. Tired of trying to guess, I ask her what is the matter and she says: “You should have put in an effort to include me in the conversation. I felt left out.”

I’m on the tube, heading to her office so we can go out for dinner in central London when she gets off of work. When I come out from underground my mobile struggles to find a connection. I can’t text to her tell her I’m here. I go to the building and ask for her at reception. Apparently, she has already come downstairs. I restart my mobile and once it’s back up I see many texts from her, asking where I am, telling me she’s outside by a pub. When I come out of the building

I see her almost right away, and I smile, excited about our fancy dinner tonight. As I get near her though, she’s frowning. I tell her my phone couldn’t find a connection, that I had to restart it. I don’t remember what she says, but I remember that she somehow convinces me that it’s my fault. “I’ve had to wait out here in the cold—I had no idea where you were. I was concerned.”

I’m not an untidy person. It is one of the things we agree make us compatible. We have the same standards of cleanliness, of not accumulating clutter. I clean the house deeply, often. We have three cats between the two of us, so the fluff builds up. I spend hours at it every time. I sweep, I vacuum, I dust. I mop the floors and polish the taps. I get into all the corners, clearing cobwebs. I even take time to rub leather polish into the couches. My back aches afterwards, and my shoulders and neck, but I think she will be pleased. But no…she comes home and looks around and finds one thing—it’s always small, like I forgot to put down the toilet seat or I left the rag I used on the table on the floor in front of the washer. It’s inconsequential but she is angry and when I apologise for my small absentmindedness she says, “Well, at least now you know for next time.”

We’re visiting my family, staying in a cabin in the woods. It’s a small space and crowded. It’s winter. We are sleeping in a trailer outside, spending our days in the cabin in close quarters with everyone else. She says she wants to be alone and goes to the trailer. I’ve learned, when she says she wants to be alone, to leave her be. I’ve learned through only making the mistake of checking in on her twice. I’ve learned from the wrath, the vitriol, the rage. Later, after she returns to the group, she is cold and distant toward me. I ask her if she’s okay and she snaps: “You should have known I wanted a cup of tea. You could have brought one for me.”

After the relationship ended it was hard. It was hard to admit that I’d been with someone abusive—that what I’d experienced was abuse. I’m smart, confident, and wise—that’s what people tell me. But if those things are true, then how could I have stayed with someone who treated me so badly? How could I have let myself be manipulated? Why did I not choose to walk away, finally only leaving when _she_ ended things?

It’s difficult to work through. There’s mild PTSD, which my psychologist has me address by writing down the story of the relationship over and over and over again. She reads what I write and tells me it’s good, that my views are not warped. I clearly see my responsibility, as well as recognise the co-dependency that kept me there, but I am also able to see that I didn’t deserve any of it and that there were serious violations of boundaries, unreasonable expectations, and an imbalance of power. This is reassuring and yet, I am still ashamed. Ashamed to have given so much of myself to someone who did not deserve me. And also ashamed of how I behaved toward friends and family in an attempt to make things work in an unworkable situation.

I meditate. I do metta and genuinely, truly wish for her to be happy, to know the root of happiness. Happiness is not having stuff that never breaks down or gets damaged. Happiness is not making a certain amount of money. Happiness is not getting everyone to act in such a way as to regulate your emotions.

Happiness is a state of mind and she is so deeply unhappy. I lived with that unhappiness, and the consequences of it, for long enough to know that she does not need anyone to hate her.

I am still triggered, not as often, but still triggered. And part of my ability to have compassion is to know what I’m capable of in any given moment. I extend it to all beings involved, myself included. From afar, when she is just an idea or a memory, I am willing to wish for her happiness, I am able to remain open. But if I see her photo, or think of her voice, my chest and throat tighten with fear. I am also aware of how I resent people who are mutual friends who stay in touch. Would they do so if the blows had been physical instead of verbal? Would they if they understood how small I had to be in that house so as not to provoke her? Or would they claim to not want to pass judgement since they weren’t there and can’t know what really happened?

I do not pretend to like her, even though I love her. I love her because of her humanness, but I can still say that she caused harm and that it was not okay. I can forgive her, even if she has never apologised, because my heart feels better when it is free of resentment, fear and hostility. I also know that forgiveness is done over time, repeatedly, and will be part of my practice for life. And forgiveness does not mean forgetfulness. I do not want to forget because if I do, there is a risk of the same patterns repeating themselves.

Which is why I’m not full of hate. I have seen what it can do when we carry it around. She carries hate around like a hot coal in her chest, spewing venom at anyone who can’t meet her expectations, which are impossible to predict. It’s a painfully uncomfortable way to live and I am sad for her. Not sorry for her, not pity, but genuinely heart-breakingly sad—she does not see how she is the architect of her own misery and how that drives away anyone who might try to love her. She taught me this. And I know that if she were truly, genuinely happy, she wouldn’t be so cruel, so harsh, so afraid.

So I wish for her to know the root of happiness, truly know it. Because when we are genuinely happy, we aren’t abusive.