Lost in a tempest

[kp1111]

I am feeling lost. Hopeless. Angry. I have been raised in an environment where relationships are not made to break, but to make. No matter how hard it gets, you always try harder in hopes of a brighter tomorrow. I personally do not know anybody who has gone through a break up. Almost all of my close friends, family, even acquaintances seem to have had achieved their happily ever after. I am not saying that it was all rainbows and sunshines for them, but they have struggled through it all and made it work. Yet, I feel lost and hopeless and angry and sad. I had a plan. A dream. A dream that I had dreamt of for the past 4 years. To marry the love of my life. But, our relationship had been like a roller coaster for atleast the past two years.

 

I have been love with this guy for 10 years now. And we had been together for 4. My first love, my first kiss, my first everything. So, yeah! You are probably thinking that everyone's firsts are difficult to forget.

 

When started dating, we knew this was it. We wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. We were aware of all the issues we were going to face (family related), but we were willing to go through it anyway...because our relationship meant a lot. But I wish I had seen this tempest coming.

 

Like many relationships, we have had our ups and downs. We have had a couple break ups as well. And once you go through a series of breaks in a relationship, it sometimes weakens it. It's like a thread. Once to break a thread, the only way to connect it is by knotting the now two ends. But, the knot will remain. Our break up was mainly due to external issues. We had been in a long distance relationship for more than 2 years. He moved for advertising school in another state (8 driving hours away). I did not visit much because being a girl from a conservative family (from another country), it was hard for me to get out of town for a few days without having my parents and my entire extended family (+50 people) know about it. Things eventually catch up to you. And a lot of these issue caught up to our relationship which lead to our first break up (only lasted a couple weeks).

 

We got back together and a year later, it happens again. This time, we got into an argument over nothing. He was frustrated and nervous about his new job. He had just moved to a whole new place where he did not know anyone. His boss was treating him poorly and he was afraid that he was going to fail. He does not handle stress well. Neither do I. In the heat of the moment, we just ended it. Next morning when I realized that it was mistake and we were both angry, I tried to reason it out and talk to him about it...but he had made up his mind. I tried talking to him about this a few times but he has a tendency of emotionally shutting himself down. We made no contact for over a month and the next thing I Know that he has moved back to town with his parents because he just lost his job. I tried to be a good friend and gave a few words of encouragement. Few weeks later, we got back together for good. We talked it all out...about our issues and what needs to be worked on. We got back together because for both of us, this was it. We were stuck to each other for life now. We decided that we will soon let our parents know after my brother gets married in a few months and his brother gets his dad to approve of his interracial relationship.

 

But somehow our parents find out before that. The men in our family (my dad and uncle & his dad and uncle) get together and talk it all out to see what needs to be done here. They decided that this relationship will not be accepted by either families and we will have to immediately break things off. I am a 24 years old and my boyfriend is 27. We live in a free country, but we do not have the right to chose the direction of our life. The reason why our families will not accept our relationship is because our families have been friends for 4 generations now. My relationship with my boyfriend will "terrorize" the relationship between two families. In addition, both of us are from really nice families with high status in the society. The culture that I come from is all about their name, their status and what the society thinks. It's more important to do what is needed to keep your name and your status even at the cost of sacrificing your child's happiness. They are afraid that people will talk about us and that we have ashamed our grandfathers.

 

My boyfriend and I do not talk anymore. I do not know if we will get back together. He is moving to another state for a new job. But, the thing is, no matter how hard we try to stay away from each other's life, there is no escaping.

 

I love my parents. I love my family. But I love him too. It is so unfair for me to love both. It is so unfair for me to have to pick one. Actually, I have not even been given the choice of picking him. My family knows that I will sacrifice anything for them. But, are they willing to see all the hurt this is causing me. How their decision has put my life on hold. I feel betrayed. I feel cheated on. Your parents are supposed to be your support, your foundation. But, they want me to live my life their way. Now, I am angry at my boyfriend because I feel like he could not stand up for me. We knew this day was going to come and our family will say no the first time around. But we keep trying. They can't force us to marry other people. There are people in my family and his who are supportive of our relationship. His cousins, my cousins, my aunt and uncle.

 

I feel like I am stuck in limbo. I suppose I should just take it as we are not meant to be. I should just move on. But I am sure we all know its easier said than done. If this is the person you know means the world to you, would you not do everything to make it work? Would you not fight for it if you know its true love? I am angry and sad and feel betrayed because the love of my life easily gave up on us. I am sure I will come out of this one day (not anytime soon though), but what about NOW? All the confusion. How do I deal with that? I am not going to be hopeful about a brighter future with my boyfriend. But I am not going to be hopeless either.

 

I am sorry for this being so long...this is my very first post and I just want to get a lot of it out of my system. Any words of encouragement at this point would help.