To whomever may notice.

I have decided not to keep playing this game any more.
I have been in pain for a while, because I will never be enough to make any one person happy.
I feel like I am nothing, because I lack a full-time job, because I worked my ass off at Uni for three years, survived some of the most horrid things a person can go through and still not managed to stick down a full time job.

I used to believe that love was all a person needs, and deep down I still do believe that, but I feel that I am lacking that of late. I'm watching people fall apart over trivial things like not being able to afford the next games console. People aren't aware of how lucky they have it. Throughout every relationship, be it friendship, or romance, I have noticed that people flit and avoid me when I am poor. Why is this? Do I not make for a good companion, do I not make for a good friend when I lack money? Is the only reason anyone would befriend me for the sake of what is in my wallet? Do my partners get so sick of paying for dates they just refuse to stick around? If anyone knew me well enough, they would know I don't care much for money. Every argument I have ever had with a partner has been about their attitude, or their behaviour towards me, never about what's in their wallet. The only thing I can think is that these people believe that personal growth can only come from having money. That is bullshit. The best type of growth comes from having nothing material, because that way they truly appreciate what it is that means the most.

Please note, I am not referring to my current relationship (my hero really does deserve the title of partner because he puts my needs up there with his own, not beneath him), but I had an ex that I was engaged to. He had a lot more money than me, a hell of a lot more, even after bills and food, and travel and things like that. But time, and time again, he always blew it on technology. He always convinced himself that everything from new surround sound speakers to a PS4 was an 'investment'. He would call himself a 'nerd' and tell me that these things come first. He would spend hours arguing with people online if they disagreed with him on a game. I don't just mean tedious debates, or even internet trolling, I mean full  blown took-it-to-heart that people didn't agree with him. He once screamed at me, and cried because I said I didn't care which people preferred- the xbox one or the PS4. I pointed out that there is world hunger and countless of wars going on, and things happening in our own politics, so a games console isn't really something worth giving a shit about. He once threw a hissy fit because his grand laptop broke, and his 3 grand gaming pc just wasn't enough. I can understand the frustration of things breaking (I tear up over my computer breaking sometimes) but when someone has an alternative it really is dramatic to break down over something like that. He watched me give up my hobbies, my passions, my talents even all so that I would have the time to do his laundry, cook his food (that he rarely ate) and try to pick up as many hours as I could at work to pay the food bills, toiletries, etc. His hobbies were always more important than mine, and yet MY hobbies were free. The best hobbies always are. I didn't need money to sing, I didn't need money to go for walks, I didn't need money to read or draw, and yet I still gave them up. He once promised to buy me a passport, so that I could follow my dream of going to Japan (to work over there, might I add, not to piss around on a holiday), he spent the money on an SD card. He promised to take me to Wales, and spent the money on a graphics card. He promised to get me a recording interface and spent the money on something else for his computer. Every time it was Christmas, it was always about how HE wanted to buy HIMSELF something. Surely, if you're gonna do Christmas for the sake of gifts, it's about what you buy OTHERS and not what you buy yourself! He spent all his money on himself, and couldn't afford his family a present. He couldn't afford the train fair to see his family, I had to dish that out too.I spent about 10 pound less on his parents' presents than on my own, and he got angry demanding I spend more money on his mother, and that all he was asking was to 'borrow £50' off me, and he'd 'pay me back'. Yet I'd borrowed the equivalent of 600 to him and never got it back. During the time we were just dating, and not committed, I'd saved up £60 to spend on travel for his dissertation. Unbeknownst to me, he'd blown all his money on things like sweets, energy drinks, and tech. I assumed he'd spent it all on much needed bills. And I figured that his dreams were important so I paid towards them, despite the fact that I was signing on at the time, and it was costing me £20 each time just to go and see him. When you receive only £50 a week on benefit handouts, you'll see it was quite a struggle for me. I often went without proper food, just so he could have things like sweets and fizzy pop. I later found out that he was deferring his academic year, and that the money that was reserved specifically for his dissertation was spend on more sweets and shit like that. He never ate proper food, it was always crap.

