He Ghosted Me And I’m A Better Person For It

I will tell you the story of this guy who wooed me religiously day and night for five months. He claimed I was the best thing that happened to him, professed his desire to settle down, then invited me to meet up after six months of talking. Three days before the trip we spoke to finalize plans and when we were done he excused himself to take a nap. It’s a new year. He hasn’t woken up yet.

My relationship history could be a novel. The most mind blowing things happen to me and I barely share. One guy professed his love to me, the same week he was to walk down the aisle. Another begged me for a relationship but conveniently left out the fact that his ex, was a backup plan. Then there was the overtly clingy one that’d lock me in a room and threaten to swallow detergent if I left. All of these experiences were undoubtedly nastier than that of nap guy, yet, he left a more lasting impact and I’ll tell you why.

There are a lot of things that are peculiar to me. I am a hopeless romantic, I’m somewhat prudent, I trust a lot, I forgive easily and I am extremely stubborn. When I met nap guy, I had gone through 5 cycles of unpleasant situations, back to back. I may not have known a lot of things but I was sure of two.

A guy would say anything to get into your pants
On no account should your standards be compromised

Here’s the thing though. I didn’t really know what my standards were so when a good looking guy who seemed responsible and ambitious walked into the picture saying all the right things and giving me the attention I thought I needed, I was quick to engage with him. I’m not an expert but in my brief run around with guys, I’ve come to learn a couple of truths that weed the good guys from the time wasters. 

Tell him you’re abstaining. If you’re not, tell him you believe in building intimacy over the course of several months before attempting anything physical. Or just point blank, ask him what his plans with you are.

I started out with this first two and was excited to see nap guy stay fervent in his pursuit until I dropped the last bomb. I got radio silence, the proverbial ghosting, and my heart broke. Over the next couple of weeks, I was a mess. I sent long messages, crafted apologies, I asked questions, blamed myself, recreated memories but never for once could fathom how someone who seemingly cared a lot for me would shut the whole thing down to avoid answering one question- the “What are We?”. I couldn’t believe or accept that he ghosted me without cause, so I blamed myself more and went on a desperate spree to try and fix things. In the fourth week, after lots of cake, 3 bottles of wine and a binge of the entire Prison Break. I decided it was time to get my act together.

The person I was killing myself over was living their best life elsewhere and it was only this hurtful to me because I had self-projected my idea of what could be into what we were. 

I stopped lazying about. I wiped my tears, counted my losses, put my head back into my project and praised God. When I was confident that I had got my feelings in check, I reached out to him again and we reconnected. Things weren’t as intense as it had been before but there was something.

Much as I cared for him, whenever he professed his feelings, I stopped to remind myself of the importance of not taking words to heart. I recollected the dump I had just come from and was reminded that I owed myself that much to not return back there. A couple of weeks into our conversations, he invited me for a meet up. It was an extremely exciting step for both of us, given what we I had just been through and we expressed that. Three days before the trip, after finalizing plans on one of our conversations, he excused himself to take a nap. He is yet to wake up. 

A couple of days after the incident, I took a moment to think about what had just happened. What it would have meant for me had I not made a conscious effort to choose me, to prioritize my sanity, and to take his words with a grain of salt. This seemingly simple act could have sent me down to the dumps for the second time.

In the past, I’ve had a lot of nasty situations with guys whom I may have made out to be the fuck boy. I never share them but I’m sharing nap guy’s story because, believe it or not, my experience with him was extremely fundamental to my growth as a woman.

I do not see him as a bad guy. I see him as someone who was either unsure of what he wanted or knew for certain what he did not want but lacked the courage to communicate that to me. And that’s okay.

The burden wasn’t on him to give me what I wanted, the burden was on me to not allow him to waste a minute of my precious time until he proved beyond doubt that he was worth it.

This is something we tend to take for granted. We rely on words alone, we imagine futures before they happen, we make heavy compromises to make the other person comfortable because we crave companionship. Then, we become bitter when we don’t get that in return. The question shouldn’t be “Why did they hurt me?”, it should be “Why did I let them hurt me?”. People do things for selfish reasons and the only way to prevent yourself from getting lost in the fog is to be selfish for yourself.

My big sister gave me a piece of advice once. She said, “every man that comes into your life is a potential time-waster”. Think about it. If you have four men talking to you right now, only one or none will stand the test of time. So rather than spend your days wondering when he’d text you, why not apply that time to something rewarding like work or school. If 5 months later, he proves to be worth it, great. If not, you won’t be bothered or as hurt, because you spent that time being productive anyway.

My experience with nap guy was an eye-opener because it shed light on a trend that I was unaware of, one so many women are also guilty of – the tendency to exert time and energy on relationships that weren’t there. I was giving more than I was receiving, fantasizing situation-ships and constantly being short-changed. When I began to expend all that energy on myself, I became a better, stronger person in all aspects of my life. I was intentional about my choices and I took back my power from frivolously hurtful situations such that, when they happened my reaction was laughter. In all honesty, it was very empowering to be able to look back after he ghosted me and say “Woah if this had happened a while ago I would definitely have been rolling in tears, thank god for growth”.

Here’s some truth, in your lifetime, you will definitely encounter a couple nap guys. People will let you down, people would give you less than what you put in, people will short change you. The fact that someone doesn’t give you what you want doesn’t make them a bad person. It doesn’t always mean they intentionally set out to toss you around. However, it is up to you, whether or not you get tossed around. A random person cannot waste your time if you don’t give it to them in the first place.

My take away from this to women is simple and I hope it is clear as day:

Prioritize yourself

Prioritize your career

Prioritize your goals

When you do this a couple of things begin to happen:

1. You start to become a better version of yourself.
2. You experience a happiness that is not dependent on a person or thing.
3. You become more intentional about who and what you allocate your time to.
4. You’re automatically excluded from unnecessarily traumatizing situations (hurt where?)
5. You reclaim your power

Have you experienced ghosting before? Do you agree with my take on the situation? Let me know in the comment section.