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What is up, everybody?

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Welcome back to the Young and Love podcast.

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A podcast for being young and love has absolutely nothing zero to do with your age,

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but has all to do with your experience and your growth and love over time.

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My name is Darius Covington.

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I am the host of this great podcast.

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And today's episode, I'm about to expose myself a little bit.

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Can you all see this light?

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No, I guess you can't.

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I'm about to expose myself a little bit on today's episode.

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So fun fact, I was actually just filming some videos for TikTok.

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And I was like, well, I already have the setup here.

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I might as well just film this episode right quick.

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So I went ahead and popped out the camera or, you know,

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shifted the camera on the tripod and hit record.

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And so as you can tell by today's, listen,

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I'm not wasting no time with this video because it is a little bit embarrassing

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because these next couple of videos are all going to be on the same topic.

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And I'm about to embarrass and expose myself a lot.

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So

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we're going to jump right into this episode real quick before we do.

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If you are not subscribed to the YouTube channel,

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go ahead to YouTube if you're already here.

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What's up?

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Go ahead and click the subscribe button down below

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and make sure you're following us if you're watching on Spotify, Apple podcasts

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or any other place that this podcast gets uploaded to.

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Thank you all for your support.

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If you go to the link in the description, you can click my link tree and you can go

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ahead and join the Covington Family Group chat over there.

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We'll be talking.

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It is almost like if you know what Patreon is, the same thing as Patreon.

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I was just trying to find an avenue where I wouldn't have to charge all anything

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because Patreon, there is a free option on there.

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So go ahead, click the link in the bio and join that family group chat.

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Anyway, you'll see me stalling a little bit, right?

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Before we start this podcast, let me hear what your highs and lows of the week were.

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We do a game here called Roses and Thorns.

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Your roses are what were those good moments?

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Those smell good moments, those feel good moments of your week.

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And then the thorns are what were those moments that, like,

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you know, won't really that feel good?

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My rose for this week, I will say

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actually, I have pretty good roses this week.

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I have a few friends coming over.

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I had a friend come over yesterday.

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We had shot something for her business.

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I have two friends coming over today, actually, in about 30 minutes and

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went out to brunch lunch after church on Sunday.

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I was in Jersey last week.

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I got to see my people in Jersey last week.

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So those are some rosy experiences.

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The thorn is this to do list that I have

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on this computer that I just feel like is never getting done.

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I just like to keep adding stuff to it and I keep doing things.

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But like,

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I don't know, it's just too much going on.

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That's that's my thorn for the week.

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Anyway, getting into a comment down below,

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let me know what your rose and your thorn,

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what your rose and your thorns were, excuse my tongue,

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what your rose and your thorns were for the week.

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And I try to respond to them getting into this episode.

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Episode five, I think it is single after seven years

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of a relationship.

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Now, I do want to say I'm not going to say any names.

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If I do, we're going to probably throw

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a fake play name in there so that I don't get confused.

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And I did reach out to this person before

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I filmed these videos and said, just so you know, I'm not talking about you

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in these videos, I am more talking about myself and my experiences and how

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my experience can probably help somebody else.

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Because honestly, I did.

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Somebody when I was in that relationship,

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there was somebody who I knew who was in a relationship for 10 years

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and their relationship ended.

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I want to say it inspired me to end my relationship,

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but it definitely inspired me to understand at that time

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that just because we had dated for all these years didn't necessarily mean that

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we had to continue dating if we didn't like or if I didn't like

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where the relationship was going.

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And so and so that is a lot of the reason why I'm doing this video.

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I think that there might be other people and people do me all the time.

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Other people who have been in long term

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relationships that they're feeling that these relationships aren't necessarily

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what they want to do long term.

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But once you're in a relationship for all

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those many years, that seems like the best option.

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Like leaving or staying in the relationship seems like the best option.

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And in my experience, leave run has nothing to do with the other person.

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I think it has more to do with the fact I would rather leave a relationship after

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10 years and start all over if it means that I find a person that I could be

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everything that I wanted to be to that I couldn't necessarily be in my relationship.

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Anyway, let me give you all the back story of this relationship, how it began.

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We're going to make this three part series.

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So I'm going to talk about how the relationship started,

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my experience a little bit before that relationship, how that relationship started.

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And then we're going to go all the way up until I felt like

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this relationship probably isn't what I want to do anymore.

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And then we might we might devolve and it might be a part two.

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There will be a part two.

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We might dip up there and then pick up on part two because I only have my friends

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are coming. I only have 30 minutes to do this anyway.

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So that relationship started when I was 14.

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I was 14, which means I was in eight.

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I was in the eighth grade when that relationship started.

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So from obviously from kindergarten,

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since they're kindergarten to eighth grade, obviously I had I don't even want

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to say relationships because.

