What was Real?

The hardest part of my healing journey has been making sense of what was real and what was not.  It's not the fact that the relationship ended that continues to bother me a year later.  I can accept that part more easily especially with some hindsight showing how it wasn't a good relationship.

But he didn't just end the relationship.  That would have required communication (and some accountability) he wasn't willing or capable of.  Instead he threw a grenade at the entirety of our relationship.  

So I sit here piecing together my memories.  There are a few concrete things I can verify which I greatly appreciate.  Those verified things often match my own memory (despite their contradiction with the stories my ex told last year) which builds back some confidence in my own memory.  There are other things that clearly I got wrong demonstrated by my ex's behavior in the end and some self-reflection of red flags I ignored.  And then there is a lot in the fuzzy middle.

I'm trying to filter some of it through what I learned recently about memory and perception.  If I can reflect on my own world view and also try to put myself into his world view, maybe I can understand how our world views affected our perceptions and find some estimation of reality within.

I want something real to hold onto from these last two decades so I'm not tempted to just block the entire time frame from my mind.  These were significant years of my life that shaped me and taught me lessons.

And I want to understand how that gap between our perceptions got so large so I don't find myself in relationships again that ignore that gap.  I imagine there will always be that gap in any relationship (romantic or platonic).  But when that gap is ignored instead of embraced with curiosity, misunderstandings will be frequent, resentment will build, and connections will fade.