When Love is Not Enough

one of my articles published on Starbuzz Magazine way back 2006

You love him so much. You see to it that he can always rely on you in times of need. And you’re willing to do everything to make your relationship work. So how come it seems that all your efforts and sacrifices are still not enough? Why does it feel that amidst the cuddlings that you share, there seems to be the skeleton truth that something is wrong?

There are moments that he appears to be distant. Every now and then, his problems get the better of him and off he trails to an invisible wall—far from your reach. It hurts to constantly see him in pain. And it hurts even more, to know you cannot make it go away. No matter how you try, your love for him cannot battle with his inner conflicts. And eventually, you find yourself the one to blame for not being able to make him happy. The way he relies solely on you is affecting you too much already. You cannot help but hate yourself for not being enough.

If you feel like this, then you are missing the whole point. Open your eyes, the relationship is not healthy anymore. And the fact that he keeps turning to you to save him proves that he needs you more than he loves you. You know that.

You’ve tried your best and yet he’s still not happy. You still hold on, because you believe that if you let go, you will be taking away your happiness. But the question is, are you really happy? Or are you just scared that if you let go, he will fall apart?

Like him, you have feelings too. You have your own sets of problem to face. You’re not helping him by solving his problems. You’re only making him depend on you more. The more you do that, the more you’re destroying yourselves and the thing that was both of you. And what sense would that make? To ruin two lives?

Helping him but hurting yourself in the process, is absurd. Yes, love is giving. But it doesn’t mean locking yourself into the role of the “giver”. One can only do so much to help, but one has to also know when to stop and finally accept the fact that you’re not what he needed. And his happiness, the one you tried so hard to give him, will be best discovered without you.

Requiem

It died… No one did the killing.

It just happened… ended all by itself.

It wasn’t sudden, the demise.

In fact, it’s been dying for over a year already... and we let it…

“Save me… or kill me,” it cried out to us.

But we chose neither.

We just looked at it with unseeing eyes.

Both too busy drowning in our own private hells to dare lift a finger...

Then, a cry…

A sharp one that tells of its fall towards final things…

We both heard it… yet we remained still.

… Maybe, just maybe, we’d look at it someday…

Look at the glow, five-years-worth, that was no more…

All ashen… gone…

took everything along with it…. All the good, all the bad….

… nothing left behind…

Nothing lasting, nothing real… Nothing… Not even love…