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Are they really relationships when you're that young?

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When I was in fourth grade, we used to go to gym and we used to have weddings.

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That is embarrassing.

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They used to they used to literally play and like we would be in class

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and they'd be telling us we're getting married today.

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And then during gym, we would go outside.

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We would go to this area and I don't know.

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We were different as kids back then.

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I don't know. It was crazy.

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But so I dated I didn't want to say dated, but I I was a kid.

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I could dated at that time.

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You know, so obviously those are more play relationships.

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They weren't anything serious.

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And I'll be honest at 14 when I got into this relationship,

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I didn't know that it would become as long term or as serious

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as it became because this is just somebody at that time.

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And I said this many times and I don't know that she received it the right way.

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But I had said many times that at 14, when you're dating a girl,

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you're not really dating because I like your mindset.

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You're not really.

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Or at least I wasn't dating because I like to mind set.

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I wasn't dating because your future plans are they they align with my future plans.

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Your desires line, my desires at 14.

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I was like, you cute.

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Listen, I'm be real transparent.

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I am not I am not a person who I'm not afraid to expose myself or my thoughts at all.

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And so at 14, I was like, you cute, you got a nice body.

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Cool. This is great.

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Obviously, it grew into more than just somebody being pretty and somebody having

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a nice body, but at 14.

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In the church or not in the church, I'm a guy.

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That's what I was looking for at that age.

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And so we met at.

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My church.

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Trying to make sure that I'm not like exposing anything here,

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but we met we met at my church, we were in the same youth department.

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And honestly, we were different age ranges.

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She was a little bit literally a little bit older than I was.

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And in that little bit amount of age,

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so if I met her in eighth grade and she's older than me,

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that means she was in high school.

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So, you know, high schoolers are with the high schoolers where the seven, eight

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or six, seventh and eighth graders, the middle schoolers with the middle schoolers.

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And so our friend groups in church were very different.

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But because we met and we started dating

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in eighth grade, that that split was short lived

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because eventually we were both in high school.

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And so we were both now, you know, like the experiences that we had

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in the youth department were both in the same places.

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I for a long period of time at that church, I did not know anything about her.

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I just knew that she was some some girl that went to my church

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because she wasn't in the group of people that I associated with.

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But again, I knew who she was.

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And I had friends who were in high school.

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Eventually, when I got to the eighth grade,

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somehow I don't really know, but we started we started talking on the phone and.

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I was like, oh, you know, you're actually pretty cute.

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And we were talking, we were talking, we were talking, we were talking, we talk.

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And then eventually I had this thing when I was younger,

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we're like, I'm probably not going to if I like you,

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I'm not going to tell you that I like you.

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I'm just going to tell your close friend that I like you

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because nine times out of ten, your close friend, a girl's close friend,

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if you tell a girl's best friend that you like her,

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her best friend is bound to tell her that the boy likes you.

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So I told her best friend, knowing that her best friend was going to tell her.

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We eventually started dating.

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I don't even want to go through the whole story.

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We eventually started dating.

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I was 14 in the eighth grade.

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We started dating.

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I went to ninth grade.

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We were still dating.

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I went to 10th grade.

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We were still dating.

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And I think from eighth grade to 10th grade,

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actually, I want to say eighth grade to 11th grade.

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It was fine.

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Like, you know, we weren't we weren't we weren't adults dating.

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So there wasn't much of responsibility to be people like who were adults dating.

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We went to the same church.

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So obviously we saw each other every Sunday.

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We had youth group at our church on Friday.

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So we saw each other every Friday as well.

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So the dynamics of our relationship, I feel like for a long time.

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We're fine.

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You know, we got to see each other, whatever.

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I think in 11th grade is when

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things just started to change.

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I think that I.

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Let me be honest, I think that I started to weigh the fact that.

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I think I started to weigh my options, you know,

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I think that I started coming into more of who I was,

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and I think the options, not that there were like 20 girls lined up trying to

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talk to me, but I think the options that I had, I started realizing, you know,

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we're more than just this one person,

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and I really started to want to experience other things, never pursued that.

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But it was always it became started to become a thought in my mind when I was

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when I was in 11th grade and also noting the fact that she's two years older than me.

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So by the time I went to 11th grade, she was going to college.

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And so she's having her experiences in college.

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I'm still in high school at home.

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She was dorming at college.

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So the dynamics of our relationship started to change a little bit or a lot of it.

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She would come home, you know, for church on the weekends.

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And I would obviously have an opportunity to see her then.

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Um, but the dynamics started to change once she went away.

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The dynamics started to change once she went away to college

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and once I started to come into who I was a little bit.

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I definitely think that at the time and I have said this not to her,

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but I've said this in conversation with the people since this relationship has ended.

