Why I Kept Breaking Up And Coming Back To Love

He broke up with me! No, that’s not true. I did it. He pushed me to make that decision, so in a way, he was the one who ended things. I merely became the messenger of the breakup. I was consumed by anger. All that rage built up inside me, and every time I tried to express it, he would dismiss me with, “You’re overreacting.” Over time, I learned to keep my feelings to myself, to swallow them down and exhale them before they drove me to act out in anger.

But that day, my anger reached a boiling point. I couldn’t take it anymore. I picked up the phone and said, “Kelvin, I can’t do this any longer. If I’m not careful, this relationship will be the death of me, and I don’t want to die anytime soon. It’s over between us. Please don’t ask me to reconsider because I’ve thought this through for a long time, and everything in me tells me to move on without you.”

I fell silent, waiting for his response. I expected him to go wild or beg for forgiveness, promising it wouldn’t happen again. Yes, I told him not to ask me to reconsider, but deep down, that’s exactly what I wanted him to do.

He asked calmly, “Is that what you want?” I hesitated. Then he pressed, “Would that make you happy?” I replied, “Yes. Everything you do drives me crazy. I can’t continue.” He paused for a moment before saying, “If that makes you happy, so be it.”

I hung up and cried. I sobbed like a child. Two years of our relationship ended as if it meant nothing. He didn’t even try to fight for us; he just let it slip away. I felt like the loser.

A couple of days later, I spotted him with another girl at the campus cafeteria. They were laughing, and I saw him paying for her food. They didn’t notice me, but I watched their every move. It was clear she was the one replacing me. I texted him, “It’s only been three days, and you already have a new girl? You left me for her?” Ten hours later, he replied, “She’s not my girl. Just to clarify, I didn’t leave you. You left me!”

I felt a wave of relief for two reasons: first, he hadn’t replaced me, and second, he cared enough to respond. I thought about calling him to express how much I missed him and how I wanted to rekindle our relationship, but my pride held me back. So, I devised a plan.

Steve became my bait. He had wanted to date me for a while, so I figured I could use him to provoke a reaction from Kelvin. I spent all my time with Steve. People started talking about us, and Kelvin saw us together a few times, but he didn’t take the bait. Instead, it seemed to strengthen his bond with that girl. I saw them together more often than he saw me with Steve. I couldn’t take it anymore, so one night, I sent Kelvin a long message on WhatsApp.

I poured my heart out, telling him how much I missed him and how the memories of us haunted me. I wrote about our past and the future we never had. It was a lengthy message, one that would take about ten minutes to read. He didn’t read it until I was asleep. I went to bed hopeful for a sweet reply in the morning.

When I woke up, I immediately checked WhatsApp, and his response was simply, “Cool.”

Cool? I had spent nearly two hours crafting that message, editing every line to ensure it conveyed exactly what I felt, and all I got back was “Cool?” That was far from cool. I called him right away.

“Hello, Kelvin… Did you read what I sent you last night? Did you really read every line to understand what I meant? You read it and thought ‘cool’ was an appropriate response?”

“Adaku, what do you want me to say? Maybe you should tell me what kind of response you expected so I can give you one right now.”

I wanted him to say he missed me too and wanted to get back together. I wanted a long response to match my long message. How could he not see that I was desperate to restore our relationship? But when he asked what I wanted him to say, I replied, “Don’t say anything. Bye.” I hung up.

A few minutes later, I received a notification. “I knew he would message me. That guy can’t live without me,” I thought. I opened my messages, only to find it was an MTN reminder about a raffle. I lay quietly on my bed, feeling ashamed and angry for expecting so much from someone who hadn’t given much when we were together.

From that day on, I resolved to move on. I told myself, “Kelvin doesn’t deserve the attention and love I’m giving him. He’ll meet someone who will make his life miserable enough that he’ll miss all the love I once gave him.”

I tried to move on, but the campus was small, and I kept running into him. I saw him with other people, especially women. He always seemed to be laughing and having the time of his life. He appeared to have completely moved on, which tore me apart inside. All I wanted was for him to be miserable enough to come back to me.

One early morning, I grabbed my bag and walked to his hostel. I knocked, and his roommate answered, saying Kelvin wasn’t there. I told him I would wait. I lay on his bed and took a deep breath, unsure of what I would say. When Kelvin finally arrived, he was surprised to see me, but I was thrilled to see him. We had a long conversation, something we never did when we were together.

I told him I wanted him back, explained why I left, and pointed out how annoying he was. He replied, “If there’s something you don’t like about someone, you should talk about it. You can’t just bottle it up.” I responded, “When I tried to talk about it, you said I was overreacting.” He countered, “When I say talk about it, I mean without drama and without anger.”

“Are you calling me a drama queen?”

“No, I’m not. I’m just saying…”

“No, you just did. You called me a drama queen.”

“You’ve started again… this is what I’m talking about.”

And then we fell silent… for a long time. I finally asked, “Are we back together again?” He replied, “Is that what you want? Would that make you happy?”

We were just kids pretending to understand love. That day, I learned something important. I realized I didn’t like being called a drama queen, but more importantly, I learned that I needed to express my feelings instead of bottling them up. This became both my strength and my weakness. I began to voice all the little things that bothered me about people. I lost friends along the way, but I was happier.

We broke up and got back together multiple times. A few months before graduation, we broke up again. During our NYSC, we broke up about fifteen times, only to reconcile the sixteenth time. When he got a job, he started ignoring me, and we broke up again. Once I had a job, we barely spoke, but we handled it like adults; we cared less.

Now, we’ve been married for three years, and even in marriage, we still break up and come back together. Maybe the issue isn’t with Kelvin; it’s me who’s always looking for faults. When we argue and drift apart, I’m usually the one who brings us back together. Kelvin has grown accustomed to my ways. He says I enjoy breaking things up because I love fixing them. That’s not true. I just love new beginnings. I break things so we can start fresh. And every time we begin anew, he’s careful, loving, and generous until it becomes routine again. Everything needs a refresh button, just like computers have a restart option.

My son is now two years old. He’s a handful—crying, kicking, biting, and falling. Sometimes, I feel exhausted by his antics. I wonder if I should break up with him too, thinking maybe he’ll learn to behave. ???  

—Adaku  
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