i'm sorry

breaking up bald

hi, my name is eloise and i’m a serial monogamist.

it’s a nasty habit; one moment you’re casually talking to a guy at a party, next thing you know you wake up next to him in your studio apartment where he has somehow managed to be living for the last two years!* one never truly “dates”—flings and crushes between friends tend to snowball into an accidental sort of commitment. i’m not the greatest partner, not the worst. i’m definitely not the most tender, affectionate, or supportive. i eschew romantic gestures while simultaneously pining for them. i’ve had major fuckups that generally involve getting too drunk or high and being a major asshole. i can be self absorbed, brusque, and overly critical. but i’m loyal and i’d consider myself good company. i’ll treat you to dinner, patch your jeans, and clean out your closet. i know how to get bloodstains out of anything. what to get your mom for Christmas. exactly how to scratch your back. i’ve managed to get a few guys to stick around.

i was cheated on and dumped, once, but i’m usually the one to break things off. feelings fizzle, vision clears. you look over at this person and realize you’re just not into it anymore. this comes directly after you realize you aren’t “getting” anything out of this association with this person anymore. you would be better off. you can’t believe you didn’t think of it sooner. this person is no longer building you up (if they ever were), they are draining you. you must save yourself. it is easy to pull the plug and walk away unscathed. with cancer, there is no feeling of “winning”. they are the ones lucky enough to escape. you have cut them loose while you are still plugged in to the wall. you have no collateral; you are undesirable goods. there’s nothing like breaking up bald. can’t even whip my hair to Lizzo. there will be no new Tinder account. the next few weeks will be bleeding hemorrhoids, infusions, yeast infections, and seasonal depression. bad days. days of sitting in bed without perfume or deodorant or pants on. sad country old country songs have been my only respite (at least breakups yield great music). i’m sorry. so sorry, wails a young Brenda Lee. it’s the universal ballad of a rejected woman, answering her suddenly apologetic former lover. you tell me, mistakes—she falters—are part of being young, but that don’t right the wrong that’s been done. he may be sorry for whatever he did, but she is certainly more sorry she didn’t see it coming. i’m sorry. over and over. he’s sorry. they’re always sorry. please accept my apology, but love is blind, and i was too blind to see.

in my post-traumatic googling, i found a blog article on Medium, entitled “50 Percent of Couples Break Up During a Cancer Diagnosis”, and i took the clickbait. the only hard statistics in the article i could cite were more like 21% of couples, for women diagnosed, and 3% of couples, for men diagnosed**. yikes.

“The first two years of our relationship, my tall, athletic body was topped off with long, Barbie-like blonde hair; I looked good in his Porsche. It wasn’t until the threat of my disfigurement and the stripping of my mane, my confidence and my income did his emotional commitment detour,” recounts blogger, Beauty Through The Beast.

i felt that. see, i know i’m no longer any fun. i have been moody and insensitive. i have never felt more unsexy or self-conscious. i am not carefree. i am a constant downer. i can’t hike mountains or fly to europe. but it isn’t strictly the physical stuff. the emotional toll of caring about someone going through a difficult period or a serious illness is huge. it takes a lot of mental and spiritual energy. i am currently a LOT of investment with little return. i am dead weight. i have felt that way for a long time. and i have been sick for a long time. i have not been myself for a long time. i don’t blame him, but i hate that it had to be me. when you’re first diagnosed, everybody appears to be on board. he had promised to come to every chemo. i had my doubts, considering the current long distance (42.9 miles) was already proving difficult for us. i was aware that i would always be the less attractive option, but that didn’t make it hurt any less when the possibility of my company was forfeited in favor of some more appealing plan. cancer can bench you in some people’s lives, waiting your turn while the better players are out on the field. you have no choice but to sit back and watch from the sidelines. and thanks to social media, you have all the highlights and replays you could ever need. the phone calls were almost nonexistent. my mailbox remained empty. we managed to arrange two three-day visits in six months. all of a sudden i was on the receiving end of a very bad lie, brushed aside the way you would your nosy mom or a bad friend. and all i could do was watch the first-string team play.

one of the most difficult things i have had to learn from cancer, is that we are often dispensable in other people’s lives. life goes on without us and the people around us don’t seem to mind, to miss us, to need us. they are the ones who would be better off, who are now putting more into maintaining this relationship than they are getting out of it. you are cut from the varsity team and put on the DL instead. you have all the time to imagine all the things you could have done differently—maybe it was you who pushed them away, perhaps you were being too selfish. you should have tried harder. but then you realize you have fucking cancer, the one thing everyone can seem to agree on. cancer is supposed to be the universal humanizer. it is the nightmare everyone has. cancer is an empathy accelerant. we feel sorry for jerks with cancer, we should be especially distraught when it happens to someone we love. Beauty Through The Beast writes, “Frequently, my partner told me there wasn’t enough time in the day for him to work, exercise and emotionally support me, so he withdrew. Maybe he underestimated the strength and pace needed for the long haul, and needed to ask for support for himself as he tried to handle so much responsibility.” as Warren Buffett is fond of saying, “Only when the tide comes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.”

i knew it was over as soon as my boyfriend went on a ski trip to california, without telling me, having not visited in 5 months. he told me he was with a client (in Detroit) when i tried calling him. according to snapchat, he was in Seattle. he explained that he had kept it a secret because he didn’t want to hurt my feelings, but not concerned enough about hurting me to not do it. when i called to tell him i had cancer, he said he had to get off the phone because he was “hiking in the Alps”. if you’ve been through a breakup, you know that the only true healer is time. eventually, we adapt and forget and move on. emotional pain becomes a distant memory and you are able to look at things with a flat affect. in time, this will all be over. i will be healthy again. in the new season, i will be able to play with the starters. right now i am more concerned with my own team. there will need to be some cuts and a few trades—what do they call it? a rebuilding season? but we’ll be back and better than ever soon enough. for now, my only consolation is at least the dull stomach ache of chemo is indistinguishable to that of heartbreak. i can’t tell the difference.

Well now, just because you think you're so pretty, just because you think you're so hot
Just because you think you've got something that nobody else has got
Yeah, well now, just because you think I'm so lonesome, just because you think I'll be blue
Just because you think I'd be foolish to stay around at home and wait for you

Though you make me spend all my money you laugh and call me old Santa Cause
Well, I'm telling you, honey, I'm through with you, just because, just because

Brenda Lee, “Just Because” 1959

*this has happened multiple times.

**Gender disparity in the rate of partner abandonment in patients with serious medical illness. Glantz MJ1, Chamberlain MC, Liu Q, Hsieh CC, Edwards KR, Van Horn A, Recht L.