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When you're 11, you're broke.

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There's not really much you could do in your relationships.

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And so we did hang out.

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We did go out on dates.

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But obviously, there's nothing like the dates that I'd be going out on now,

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because at that time I didn't have any money to be going out on dates with her.

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And so there was a part of that that does feel a little toxic.

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We weren't we weren't also I would go over her house sometimes.

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But we weren't people.

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We weren't people like who had the ability.

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Thankfully, actually,

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weren't people who had the ability to like, you know,

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I know people who go to their boyfriends and their girlfriends houses every day.

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They be in a room with the door closed.

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I need the covers.

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See my eye twitch underneath the covers.

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You know, really just chillaxing, just relaxing.

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We didn't really have that experience that was not our experience.

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Her mom was a very devout Christian or is a very devout Christian woman.

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My mom, my mom is not a very devout Christian woman.

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She just don't play that.

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And so there is there is a level that I'm like sometimes I imagine

243
00:12:44,040 --> 00:12:49,800
that I think sometimes I credit that to be like a toxic trait for myself

244
00:12:50,000 --> 00:12:54,960
that I didn't really make time to go out with her or go out on dates with her.

245
00:12:55,160 --> 00:12:56,840
Or at least I did have that mindset.

246
00:12:57,040 --> 00:12:59,040
And then I got older and I realized, like,

247
00:12:59,240 --> 00:13:02,840
you didn't have any money, you didn't have a job, you were in high school.

248
00:13:03,040 --> 00:13:04,560
She was in college.

249
00:13:04,760 --> 00:13:07,440
And although people do all the time.

250
00:13:08,360 --> 00:13:10,920
I didn't do it and I OK, I didn't do it.

251
00:13:10,920 --> 00:13:16,040
And if I'm wrong for not doing it and I, you know, I just didn't do it.

252
00:13:16,240 --> 00:13:19,760
But we definitely had we definitely saw each other every week.

253
00:13:19,960 --> 00:13:23,400
And if it wasn't every week, we definitely saw each other every two weeks.

254
00:13:23,600 --> 00:13:25,960
But I want to see every every single week for sure.

255
00:13:26,160 --> 00:13:28,440
But as time started to progress

256
00:13:28,640 --> 00:13:31,760
in that relationship.

257
00:13:32,160 --> 00:13:35,680
I think some things started to happen.

258
00:13:36,600 --> 00:13:39,080
So for full transparency, she never cheated on me.

259
00:13:39,280 --> 00:13:40,360
I never cheated on her.

260
00:13:40,360 --> 00:13:43,600
But I think that there were some other things that happened in the relationship

261
00:13:43,800 --> 00:13:46,600
that kind of make you.

262
00:13:47,560 --> 00:13:52,680
Or that kind of made that just change the way that I showed up in the relationship.

263
00:13:52,680 --> 00:13:55,920
So there were things that happened that, like, you know, killed my trust a little

264
00:13:56,120 --> 00:14:03,280
bit, there were things that happened that killed my liking this to her

265
00:14:03,480 --> 00:14:06,280
a little bit or a lot of it.

266
00:14:06,480 --> 00:14:09,360
And I think that I think that.

267
00:14:09,360 --> 00:14:12,640
I think that when that started to happen,

268
00:14:12,840 --> 00:14:16,720
if I knew what I know now, if I knew then what I know now,

269
00:14:16,920 --> 00:14:20,480
I would have probably ended the relationship at that point instead of just

270
00:14:20,680 --> 00:14:25,560
holding on and holding out or being afraid to end the relationship.

271
00:14:26,800 --> 00:14:29,160
Because I think that once

272
00:14:29,360 --> 00:14:32,600
knowing myself, it's hard to rebuild trust.

273
00:14:32,800 --> 00:14:36,680
And so I think that once the trust started to go out the window,

274
00:14:36,680 --> 00:14:41,120
I didn't set us up in a good way in our relationship because I really should have

275
00:14:41,120 --> 00:14:44,080
just ended it knowing that that trust probably isn't going to come back anytime

276
00:14:44,080 --> 00:14:48,200
soon. And now the way that I respond to things, the way that I act around you,

277
00:14:48,400 --> 00:14:52,200
it's all going to be based off the fact that this trust

278
00:14:52,400 --> 00:14:53,720
is kind of draining a little bit.

279
00:14:53,920 --> 00:14:55,800
And there might have been some instances

280
00:14:56,000 --> 00:15:01,840
where she might have felt that I did things to her as well that made that trust dwindle.

281
00:15:02,040 --> 00:15:05,040
And so I give us both responsibility for not ending the relationship.

282
00:15:05,040 --> 00:15:08,680
If you ask her today, did I treat her great in that relationship?