I know that this is seeming to just be a rant, but I think it's important to get it off my chest. In our early stages of our relationship, probably by the 4th week or something I discovered that he'd been texting his ex, telling her that he missed her, right on our second date. I also discovered that he'd been flirting with an old flame of his, 'joking' about sleeping with her up until about the 6th month, and then later issues arose from that because he refused to delete her, claiming she was a good friend. He didn't care how crap it made me feel, her 'friendship' meant more to him. I remember never being able to watch any TV show that I liked, he'd leave the room if I did, yet, he was always able to somehow force me to watch TV shows he liked, even if they made me cry with boredom. Quite a few times he bullied me into playing a game with him, and he would shout at me and being quite physical with the controls and things. I would sit there crying and try to leave and he'd always push me back telling me that I'd enjoy the game soon enough. When I stayed at his, he never left the house for anything besides to buy sweets, and then it was always at nighttime. I got really ill, because I saw no sunlight, and needless to say my depression came back and I lost the fight in me, I stopped trying to fight for my own happiness. He was eventually diagnosed with anxiety because the doctors got fed up of him coming in with indigestion brought on by eating shit like sweets. They started to put it down to an eating disorder, and maybe he did have anxiety. I can't say for sure tbh. But he was given pills and at first things were good, he wasn't as selfish, and he was eating better, and I started feeling good about myself again. But then he stopped taking them, and then when he was given them again, he kept 'losing' them. His mum blamed me for anxiety, despite the fact that the doctor had said right infront of her, that he'd been showing signs of it for years. She still blamed me. It put a lot of pressure on me to be everyone's saviour.

Don't get me wrong, he used to buy me dresses or vegetarian sweets sometimes, but he would always spend more money on himself. Not that that should matter, but when there are more important things to be bought, like proper food, or bills to be paid off, stuff like sweets and dresses mean bugger all. Especially when they're thrown around as some sort of amazing feat. Something terrible had happened to me before him and it had led me to doing something 'stupid', I think you can all work out what I'm talking about (but I don't want to influence any young readers). But the thing that had happened to me, he kept parading it around telling everyone of his friends about it, making out he was some kind of hero for still being with me. He used to pester me for sex, telling me he can't be in a sexless relationship. But it is not a relationship unless you can go without sex. A true relationship is the ability to be best friends and get through anything. I did not desire him sexually because he was so skinny, and immature, and quite selfish. I was still with him believing that the person I believed I'd met would come back to the surface eventually (little did I know that the person that I met never really existed, it was an act). I ended up spending £50 on protein powder because he got dangerously thin and claimed to never have the energy to go out of the house for anything besides going to the pub to drink (but only if I paid).  A few times he yelled at me for tipping the waiter because they were guys, he got angry with me for donating food to the foodbank instead of spending money on buying him sweets. He got angry that I started to put money aside to buy myself a passport. Being stuck in a loveless relationship made me even more determined to run away to Japan. Everything he'd promised he'd get for me, or do for me never happened, he was always too selfish. Things like going to Wales or to Japan, we could have done together, but he would have always have picked doing something on his own (like playing games, or going the cinema- he went on his own a lot) over doing something together. Our arguments weren't typical arguments, they were full on screaming fits. Horrible, scary things where I felt like I had no way to bite back. I hate swearing, and I hate screaming, and unfortunately everything I hate about arguing I've started to do now out of fear over how I was treated by him.

We'd been arguing towards the final breakdown of the relationship over me hanging out with my friends. I'd started going swimming and going on day trips with my friends, he'd always been invited but never wanted to go because it would mean not playing Assassins Creed or some shit like that. He accused me of having an affair, because I was having more fun with my mates (both were male) than I was with him. Of course I was having more fun, they were actually doing things with their lives, they were actually there for me when shit hit the fan. They listened to my problems, they didn't just zone me out and then play a video game. I'd recently lost my job whereas my ex had decided to walk out on his because he decided he just didn't want to do it anymore, with no back up, or anything. They actually cared. I was not having an affair but I think a part of me wanted me to be, just so I could have shoved it in his face that he would lose me if he didn't grow up. But as it was he did lose me, not to another man, but to myself. I started to love myself again, and I started to argue back, I started acting and singing again, and I stopped doing his laundry and doing his cooking. A man can provide when he needs to, even if it's just for himself. But he was a boy, and incapable but I wasn't going to play his second mother anymore. The last few arguments we had were over him wanting kids. He wanted kids to prove his Dad wrong. One hundred percent the wrong reason to have kids! He wanted kids to make it easier to get benefits, need I point out how wrong that is?! He wanted kids because he thought they would make him grow up. It was at that point where I realised, I don't want kids. Not just that I don't want kids (because I don't think any person is really sure until they're in that financial, loving setting to do be able to do so) but more to the point -  I realised I didn't want kids with him. Ever. There was no chance of me having children with him, when I would always have to be more of a mother to him than I would be to my own kids. 

