My May December Romance

Many people have expressed fascination and curiosity regarding my relationship with R., wondering how we met, how we fell in love, and how we make a relationship with a near 30-year-age difference work. I don't mind these questions, of course--having a mere 20-year-age difference would be unusual, but the age gap between me and my significant other is practically unheard of. Perhaps people are surprised when they find out that our relationship is the deepest romantically I've ever had in my life, the most stable, and the most loving. We are deeply committed to one another, deeply in love, and in the latter stages of his life and near middle-age of mine, we are grateful that we have finally found our soulmate, something some people will never have.

My significant other is exactly four months older--to the day--than my mother. When we first met over a decade ago, he was standing in the electronics department of a Kmart, rolled up shirt sleeves, against a backdrop of what little electronics the closing store had. He tells me he still remembers what he first noticed about me--my thick eyeliner and my black hair; he apparently was instantly attracted to me. Back then I hadn't met my now ex-husband, and I had just quit my job working as a research assistant for a retired Duke professor. I had assumed eventually I would go back to school and get my master's degree, but at the time I had bills to pay, and I took the first job to which I applied and knew I would be hired. It was to be a fateful decision.

My personality was completely different back then: I still struggled with depression and borderline personality disorder, but I wasn't reclusive--in fact I went out with so many friends so often that I was rarely home alone at all. I hadn't yet started to drink. The Brightleaf District was still alive, and I was seen every weekend in and out of boutiques and my favorite coffee shop, arm-in-arm with my father, dressed to the nines. Back then the thing that shocked my friends the most was that I had recently cut off several feet of hair, losing my signature bouffant that I had worn for years. I actually answered the door and responded to calls and texts from friends--many of them from R. I had been in a relationship with a very troubled individual--and my new friendship with R. was a welcome respite from the abuse I was experiencing at home. I liked him immensely. Then the Kmart closed in January of 2012. R. and I decided to meet at Northgate Mall, the last mall in Durham that we both had so many memories of since South Square had closed nearly a decade earlier when I was a senior in high school.

R. was quieter back then, more reserved; to be honest I was almost certain he didn't like me, or at least was secretly annoyed at what must have been an eye-opening experience meeting someone with borderline personality disorder for the first time. I was always too much of everything: I was too open with my feelings, I was too emotional, I was too depressed when I was sad, and too excited when something made me happy. But yet he always talked to me. And now we both sat near one another, meeting each other again for the first time since the store had closed. He really liked me, he said, but he knew I had a boyfriend. He was lonely. I was shocked, and a little sad. We embraced. I don't remember exactly what I said, but I remember trying to convince him that if I weren't already in a relationship I'd definitely go out with him on a date. 

Here's something about people with borderline personality disorder--for the majority of us, if you give us any type of positive attention, we will latch onto you. Nearly immediately, instantly, and very passionately. I knew then he liked me. And it was everything I needed. He suddenly became nearly everything I thought about. My boyfriend suddenly became less and less important to me. A month later in February of 2012 I started working at Sears, a logical transfer since Sears and Kmart had merged earlier to form one company. R. did not. I met someone new: my now ex-husband, whom I liked nearly instantly and with whom I was smitten due to his blond hair and blue eyes. He was four years older than I was. I quickly left my then-boyfriend for him. Several weeks after we started dating I remember getting into an argument with him--I don't remember now what it was about, but I remember messaging R. on Facebook telling him that I really liked him and wanted to see him. His response, however, wasn't what I was expecting. I was too young for him, he said, although he did care about me. It would be best if we didn't talk to one another anymore. I was devastated and bewildered. I quickly deleted him from my friends' list and my contacts in my phone. Several years later, I ended up marrying my now ex-husband.

I've written before about my divorce, but I don't feel comfortable writing about why our marriage eventually fell apart. Suffice it to say it was doomed to fail nearly from the start, our underlying problems exacerbated by the fact that I had become an alcoholic. The abusive boyfriend I had dated while I was at Kmart got me hooked onto that--years later, my ongoing struggle with addiction is a lasting reminder of the poor choices I often make in relationships. Our marriage started to fall apart, and I increasingly relied on the support of friends and family, especially my close friendship with M., who was at the time the most important person in my life outside of my parents. Then several years ago on New Years' Day I received a text from a number I didn't recognize wishing me a Happy New Year. I was confused. Happy New Years, I said, and then, embarrassed that I didn't recognize the number, asked a favor: Send me a selfie! The person responded that he didn't know what a selfie was--I guessed then it was someone older. You know, I said, send me a picture of you. Several minutes later I received a picture of someone I hadn't seen in a longtime--it was R. Suddenly it was as if what had happened years ago no longer existed. I had missed his friendship. We decided to meet at a restaurant in the Brightleaf District that I had frequented since I was a young teenager. I had to squeeze in the date, however, after my weekly outing with my father at our favorite coffee shop. That was an appointment that, even after twenty years, I never missed.