283
00:15:08,880 --> 00:15:09,880
She would tell you no.

284
00:15:10,000 --> 00:15:12,960
And I would say to her in response, why didn't you end the relationship?

285
00:15:13,160 --> 00:15:17,040
And if you ask me if I felt that I was good to her in that relationship,

286
00:15:17,240 --> 00:15:18,400
I would also say no.

287
00:15:18,520 --> 00:15:21,880
And I would take the accountability of asking myself, why didn't you end the

288
00:15:21,880 --> 00:15:25,480
relationship at the time that you knew that you weren't treating her the way that

289
00:15:25,480 --> 00:15:29,880
you wanted to treat her. But obviously, as time moved forward,

290
00:15:30,680 --> 00:15:34,800
I started to realize that, like, all right, for the sake of us both,

291
00:15:34,800 --> 00:15:36,280
let me end this for us both.

292
00:15:36,480 --> 00:15:37,680
So then time progressed.

293
00:15:37,680 --> 00:15:39,320
Eventually, I went I graduated.

294
00:15:39,320 --> 00:15:40,120
I went to college.

295
00:15:40,320 --> 00:15:45,800
That was 14 or that was eighth grade, ninth, tenth, eleventh, twelfth.

296
00:15:46,000 --> 00:15:47,680
That's five years.

297
00:15:47,880 --> 00:15:50,360
I went to college for two years.

298
00:15:50,560 --> 00:15:53,480
I went to college and.

299
00:15:53,680 --> 00:15:54,680
I don't.

300
00:15:54,880 --> 00:15:55,880
Stundering.

301
00:15:56,080 --> 00:16:00,000
I went to college and I don't I don't I don't remember how I was.

302
00:16:00,200 --> 00:16:02,880
I don't remember how toxic our relationship was in college.

303
00:16:02,880 --> 00:16:07,160
I don't really remember how the dynamics of our relationship changed

304
00:16:07,360 --> 00:16:09,760
while I was in college.

305
00:16:09,960 --> 00:16:13,920
But I think around that point, because that was rounding off the seven years,

306
00:16:14,120 --> 00:16:16,920
I think around that point is when.

307
00:16:17,120 --> 00:16:19,280
I started to realize more and more.

308
00:16:19,280 --> 00:16:20,480
I think around that point is actually

309
00:16:20,480 --> 00:16:23,560
when I had the conversation or heard the conversation with the person who said

310
00:16:23,560 --> 00:16:25,960
that they were dating for 10 years and they ended the relationship.

311
00:16:26,160 --> 00:16:27,480
So around that time of hearing that

312
00:16:27,480 --> 00:16:30,360
conversation is when I was like, this relationship isn't going the way that I

313
00:16:30,360 --> 00:16:33,440
wanted to go and full of transparency.

314
00:16:33,640 --> 00:16:35,640
Obviously, we were we grew up in the church together.

315
00:16:35,640 --> 00:16:37,360
We went to the same church together.

316
00:16:37,560 --> 00:16:40,520
We lived in that we lived in the same town.

317
00:16:41,680 --> 00:16:43,520
And.

318
00:16:43,720 --> 00:16:45,600
We were dating for all these years,

319
00:16:45,800 --> 00:16:52,120
so obviously the conversation of marriage came up or started to come up a lot.

320
00:16:53,400 --> 00:16:56,720
You know, looking at rings, although we were young,

321
00:16:56,720 --> 00:17:00,200
but when you're young and you've been dating for seven years,

322
00:17:00,400 --> 00:17:03,280
I feel like marriage makes.

323
00:17:03,480 --> 00:17:05,520
It's since a little bit,

324
00:17:05,720 --> 00:17:07,840
probably all the way like you definitely could have waited.

325
00:17:08,040 --> 00:17:09,600
We started looking at rings.

326
00:17:09,800 --> 00:17:11,760
We were talking about, oh, I saw this church.

327
00:17:11,960 --> 00:17:13,120
We should we would get married in this church.

328
00:17:13,320 --> 00:17:16,680
Oh, obviously, that never happened.

329
00:17:16,880 --> 00:17:19,520
No shade. I'm grateful that it never happened

330
00:17:19,720 --> 00:17:25,320
because I remember somebody telling me we were in an office like environment.

331
00:17:25,320 --> 00:17:28,560
I don't want to say exactly who we are because people who know we might know

332
00:17:28,760 --> 00:17:32,000
who I'm talking about, we were in an office like environment.

333
00:17:32,200 --> 00:17:36,440
And I remember this person coming up to me and they were talking about

334
00:17:36,640 --> 00:17:40,880
just marriage and relationships in general, marriage and relationships in general.

335
00:17:41,080 --> 00:17:44,840
We were literally at a printer in this office environment.

