This isn't the Love Boat

The butterflies. Those damn butterflies. Nothing seems to be quite as exciting as your first love. Your heart always seems to have a hole from that piece that you gave them. It's something you will never get back. Even if you find that true love later on, you always remember your first love and it still has some kind of meaning to you. I found mine at 16. Now, before I start the story I will warn you this may be a little lengthy. You might want to go get some snacks and a drink. Oh and maybe take a potty break. 

Ok, you ready??

My longest relationship was with Captain Douchebag. I love this name. I even had this in my phone when I used to have his number. It gave me a laugh when he would text me. I really couldn't tell you how we met, and I'm really not kidding. He couldn't either. We tried to think of it and for some reason there is this void in our minds about how we came across one another. I'm sure that my family has heard different stories from him and I on it and I really don't think they meshed with the others' story. We also both have different opinions when it comes to how long we were actually together. He says two and a half years and I say a little over three. I think I am right, but what do I know? I still don't know if I was just really persuasive or just annoyed my mom to her breaking point because I am not sure how she let me go on a date with him. He was 22 and I was 16. I guess it was similar to Aqua man, but I dunno. In the beginning, the relationship really wasn't supposed to progress all that far. He was going to be going to boot camp for the Air Force in two months so he wasn't wanting to get attached. It seems like we were meant to spend the time we did together because his leave date kept getting pushed back time and time again. By the time that he actually left to boot camp we had been together for a year and a half. 
The Captain was a looker, I will admit. There were some people that actually asked me if he was gay because he was that metro. One of my gay friends I worked with actually checked him out. We were folding some shirts and he came up to me and made a comment about the guy walking in the store. I just laughed and said, "That's Captain Douchebag." I don't think I had ever seen him blush so much. He had come to my house a little while later and the Captain was there and told me, "Don't you ever tell him I thought he was hot. It might make him feel weird". It wasn't the first time it happened.  My aunt asked me once if he waxed his eyebrows. Yeah, I dunno. I don't think so? He also had these stories he would tell. At the time I thought his big fish stories were endearing, but now they just drive me nuts. There were so many times that family and friends would ask me if he was really telling the truth or not. *Shrugs* Your guess is as good as mine. There were very few stories that I could actually confirm the authenticity of, but most of them I still don't know. On top of telling ridiculous big fish stories, he was a know it all. Even if I knew for a fact that I was right it didn't matter. I was wrong. There were so many times that I wanted to punch him in the face. He also had terrible taste in tattoos. Tribal. That's all I will say about that one.
 
I'm going to save you a lot of boring details and fast forward a bit to when he leaves for boot camp. Like I said, by this time we were together for a year and a half. Before he left he decided that he wanted to propose. You read that right. PROPOSE. I was so excited when it happened and so happy. I felt like I was living my own fairy tale and getting my happy ending. I remember a conversation with my sister and I had told her about the engagement. The way I heard the conversation was, "You're too young. Blah blah blah. Go to college. Blah blah blah. What are you thinking? Blah blah blah." Sorry, sis. I get what you meant now, but I was kind of being dumb back then. Captain finally ships out and I am starting my senior year, and I am engaged. Not only was this my first serious boyfriend, but I was engaged. Did I mention I was engaged?! Yeah, I started freaking out. I played it cool though and tried to deal with it. He came home sooner than expected because he got hurt in boot camp and couldn't finish. Shortly after he came home is when things started falling apart. Things felt different between us, I felt different and I knew he felt different but he wouldn't come out and say it. 

In a last ditch effort to save what we had, I told him to still plan on coming to Lava Hot Springs with us for our annual camping trip. Worst. Idea. Ever. That was the worst camping trip I have ever been on in my life. Almost the entire trip he barely talked to me, barely touched me, and just acted like an ass. When he finally did reach out to touch me it was because he wanted to stop being an ass and get some ass instead. Then he got mad at me when I called him out on it. He turned away from me and started acting like a two year old and gave me the silent treatment. I dealt with a lot of insecurities when I was dating him and he knew this. We had gotten matching shirts (Not on purpose. I bought it for him for his birthday and I liked it and wanted one for sleeping in) and they were both the same size. I had gotten in the tent and changed into my shirt and next thing I know he freaks out. "You are wearing my shirt! You are going to stretch it out!" For those of you that knew me at this time I was on the heavy side, which was why I was insecure. I simply thought that he was referring to by boobs but he said, "No, your arms are going to stretch out the sleeves." Fuck you, dude. I may have been chubby but my arms weren't bigger than yours. 


That wasn't even the worst of it. He ran into some people later on that he knew from work and when I came up to him to let him know that dinner was ready he looked at me like my face was melting or something. Not only that, I was introduced as a "friend". We hadn't broken up yet! We got rained out and had to come home early from the trip and we saved the majority of the alcohol for the last night. So add in all the asshole things he had done on the trip, his shitty attitude, and the "friend" comment then mix that with Tequila and Jager. I don't remember a lot of the night, but I remember finding out that he hacked my email and messenger accounts and periodically checked my phone. I got taken to my aunt's house even though he tried to get me to stay. I wandered into my her house all snotty from bawling, drunk off my ass only to be greeted by my other aunt that was staying over as well. The reason this is so significant? She is one of my VERY Mormon aunts. Her comment? "Is she drunk?" Yes, yes I was. I lost a shoe and it took me a day to remember where I left my glasses. I couldn't even eat a piece of toast the next day. It wasn't pretty. Luckily, he blacked out almost as bad as I did so we couldn't really talk about what happened because neither of us remembered. That fateful day is when things ended with us. I decided that we needed to separate and that I needed to go out and live a little. I couldn't deal with being engaged and I just felt like I needed to do other things at the time. If maybe we had met a couple years later things would have worked out differently, but that's not how things happened. 

Part of me wishes that I could say things ended with us here, but I can't. About a year after we broke up we started talking again. He started talking to me on Facebook and we were friends for a while before I got put on his permanent block list. I may have been on the block list, but that was just so I couldn't stalk him and call him out on shit that he failed to mention to me. (Like having a girlfriend but trying to get me to let him come over and "hang out".) I also want to say that he is the one that always starts talking to me again. He could never tell me why, but something always brought him back.
 

 I don't want to bore you so I am actually going to split this up into two posts. Mostly because the most ridiculous stuff that happened with him was after we broke up. Save some snacks and soda for next time, kiddos.