In this journal entry, I’d like to share some vulnerable moments from my life, in the form of audio recordings. A couple of the recordings are addressed towards r/GNV, but they are all intended for consumption by anyone interested. I have a variety of reasons for sharing somewhat.. humbling details of my life with the general public, and I hope those reasons will become self-evident as you listen/read your way through this entry.
Without further ado, here is an introduction I recorded the night of December 28th, 2024, when I was feeling hurt but also grounded and optimistic:
Below, you will find the 2 recordings I described in the introduction above. They were recorded the night of December 17th, right after a big fight with Sarah which left me devastated. Over the 11 days between that night and the night I recorded the introduction, Sarah and I rebuilt the powerful yet delicate bond that has always existed and always will exist between us—and then we tested it again.
My phone stopped recording halfway through when I locked the screen. I could have spliced the recordings together, but I figured a single giant recording might be less digestible anyways.
Putting voices with my stories
Here is a recording I took when Vicky and I were fighting back in early 2021, following a bike ride we went on with my dad. At the time of recording, I intended to collect evidence of what an abusive partner Vicky was. She saw me pull out my phone and start recording. I think the recording just shows two humans, stressed out and fighting for their own reasons. I believe those moments are also part of a larger pattern of me being a pushover, failing to set boundaries with people around me, and then transferring the resulting stress to my romantic relationships.
Next, a voicemail from Saphronia that I mentioned directly in my emotional recordings from December 17th. I found it in the Blocked section of my iOS voicemails quite some time after she sent it. Almost 2 years after Saphronia recorded it, Kaley taught me what it feels like to be completely cut off, without warning or remorse, by someone you are intimately attached to.
I wish I had an audio recording of Kaley to share, or perhaps that I could comfortably share her most vulnerable email, but I cannot. Instead, I will share the text from a hidden page on her website that she published on October 21st, 2023:
Sam and Kaley’s 1st Anniversary
Sam,
It’s been a year! We’ve had great times and bad times and everything in between, from the mundane to the extraordinary, and every moment by your side has been better than I could have ever dreamed. As cheesy as it sounds, I feel like you complete me, and I wouldn’t have wanted the past year to have happened with anyone else.
Thank you for always being my rock, my light at the end of the tunnel, and my best friend. I feel so grateful every day to have the chance to grow beside you and with you. You are everything I have ever wanted in a partner, and you help me strive to be everything I have ever wanted in myself. I am constantly finding myself inspired by your desire to change the world and your drive to constantly learn and innovate. You never say “good enough” and leave it at that. You want perfection, and maybe sometimes that is to your detriment, but most of the time, it turns into something incredible.
I have been awestruck by you since we met, learning about your drives and passions, watching you change the world one line of code and one word at a time. I have never believed in anyone the way I believe in your ability to change the world, and I look forward to being by your side the entire time. I have seen you stressed out, I have seen you after you create something, I have seen you angry, I have seen you sad, I have seen you at the top of a mountain, I have seen you focused, I have seen you at peace, I have seen you tired, I have seen you hyper. I have seen you at your lows and at your highs, and what I see is an incredibly beautiful soul, inside and out.
Everything I have ever wanted to do in life feels so much more possible with you. My desires to live sustainably, travel, write, create art, program, and innovate have been met with nothing but encouragement from you, and in a world that isn’t particularly encouraging, that means the world. I can’t wait to see where we end up in another year, individually and together.
Thank you for believing in me every day. You truly are an absolute gem of a person, and I am the luckiest person of all to get to call you my partner.
Wishing us many years of never forgetting where we came from, who we’ve become, and who we want to become.
I love you more than words could ever describe.
Love,
Kaley
And here is an email (not her most vulnerable one) that she wrote ~4 months prior to that anniversary page, but did not send to me until after dumping me at the end of March 2024.
June 30, 2023
Today, you brought it up again. That email, that fateful email.
It has been almost five months since you sent that email.
The email that freed you, that made you feel like you were bringing people closer, that made you feel open and vulnerable.
The email that built relationships, that brought you and Tim closer together, that helped your family to open up about their struggles and to show you that they care.
The email that tore me apart in front of your entire family, your ex-boss, your friends, your ex.
The email that detailed everyone you have dated and had sex with in the past few years, that detailed how you paid a girl that you really liked off because your ex told you to cut her off. That could have been me, being cut off for no good reason. Or if you had balls back then, she could have been me, in your bed, in your heart, in your home.
The email that constantly swirls in my head as reminders of everything that I am not.
I am not an Asian girl with monolids, jet black hair, and impeccable skin.
I am not your type.
I am not slim, and I am not short.
I am not your type.
No matter what you say, no matter how you try to spin it around the idea that you have changed, that you have fought against the selfish, shallow asshole you were in the past, the facts still say the same.
I was not your type.
I am not your type.
I never will be your type.
The reason I’m juxtaposing her email and her anniversary gift to me is because I believe she was forcing herself to say things that she didn’t feel. Grand displays of affection might seem like the pinnacle of romance, but my favorite moments with Kaley were always after we fought and then renewed our trust in each other. Our closest moments.
Closure
I’m thankful that my exes were willing to stick by me as long as they did. They have taught me so much, and I will never forget about them. That said, I let lingering desire for Vicky taint my relationships with Saphronia and Kaley from the start. I’ve recently gone through my phone and deleted years’ worth of photos. I’ve taken a trip down memory lane at least once a month for the past 5 years, and each trip has gotten longer and longer, more and more exhausting, as the thousands of pictures have accumulated. This journal entry is my graveyard of relationships. Time to let the past die.
Looking to the future, I intend to marry Sarah. I want to keep her close and hold her firmly yet gently for the rest of my life. She is no angel, and loving her will not be easy, but if she doesn’t deserve love, than neither do I nor anyone else. I have pondered the human condition at the expense of my own sanity for years, but that simple logic is what keeps me focused on my objective in moments of fear and anguish. I have to grow. I have to love her, warts and all.