336
00:17:45,040 --> 00:17:50,400
And they were like, you know, if you and this girl who I was dating at the time,

337
00:17:50,400 --> 00:17:55,440
if you and her ever got married, I feel like you all would just figure it out.

338
00:17:55,640 --> 00:17:58,400
And that happened years ago.

339
00:17:58,600 --> 00:18:04,200
And I will never I don't think that I'll ever get that conversation out of my mind

340
00:18:04,400 --> 00:18:11,360
because two have been in a relationship is different if somebody says

341
00:18:11,560 --> 00:18:14,400
I can see it's different if somebody says I can see all getting married.

342
00:18:14,600 --> 00:18:16,560
I'll make a great married couple.

343
00:18:16,760 --> 00:18:18,680
It's different hearing that versus

344
00:18:18,680 --> 00:18:22,040
hearing somebody say if you all got married, you all would just figure it out

345
00:18:22,240 --> 00:18:25,080
because I never want to be and although I don't really care about what people

346
00:18:25,080 --> 00:18:28,040
think, but I never want to be in a relationship with somebody.

347
00:18:28,240 --> 00:18:31,640
And the the the thought that people and the thought that somebody has about your

348
00:18:31,840 --> 00:18:35,960
relationship is that if this ended up in marriage, you all would figure it out.

349
00:18:36,160 --> 00:18:43,440
Hearing that because there was a lot of truth in that hearing that made me like.

350
00:18:43,640 --> 00:18:47,760
Take a step back and be like, you right.

351
00:18:47,760 --> 00:18:49,400
You are absolutely right.

352
00:18:49,600 --> 00:18:55,160
If we got in, I obviously as somebody who dates with the intention to be married,

353
00:18:55,360 --> 00:18:58,760
obviously there was a goal for that relationship or every relation, not every

354
00:18:58,760 --> 00:19:01,720
relationship, there was a goal for the relationships that I'm taking serious to

355
00:19:01,920 --> 00:19:07,000
obviously end up in marriage, realizing in that moment that if we got married,

356
00:19:07,000 --> 00:19:09,840
that we would be one of those couples who just figured it out.

357
00:19:10,040 --> 00:19:14,280
And on top of that, somebody had said to us, when our relationship started to start

358
00:19:14,280 --> 00:19:18,400
going sour and it was very evident that it was going sour,

359
00:19:18,600 --> 00:19:21,760
somebody was like, you all should go get couples counseling.

360
00:19:21,960 --> 00:19:24,160
And I was like, so

361
00:19:24,360 --> 00:19:27,320
if we're not married.

362
00:19:27,880 --> 00:19:31,280
And not not not premarital counseling.

363
00:19:31,480 --> 00:19:34,480
Couples counseling, because you are not doing good in this relationship.

364
00:19:34,680 --> 00:19:36,680
If we're not married

365
00:19:36,880 --> 00:19:41,120
and it already looks like we need counseling to help us in our dating

366
00:19:41,120 --> 00:19:44,320
relationship.

367
00:19:47,520 --> 00:19:50,000
Marriage ain't going to work.

368
00:19:50,200 --> 00:19:52,160
Marriage would not work out for us.

369
00:19:52,360 --> 00:19:54,360
And so so I think it was a combination.

370
00:19:54,560 --> 00:19:58,280
She had also mentioned the same counseling scenario.

371
00:19:58,480 --> 00:20:00,000
And I was like, so

372
00:20:00,200 --> 00:20:03,880
it don't make sense to me if we're all if we already need counseling.

373
00:20:03,880 --> 00:20:05,560
Do you really want to be in a marriage

374
00:20:05,760 --> 00:20:09,040
where as two people who are dating, who don't live together, who don't see each

375
00:20:09,040 --> 00:20:11,560
other every day, who don't have to talk about finances, who don't have to talk

376
00:20:11,560 --> 00:20:14,160
about children, who don't have to blend their families together, who don't have

377
00:20:14,360 --> 00:20:16,920
to blend their cultures and their experiences together.

378
00:20:17,120 --> 00:20:23,760
If we can't get it together here, I don't know that it will make any sense.

379
00:20:23,960 --> 00:20:25,800
To get it together there.

380
00:20:26,000 --> 00:20:29,800
And so hearing those two things, the y'all would just figure it out

381
00:20:30,000 --> 00:20:34,320
and the y'all should go to counseling in my mind, it snapped.

382
00:20:34,520 --> 00:20:36,560
A trigger in me

383
00:20:36,560 --> 00:20:42,880
and made me realize that, like, maybe this relationship isn't for us.

384
00:20:43,080 --> 00:20:45,720
And obviously we were dating for seven years.

385
00:20:45,920 --> 00:20:51,000
And so I didn't want to just give up on that relationship.

