I walked down the sweeping stairs of a gorgeous modern home with my heart in my throat and a weight being lifted off my shoulders. It felt so right, but I wondered, why did I feel so sad and as if my future has just disappeared right in front of me? I walked into the room where my friends had gathered and I pulled the diamond ring off my left hand to place it on the desk in front of me. “It’s over, we broke up, I am no longer getting married” with no tears at all. They said they were sorry in the most comforting way possible, but what I couldn’t see at the time was how happy they were for me.

I had spent the past year and half dating and being engaged to a boy that I thought was good for me at the time, but a relationship I should have never entered into.

We had known each other for years, having attended the same bible camp as teens and having the same mutual friends, it seemed rather natural that we would start dating. However, we started dating with the intention of getting married and that was the worst way to begin our relationship. Before we had gone on an official date or even decided if we were a good fit together, we had committed ourselves to each other. This of course was a product of the community that we were brought up in and believed we were doing the right thing.

Our first year together went quite well. We laughed a lot, took road trips all over and spent many night talking under moonlit skies before jumping into the car to find a cliff to watch the sun rise from. He supported me emotionally while I attended college and I supported him through the roller coaster of his health. We dreamed together and made plans for our future, and most definitely discussed our wedding.

Almost a year to the day when we had the discussion that we’re in this for life we took a road trip to our favourite beach, and there under a cloudy warm summer day, he got down on his knee and proposed.

I remember the whole world fading away, except for one man just behind us smiling and my then boyfriend eagerly awaiting my response. In a split second my heart and head had a discussion. My heart was screaming “NO! No! No, don’t do this!” My head, however, responded very calmly “Of course you’ll say yes, you said you were starting this relationship to become married, of course it’s yes”.

I said yes and we hugged and kissed, laughing at the wonderfulness of our future together. He drove me home to the house on a hill that I shared with four other girls. I hid the news from from my roommates for days, and I honestly can’t remember when I called my parents. I do remember my parents not being surprised, since he had asked them for permission, but they had asked us to a wait another year before tying the knot. I don’t really remember them being overly happy about the news.

Within days of us getting engaged our relationship started to breakdown.

We fought constantly about our expectations of the other. He made endless comments about how I dressed, suggesting at one time that I dressed like Brittany Spears from the early 2000’s. I couldn’t understand this as I was constantly in jeans and a t-shirt, never wore shorts, and had just purchased my first bikini to wear on the hammock in my back yard – I couldn’t imagine wearing it in public. I was very self conscious of my body.

One evening in the dead of the night, parked in a dark lot at the edge of a beach, we were in the midst of another argument. We yelled, we screamed, we both threw tantrums feeling like the other wasn’t listening. Suddenly he tells me he can’t deal with it anymore, opens the car door and walks toward the beach till I can’t see his silhouette against the light from a beach home. I sit there, with tears streaming down my face wondering what I did to cause him such pain? I began thinking of ways to make him happy in an attempt to fix us. Then suddenly, I realized that he walked away and left me abandoned in his car alone without keys and with no cellphone coverage. I decided I didn’t deserve to be treated this way, and walked away from the car without a note.

I walked down a dark street until I knew I’d have cellphone coverage again and called my roommate who I knew would come get me without asking any questions and without judgement. Little did I know she would ask questions, and once I was home my roommates sat me down and tried ever so gently to tell me how the relationship I was in was toxic.

At the time I didn’t see how damaged I had become or the damage I was causing him by continuing in the relationship. I was depressed, I made excuses for his behaviour, I allowed myself to be emotionally and mentally abused because we had said we were in this relationship forever. To me it was a promise I couldn’t break. The community that I surrounded myself in, I believed that if I broke it off it would be like I was divorcing him and I’d be forever looked at as a sinner.

However, my roommates saw it and knew I couldn’t help myself, so one of them did something behind my back that forever changed the course of my life.

She called my mom.

She told my mom the whole story and everything that she saw going on between us, everything that I couldn’t see and wouldn’t see. She explained how much I had changed and how I was not the person I once was or should be. She told my mom that she needed to come and get me then take me home.

That day my roommate rescued me from a relationship that would have left me miserable and utterly unhappy.

Two months later, when I called to tell him I would be late arriving at his place, he told me to not bother coming. At first I thought he meant that weekend, as if me missing the ferry had upset him. And then he tells me that he doesn’t know who I am anymore and doesn’t believe we should get married. I ask why. I ask what can I do to fix it. I say everything you can imagine to stay together, believing I have to do everything to make him happy again. In the end nothing would do, and I say “okay”.

Surprisingly, there were no tears. Just a complete understanding. The tears, however, came days later when I realized how much of myself I had poured into our relationship, how much of I had given up and given away, how I felt like my future no longer existed because it only existed in him.

As I told my friends that is was over I remember my heart feeling so much joy, but not being able to explain it at the time. I was finally free to begin living a life full of happiness and that day, a broken engagement and leaving an unhealthy relationship, set me on the path to discovering what truly makes me happy.