"Who are you seeing?" my father asked.  "R.," I said. "We used to work together at Kmart," I reminded him. It was freezing cold, and I was wearing a jacket over a dress I had picked out hoping R. would like it. I left the coffee shop and walked the half block to the restaurant, getting there several minutes early like I always did. Then I saw him, and ran up to him to hug him. It was so good to see him again. That day was the rekindling of a close friendship in which he slowly became the most important person in my world again. 

When I finally left my now ex-husband a year and a half ago, two things were certain: one, that R. and I were soulmates and had fallen in love, and two, we wanted to spend the rest of our lives with one another as husband and wife. I had finally found the love of my life. The problem? I will be with him for the rest of his life, but he won't be there for the rest of mine.  I will be widowed long before I should be. And it is something that haunts me. Both of us have lived troubled if not lonely lives--we have friends, to be sure, but neither one of us has really fit in, never really followed the paths that most people find themselves on in life. He dropped out of college to become a musician, and then was a bachelor for the majority of his adult life. I excelled in school, once I myself had dropped out of college twice due to ongoing struggles with mental illness before graduating first in my class with a degree in social work. But then? Then I became an addict. And I've never really been the same since. 

Aside from the happiness that our relationship has brought us, there's a latent anger there that he and I rarely discuss because of how painful it is. After everything he and I have experienced in our lives, why only meet now? Or, perhaps at the outset--why couldn't we have been the same age? We will soon be married, but unlike many couples who are starting out on the journey that is marriage there will be no children. We will most likely never have a house and a yard. There will be no fiftieth anniversary. At the risk of sounding pessimistic, sometimes I can't help but think he and I are holding hands and jumping off of a cliff into a fate that is inevitable--he is getting older, and someday I will most likely die alone. It isn't fair. 

He has asked me on more than one occasion why I'm still here--why not marry someone with whom I'll have more of a "normal" future? The answer for me is so very obvious--there's no one else on earth with whom I'd rather be. I've never had someone who loved me so selflessly, completely--despite all of my faults and struggles with addiction--he's never asked me to be more than who I am. It can't be easy for him: addiction aside, I am mentally unwell and unstable. On more than one night I have kept him awake with my crying, with my utter despair over whatever the crisis of the day is, with my complete lack of any emotional coping skills whatsoever. I am keenly aware he deserves so much better than me. He deserves so much better than the constant ups and downs of my depression, of my personality disorder that manifests itself into irrational jealousy, fear of abandonment, deep depression and my exhausting never-ending quest for love despite his repeated assurances that I have it completely. I love R. as best as I know how--but I openly admit I can be unkind, emotionally manipulative, possessive and jealous over other women I know are less troubled than I, angry, sarcastic, and cynical. But he fell in love with me anyways. Whenever I'm in a new relationship I always wonder if they really know what they're getting into--and how many would continue if they knew how very bad things with me can get. R. admitted to me recently that when he fell in love with me he wasn't aware of just how deeply troubled I was. I asked him the same question he posed to me--why is he still here? He said because he was in love with me, and that he has loved me more than any other woman he's ever been with. Maybe someday I'll get better. Until then it's just...he and I, doing the best we can.

He and I routinely leave each other love notes expressing our deep love and commitment to one another; we've saved every single one of them, and they're currently taking up not a small amount of space on our refrigerator, bookshelf and kitchen table, a kitchen table that is nearly always adorned with a bouquet of my favorite flowers, yellow carnations that I discover when I inevitably come home to an empty apartment as he works the mid-evening shift at work. "What's the occasion?" I always text him. "I love you," he always responds.

R. is still asleep now as I write this. Every morning I go back into the bedroom where he's still asleep, and wrap my arms around him, removing the pillow he habitually puts over his head every night to keep out the light from a poorly-placed street lamp just outside of our second story apartment window.  And then I always run my hand over his face and kiss him, telling him I love him. He inevitably wakes up then and kisses my hand, responding he loves me, too. It's something we've done every morning for as long as I can remember, even if the last words to each other were spoken the night before in anger, or as often in his unfortunate case, emotional exhaustion. Love is an emotion that throughout my life has been offered to me and then taken back, often in violent and confusing situations. But R. has demonstrated time and time again that his love for me is unconditional, and that he's in it with me for the long haul, until one of us inevitably passes away someday. Until then I can honestly say I've never been happier. I've never been treated so well--treated like I matter, that I'm worth something, and that despite my flaws deep down inside he knows I'm a good--if not tragically hurt--individual. Sometimes we just hold one another, and I usually ask him what he's feeling in the moment--"I'm just happy," he always says. "You've made me so very happy." And how very happy he's made me.