386
00:20:51,200 --> 00:20:54,120
Obviously, we were not both over the relationship.

387
00:20:54,320 --> 00:20:57,080
And so I didn't want to be that guy.

388
00:20:57,280 --> 00:20:58,440
I didn't want to be rude.

389
00:20:58,640 --> 00:21:00,240
I also.

390
00:21:01,400 --> 00:21:04,920
I don't know that I liked her at this point, but I definitely I loved her.

391
00:21:04,920 --> 00:21:08,320
I didn't like her. And so loving somebody, obviously, you don't want to just be

392
00:21:08,320 --> 00:21:10,800
like, you know, tap dancing on their emotions and their feelings.

393
00:21:11,000 --> 00:21:12,720
And so there was a lot to consider.

394
00:21:12,920 --> 00:21:16,760
And unfortunately, I spent like probably over a year

395
00:21:16,960 --> 00:21:22,360
over a year considering if we should be in a relationship at all or not.

396
00:21:22,560 --> 00:21:26,480
And within that year of considering if we should be in a relationship or not,

397
00:21:26,680 --> 00:21:31,480
I think the way that I showed up was in a way that seemed like I was considering

398
00:21:31,480 --> 00:21:35,000
this, like considering and in this relationship and so even hugging.

399
00:21:35,200 --> 00:21:38,920
I talked to my friend, talked to my friend about this all the time that, like,

400
00:21:39,120 --> 00:21:44,360
you know, even like being hugged by her, I was like, OK.

401
00:21:45,080 --> 00:21:49,560
Like, because she's hugging me romantically and in my mind, I'm still pondering.

402
00:21:49,760 --> 00:21:54,160
I'm still thinking about if this relationship is supposed to last or not.

403
00:21:55,080 --> 00:21:57,160
Yeah, like, does that make sense?

404
00:21:57,360 --> 00:21:59,600
So I do think that if you're in a relationship, I will say this,

405
00:21:59,600 --> 00:22:03,360
if you're in a relationship and you do have it, it might not be the hug thing.

406
00:22:03,560 --> 00:22:04,840
Oh, you'll see this light.

407
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:06,160
It might not be the hug thing.

408
00:22:06,160 --> 00:22:07,000
It might be something else.

409
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:09,120
But just use this as as an example.

410
00:22:09,320 --> 00:22:13,240
If you're in a relationship and.

411
00:22:14,760 --> 00:22:16,760
It feels like when you hug this person,

412
00:22:16,960 --> 00:22:23,160
they don't hug you back with the same romantic feeling or the same loving

413
00:22:23,360 --> 00:22:27,280
feeling that you're giving off and that that can be hugging, kissing,

414
00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:31,880
being conversating, go just being around them.

415
00:22:32,080 --> 00:22:36,520
It might be worth to like wonder if this person also wants to be in this relationship,

416
00:22:36,520 --> 00:22:39,800
because I really do think that it would have been helpful for her to be a little

417
00:22:39,800 --> 00:22:43,120
bit more aware of the fact that I was off and we did have conversations about it.

418
00:22:43,120 --> 00:22:45,520
But I don't think the conversation of and maybe it did.

419
00:22:45,520 --> 00:22:49,240
And I just remember I don't think the conversation of do you want to break up?

420
00:22:49,240 --> 00:22:50,840
Because it seems like when I hug you,

421
00:22:51,040 --> 00:22:54,960
you're not hugging me in the same the same romantic feeling that I had

422
00:22:55,160 --> 00:22:56,600
in my affection toward you.

423
00:22:56,600 --> 00:22:57,400
And we did.

424
00:22:57,400 --> 00:22:58,600
We talked about affection all the time,

425
00:22:58,800 --> 00:23:01,840
how over time I just became less and less affectionate.

426
00:23:02,040 --> 00:23:03,320
And I think it was.

427
00:23:03,520 --> 00:23:05,200
Let me say this.

428
00:23:05,400 --> 00:23:09,720
I oftentimes say in my conversations about this relationship,

429
00:23:09,920 --> 00:23:14,120
I oftentimes be like, I was so toxic in that relationship.

430
00:23:14,320 --> 00:23:15,840
I was so I was trash.

431
00:23:16,040 --> 00:23:18,120
I don't know that I was.

432
00:23:19,000 --> 00:23:19,800
I was trash.

433
00:23:20,000 --> 00:23:23,200
I don't know that I was fully trash as I'm talking this out.

434
00:23:23,400 --> 00:23:25,440
I don't know that I was fully trash

435
00:23:25,440 --> 00:23:31,600
or I do have to I do think that because I knew that I was considering

436
00:23:31,800 --> 00:23:36,360
like really thinking hard about if this relationship was a thing for us or not.

