Is there an expiration date on human interaction?

As I come to the end of a long term relationship, yet again, I have to ask myself...Is there an expiration date on human interaction? Is there always a point in the relationship where one person can refuse to grow with the other? I think back and wonder when that point was and was there a sign that only I could see. I was stagnant and becoming miserable. I needed someone to help me grow, encourage me to step outside my comfort zone. Challenge me. Tell me I can fly if I wanted to. I think about all the turning points in my life and the few moments that were important to me. Each time I thought about these amazing times in my life they were all litered with a fight or argument on why in the world I would want to partake in that event. I wonder if I was growing too fast or if he was just too scared to grow himself. Either way we didn't compliment each other. We didn't push each other to be different. We fought for our right to stay the same. To have the other person agree that the way we were was just fine and that we didn't need to change who we were. But I needed to change! I needed to feel excitement. To know that I was more than just a stagnant bowl of water sitting there waiting on something that would never come because I wasn't willing to let change happen. I was scared to let go. I was scared to see what would or could happen to this person I had loved for years if I was to change without him. I worried and worried about what would happen to him while completely neglecting myself. I never once thought what would happen to me if I stayed in this relationship just to keep misery company.

How do you break up with that person? Do you blame them? Do you yell at them because you believe in your heart the reason it had to end was because they weren't willing to grow? This is a person you've been able to get to know in and out. The person you trusted to be there for you through thick and thin. You have so many feelings for them, anger, love, concern. How do you express all of these without hurting the other person? I have tried many different approaches to ending relationships that I knew would never amount to what they could because one or both people were not willing to admit their hangups. None of my approaches ever seem to work. There is always that one person who will say anything to keep you with them as long as they can. Misery does love company and when you have been that company for so long it becomes hard to escape that lifestyle. How do you just say no and walk away? Is it ever that easy to just say no and walk away?

I knew in my heart it was wrong to hold on to something I was no longer willing to work at either, but letting go was hard. Building up the courage to walk away from something stagnant and to walk towards something new and unknown was very hard. But all of a sudden I can breathe deeply again without choking and questioning my actions. A new life is waiting for me to grab ahold of it and do what I please. No questions to be asked. No questions to be answered.

What a great feeling to know the world is yours to do with what you please, and to actually finally believe you can.


So I guess to answer my question "Is there an expiration date on human interaction?" Only if you create one yourself.

Till my next crisis.....
Abby