On Learning to Forgive Myself
Finding peace after my former partner’s suicide
Recently, I was watching Eat, Pray, Love… yes, I know.
But a scene resonated with me differently this time than it had the last time I watched the movie.
It was the scene where Richard from Texas tells Liz about how he almost ran over his son. He tells her that she must forgive herself for leaving her ex.
This year marks 25 years since my ex took his own life.
In front of me, no less.
For many years, I suppressed what happened.
I wanted to believe that the nightmares were wrong and that he was still out there somewhere.
But he isn’t. And I knew that.
I blamed myself.
I felt like I should have known, that I should have picked up on some signal that something was wrong.
But as my therapists have told me many times, sometimes there is no signal.
So I started writing a book called Until We Meet Again, based on a screenplay I had written with the same name.
I think that, through writing the book and screenplay, I slowly gave myself permission to move forward.
It isn’t that I haven’t dated since he died. I have. But the relationships often felt less fulfilling, or I found myself constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I was afraid to let someone in because I knew what it felt like to lose someone.
So I wrote parts of the story the way I wished our story had gone.
Where he came back. Where we got married. Where he made fun of our mutual friends’ thighs again.
I wrote the future we never got to have.
And somewhere along the way, I said goodbye in my own way, through words.
Because sometimes we can write down the things we can’t say out loud.
Like how I still break down in tears, even 25 years later.
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How losing a partner to suicide can leave you feeling so broken that you sabotage future relationships, or choose relationships that feel emotionally safe because you’re terrified of being hurt again.
How you can spend years blaming yourself for something you could never have controlled.
So, in a way, I forgave myself.
I didn’t get to attend his funeral.
So I made my own peace with the loss.
I held a small memorial of my own, where I said the things that needed to be said.
Things like how sorry I was that I hadn’t seen what he was going through.
How I didn’t understand the cultural pressures he was under.
And I think those of us who have been through something like this understand what that feels like. The endless questions. The wondering whether we could have done something differently. The guilt that stays with us long after the person is gone.
In that sense, I am both Richard from Texas and Liz.
I am someone who wants to be loved. Someone who wants to feel fulfilled. Someone who wants permission to be happy.
But for a long time, I stunted my own emotional growth because I was terrified that if I let someone in, I might lose them, too.
And maybe that is what I needed to forgive myself for.
Not for what happened 25 years ago.
But for all the years afterward when I struggled to give myself permission to live fully.
I’m no longer afraid to try.
I’m ready for a future where my happiness matters.
Where I can love someone without constantly anticipating the loss.
Where I can acknowledge the things that happened without allowing them to dictate everything that happens next.
I will always wish things had turned out differently. I will always wish he were still here.
Learning to forgive myself doesn’t change any of that.
But it does mean that I can finally allow myself to be happy.
And perhaps that is what it means to move forward.
Not forgetting the person you lost. Not pretending that the pain never happened.
But accepting that you, too, deserve happiness and a future.