437
00:23:36,560 --> 00:23:38,120
I feel like once those thoughts started

438
00:23:38,120 --> 00:23:40,720
coming in my mind that it affected how I showed up.

439
00:23:40,720 --> 00:23:43,680
So I don't think that I was necessarily trash because I was trying to be trash.

440
00:23:43,880 --> 00:23:47,120
But I was literally trying to think about a person's feelings,

441
00:23:47,120 --> 00:23:50,840
trying to think about how to go about this, trying to think about our life

442
00:23:51,040 --> 00:23:55,000
together and in having those thoughts, the way that I showed up was different.

443
00:23:55,000 --> 00:23:58,840
And so it wasn't that I was being toxic because I'm just a toxic person.

444
00:23:59,040 --> 00:24:02,320
It was it was I was being controlled by the thoughts that that I was having

445
00:24:02,520 --> 00:24:05,640
in my mind as it pertained to this relationship.

446
00:24:05,840 --> 00:24:11,440
And so after a year, after a year of

447
00:24:11,640 --> 00:24:18,440
thinking about if this relationship was for forget us, if it was for me or not,

448
00:24:18,640 --> 00:24:23,920
because I used to say this to her all the time as the guy, although women propose

449
00:24:23,920 --> 00:24:29,880
to their their their men pretty often, according to social media.

450
00:24:30,800 --> 00:24:34,200
But I would say often that as the man,

451
00:24:34,400 --> 00:24:37,400
it's my responsibility to ask you to marry me.

452
00:24:37,600 --> 00:24:43,440
If I don't feel comfortable enough to ask you to marry me, I'm not going to do it.

453
00:24:43,640 --> 00:24:47,520
In any relationship, if I don't feel like I want to be married to you,

454
00:24:47,720 --> 00:24:51,640
I'm not going to ask you, and so as time went on after that year

455
00:24:51,640 --> 00:24:56,400
and some change of me considering if we should be in a relationship or not.

456
00:24:56,600 --> 00:25:02,080
And also what that looked like for for me, because you also have to understand

457
00:25:02,280 --> 00:25:06,760
that me ending this relationship means that I have to start over.

458
00:25:06,960 --> 00:25:12,480
And when you've been doing anything for seven years, having to start over,

459
00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:17,920
you would rather be in this toxic than this in this toxic trash situation than to

460
00:25:17,920 --> 00:25:22,960
have to start all over again with somebody else.

461
00:25:23,160 --> 00:25:25,520
And obviously, when you're in relationships,

462
00:25:25,720 --> 00:25:29,280
starting over, being able to do seven years again with somebody else,

463
00:25:29,480 --> 00:25:35,200
nine times out of ten means having to do short periods of time with other people

464
00:25:35,400 --> 00:25:38,800
to find that person that the seven years will be worth it for.

465
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:42,200
But I will say, I feel like that experience,

466
00:25:42,400 --> 00:25:46,080
I don't I don't know what she would say that the experience told her.

467
00:25:46,080 --> 00:25:50,480
I will say that the experience taught me a lot about who I wanted to be,

468
00:25:50,680 --> 00:25:53,920
how I wanted to be in relationships, how I wanted to show up in relationships.

469
00:25:54,120 --> 00:25:59,160
And the seriousness of how I take relationships where now I would never

470
00:25:59,360 --> 00:26:03,160
we not we not make it a past seven hours if I know that I don't want to be with you

471
00:26:03,360 --> 00:26:06,080
anymore, I don't it won't take me a year to think about it.

472
00:26:06,280 --> 00:26:11,920
If the thought of me wanting to be with somebody else comes up in my mind,

473
00:26:11,920 --> 00:26:16,080
that's enough for me to understand that we're probably not the best match.

474
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:20,760
So after that year is some change,

475
00:26:20,960 --> 00:26:22,880
we had a conversation

476
00:26:23,080 --> 00:26:29,880
and the conversation started off or went something like

477
00:26:30,080 --> 00:26:32,560
I think we need a break.

478
00:26:34,680 --> 00:26:38,000
And anybody who's ever taken a break in relationships,

479
00:26:38,200 --> 00:26:41,520
I feel like maybe four people in this world of seven billion people

480
00:26:41,520 --> 00:26:44,480
have probably been successful at taking a break in relationships.

481
00:26:44,680 --> 00:26:48,480
Obviously, we were not successful after taking that break.

482
00:26:48,680 --> 00:26:50,480
I'll key in what we'll talk about.

483
00:26:50,480 --> 00:26:52,160
We'll talk about the breaks on part two.

484
00:26:52,360 --> 00:26:55,080
But I'll key in the fact that

485
00:26:55,280 --> 00:26:57,760
we ended up taking a break.

486
00:26:57,960 --> 00:27:01,960
We ended up taking a few breaks in the process of how that happened.