I didn't bother stopping him when he walked out on me that night, I remember I didn't eat anything that evening. But I pushed through and went out with my mates, I pretended to be okay. I didn't cry, or anything. I thought I was broke if I'm honest. I hadn't cried for ages, not even when we'd been arguing, I'd just got angry and stone faced. I think through feeling no happiness, I was unable to feel sadness either. I just felt empty, I guess. It took the three months of being single (though we had stupidly kept in touch due to him promising to 'change') for me to start feeling happy again, and then it hit me, and I cried, and I cried and I thought I'd never stop. Part of it was out of relief, a  part of it was out of me feeling stupid, and a part of it was due to the friendships I'd lost out of it all. Some of the reason why I cried though was because he'd taken a load of my things with him and were using it as leverage to get me back. The things he'd taken were sentimental to me, they'd been gifts or represented a significant part of my life. I didn't miss them because they were objects, I missed them because of their history.  I managed to get a new job, and I met someone new really quickly. Some may say I didn't give myself enough alone/single time before getting someone else. But I didn't chose to meet and fall  in love with the person  I met, it just happened. You can't put a time scale on these things, or fit them into a specific plan. Anything that makes you happy can't be decided when it'll fit into your life plan, it happens as a suprise out of the blue. Sometimes, I get scared because I'm not used to being with someone who treats me so well. He doesn't just take me to new places and spend money on me, and go for walks and put me before tech and sweets. But he's there emotionally as well, he'll listen to me, he won't swear or call me fat, or insult my looks in any manner. Even when we argue, it just gets emotional, it doesn't get aggressive. It's a million times better. He's stuck by me even whilst my ex has been sending me messages, blackmailing me and trying to bully me into contacting him. It takes a man to still stand by someone when there's still so much shit going on in that person's life. Sometimes, it hurts to know that I mustn't have really loved my ex after all, but in my defence how can you love someone who didn't even exist? If all that person was was an act then they were never real enough to be loved in the first place. I finally feel okay enough to start wanting my dreams again. I feel comfortable enough to hope, and to feel happy. Because I know that even if I didn't have a penny to my name, my dreams would still be supported, I would always be looked after because of the person that I am. The person I'm with now sees me for me, he recognises me aspirations, my talents, my insecurities, my fears and he looks after me. He makes sure I get home safe, and he talks to me every day, he doesn't ignore me for a video game. He cares about me, and for once I feel safe enough to believe in love, and to believe in hope, and happiness and all that gooey, gay stuff.

Many people like my ex are way too obsessed with material possessions and money. Sure, money may pay your hospital bills, money may pay for your travel, video games may make for entertainment. But when it comes down to the real issues in life, the heartbreakingly devastating disasters, who is it that is here for a person? It's family, it's friends, it's love. A 20 pound crisp note is not going to hold your hand should you enter a coma, a couple of quid is not going to be what it takes to keep fighting for your life. You will not have flashbacks of all the money in your savings, you will have flashbacks of the people you love. The people that make going to work worth going for. The real reason a person lives is because of love. Even those who are alone find gratitude with finding something to love, be it a cat, or a child they've adopted via a charity over the phone. People need love to feel worth something. If people didn't live for love, if love wasn't everything then why would people hurt when those they love hurt? Even those that blot out the pain with buying objects must still realise that love is what comes first. Love for yourself if love for another isn't attainable due to anxiety or fear.

I remember looking at The People of New York movement (a thing where a photographer goes around NY taking pictures and microblogging about stranger's lives), and I saw a fair few amount of entries about homeless people. People who had no money at all to their name, no material obsessions, but had the biggest smile on their face. They were happy, and one of the men photographed was quoted as saying that he'd come from a rich background and after having a family member murdered over an inheritance he took to the streets, and that he's not been happier since. Another had always been poor, going between jobs, but had found happiness in the birds he plays with in the park and the stray dog he decided to keep as his own. Another man had been living on the streets since leaving prison, he'd spent so long living inside that he was taking happiness in finally being free. These are the people that inspire me, because they don't have what some people would think is 'everything'. They have so little belongings and they have no money to their name, and yet they still love, and they still find a reason to smile everyday. They make the best out of what most of us would think is an horrific situation, and I think we could all take a leaf out of their books. Especially when we're having a self pitying moment.

I think what I'm trying to say is too many people push out their anger, and emotions on something like money. They're never quite facing the deep rooted issues that are going on. It's easier to yell and scream about money - because it's the one evil thing we all have in common. But to open up and communicate about a matter that doesn't affect everyone, that is so unusual or so painful that it's hard to put into words is just too difficult for many people to do. So money becomes an emotional scapegoat, it's easier to cry about money than it is about life in general. Money is often the physical scape goat too, it allows for a physical escape from problems. But running away from life, either physically or emotionally isn't going to help, it's going to do more damage in the long run.

So this is me, clarifying to myself, and the rest of the world, but most of all to myself, that I am not going to run away. I am going to face this pain that I am in, I'm not going to switch it off only for it crash around me later on in life. I am going to cry as many tears as I need to, I am going to scream, to shout, to scribble aggressively on paper, and have as many arguments as it takes. Because the issues that are bothering me could happen to anyone. And I am not alone. And neither are any of you. I am a fighter, and I  am strong, and I am not going to play this game of blaming everything but the actual issue. I am going to face this. Because I have everything that anyone ever really needs, I have love.