487
00:27:02,160 --> 00:27:08,560
I'll start to explain in part two of this series of me being single after seven

488
00:27:08,560 --> 00:27:12,280
years, I want to do a take away from all these videos.

489
00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:17,760
What was my take away in this first part of this relationship from being in a nice

490
00:27:17,960 --> 00:27:23,000
relationship as a 14 year old until I was maybe at this point,

491
00:27:23,200 --> 00:27:27,080
I was 20 when we took our first break.

492
00:27:27,280 --> 00:27:28,360
What did I learn?

493
00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:33,400
What was my biggest life lesson during that time?

494
00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:40,400
I would say my biggest life lesson at that time was.

495
00:27:40,600 --> 00:27:45,360
No matter what people's expectations are for your life,

496
00:27:45,560 --> 00:27:50,360
you're in charge of where and what you want to be.

497
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:52,680
I think that people expected us and an

498
00:27:52,880 --> 00:27:57,480
expectation is literally just people thinking how what your life should be.

499
00:27:57,680 --> 00:27:59,480
Nobody told us that we needed to get married.

500
00:27:59,680 --> 00:28:00,960
Nobody told us that we needed to get married.

501
00:28:01,160 --> 00:28:02,560
Nobody told us that we needed to get married.

502
00:28:02,560 --> 00:28:05,600
Nobody told us that we needed to stay in a relationship together.

503
00:28:05,800 --> 00:28:09,840
People just saw, you know, you see people dating you expect them to be dating.

504
00:28:09,840 --> 00:28:11,440
You expect them to eventually get married.

505
00:28:11,640 --> 00:28:13,440
And I think that knowing that people expected

506
00:28:13,640 --> 00:28:18,800
us to get married made me think that we had to.

507
00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:25,240
And so I think after that experience of like, we're going to take this break

508
00:28:25,440 --> 00:28:28,760
and we're not going to care what people think.

509
00:28:28,760 --> 00:28:35,560
I think that that has a great responsibility of why I really don't care

510
00:28:35,760 --> 00:28:39,000
what people think, I really don't care what people think today

511
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:42,600
because everybody has expectations, everybody has not just expectations,

512
00:28:42,800 --> 00:28:46,880
but everybody even has just like their own made up plans, their own desires,

513
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:49,560
their own hopes for your life.

514
00:28:49,760 --> 00:28:56,080
And I think this experience or this one part of this experience made me understand

515
00:28:56,080 --> 00:28:59,960
that, like, I'm glad you have thoughts.

516
00:29:00,160 --> 00:29:02,120
It sounds terrible, but I'm glad you have thoughts.

517
00:29:02,320 --> 00:29:06,400
But I'm going to do I'm going to do what I feel is right for me.

518
00:29:06,600 --> 00:29:08,920
Yeah, that was what I learned.

519
00:29:09,120 --> 00:29:09,920
All right.

520
00:29:10,120 --> 00:29:11,440
That was that was fun.

521
00:29:11,440 --> 00:29:12,240
This is a little exposing.

522
00:29:12,240 --> 00:29:14,240
I feel like I'm going to get a text message, a phone call.

523
00:29:14,440 --> 00:29:16,360
I might get jumped. I don't know.

524
00:29:16,560 --> 00:29:19,800
After this gets posted, but

525
00:29:20,000 --> 00:29:24,400
make sure you subscribe because part two, it just gets not worse and worse,

526
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:28,360
but it does get worse and worse a little bit.

527
00:29:29,240 --> 00:29:30,640
And

528
00:29:31,280 --> 00:29:36,120
I was thinking about I was thinking about something that I'm not going to share,

529
00:29:36,320 --> 00:29:39,520
but make sure that you're subscribed, that you like you comment below.

530
00:29:39,720 --> 00:29:41,120
Stay tuned for part two.

531
00:29:41,320 --> 00:29:42,880
I think today is today is Monday.

532
00:29:43,080 --> 00:29:46,800
This might go up around Wednesday and then I think we'll do the other one.

533
00:29:47,000 --> 00:29:51,320
I think I'll film the other one and have that one come out either Friday or Saturday.

534
00:29:51,320 --> 00:29:58,960
We'll talk about part two of how or of why I am single after seven years or am I

535
00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:01,120
single after seven years? I don't know.

536
00:30:01,320 --> 00:30:02,760
I don't know. There's more to see.

537
00:30:02,960 --> 00:30:05,600
Anyway, thank you guys for watching this video.

538
00:30:05,800 --> 00:30:10,000
Be sure to comment to like subscribe wherever you're listening to this at.

539
00:30:10,200 --> 00:30:12,760
And until next time.

540
00:30:12,760 --> 00:30:21,000
I don't know until next time. Goodbye.