Just Like The Movies

“If stars don’t align, if it doesn’t stop time, if you cant see the sign, wait for it.. If its not like the movies, well that’s how it should be.” An 18 year old me is at home, laying on my bed with the blinds closed, likely hungover with my head buried deep in my pillow, tracksuit on and listening to a broken hearted Katy Perry sing her heart out to a crowd in Brazil as part of her Part Of Me tour. As the music got my attention I rolled over to watch, as I did I listened to every lyric, I agreed with every word. She sang with tears in her eyes “Just like the movies, that’s how it should be.”

Although, it would be safe to say my obsession with romance and falling in love started way before my 18th birthday. It has been programmed into many of us (especially girls) from a really young age with all the Disney films and the happily ever afters. It’s taken me exactly 10 years from that moment and multiple heartbreaks to realise that life is in fact nothing like the movies. I’ve always been a “relationship person” and I think I’ve pretty much endured it all — narcissistic boyfriends, boyfriends with addiction problems, cheating boyfriends, lying boyfriends, poncing boyfriends (and believe me, the list goes on. I know I know, I know how to pick ‘em).

I suppose you could say life is like the movies but I do believe we are currently in the wrong genre, just like a horror movie would be more fitting right now.

Like young Natalie in the film “Isn’t it romantic” I grew up watching all the classics . Pretty Woman, Titanic, Dirty Dancing, The Notebook etc. In almost all of these films the lead male role always steps up or comes back to fight for the girl. I mean didn’t we all wish we were Baby in that Dirty Dancing scene where Patrick Swayze comes back and stands up to her father before they do that epic dance scene, you know, the “Nobody puts baby in the corner” moment, I mean wow. What a man! That would never happen now. I think the most us girls get is an “I’m outside” text, they don’t even knock on the door anymore and they park up the road, when they’ve decided they have no other/better plans and they want to see you for one night before going back to ignoring you, so you lie to your parents or your friends who already disapprove and leave the house pretending your seeing your girlfriends or just popping out but you’re really going to see the guy who, by the way, isn’t shit. Then you’ll spend the next week or two regretting it, go out get drunk and send regrettable drunk texts hoping they will prove you wrong but as you sober up the next day you realise you are being ghosted again. Two weeks and six tubs of (dairy free in my case) Ben and Jerrys later you start to realise you are better than that and just as you get your confidence back the “What you up to?” text comes through again. The vicious circle.

I have never experienced the man fighting for you scenario in my ten years of relationships. Although if that Dirty Dancing scene did happen in real life I imagine the ballsy young man would be greeted with a “You fucking what son?” from the girls father and a thump round the face, especially in Essex where I live anyway. But then again, the boy coming back to fight for you probably wouldn’t be a loving, kind, salsa dancing hunk like Johnny Castle so fair play, Dad.

Anyway the point is, the men in these movies always come back, realise their mistakes and sweep the girl off her feet and then they live happily ever after. So unlike young Natalie in the film “Isn’t It Romantic” who grew up thinking that it was a ridiculous concept that a man and falling in love could save you from your misery I believed it was the only thing that mattered, the only thing that would make me happy. As Julia Roberts famously says in response to Richard Gere’s offer of a condo and him funding her life, which sounds very appealing right now and to be honest I cant say I would turn that down at the moment, it simply is not enough for her, she responds only saying

“I want the fairytale.”

Now, I’m older and a little bit wiser I’m actually thinking “COME ON JULIA, ARE YOU EFFING SERIOUS!! You’re a prostitute for gods sake, take the condo and sort out the fairytale shit later.”

But no, what she said made perfect sense to me at the time. That’s also what I wanted and that’s what I expected. Nothing less. Absolutely no exceptions. Maybe I had set myself up with unrealistic expectation of men but at one point I really thought I had found it. I was on cloud nine, an absolute whirlwind, my soulmate, my other half. I had finally found it, everything I had been searching for. I felt like I could breathe a huge sigh of relief knowing that fairytale’s are real and I had proved everyone who doubted me wrong. But sadly, our little cloud soon became part of a huge storm that I had not anticipated. And no matter how strong you think you are together there are simply some storms you cannot weather. There’s always going to be good days and bad days, I know that and I’m not totally deluded but I guess its just a matter of how far both of you are willing to go to save what you have. If you both aren’t on the same page about that then you are pretty much doomed and with my unrealistic expectation of what I believed to be true love it all came as a bit of a shock. I knew it looked ideal from the outside, the real deal... But was it enough for people on the outside to just think it was perfect? No. Was I doing a good thing just giving people hope thinking that this picture perfect romance did exist because that’s what I wanted to believe? Maybe. Did I carry on pretending everything was perfect even though for the best part of six months I knew my world could fall apart at any minute? Yes. I didn’t want to face the truth, neither of us did. Don’t get me wrong, for a moment in time it was perfect and I will cherish that because it was special but life happens and when the bubble finally burst, to be completely honest I felt humiliated and very foolish. Should I have seen this coming?

I was embarrassed. More than embarrassed. I was mortified. I’d failed at the one thing I was sure I would succeed at. The amount of messages I received saying “but you looked so happy together” was unbelievable. It just shows that Instagram is not real life and sadly Romcoms are not real life either. If something looks too good to be true then it probably is so never compare your life to something you see in films or peoples pictures on Instagram because what is happening behind the scenes is likely to be a very different story. I wanted the fairytale so much that I was willing to put up with and over look some serious issues in many of my relationships, not just my last one but ultimately I was the one who always ended up disappointed.

Not only did I have to deal with heartbreak and cancelling my dream fairytale wedding but the realisation that everything I had grown up believing had been, to put it quite frankly, a big fat lie. What I’ve learnt in the months after this happened is that I never really knew who I was as a person and I had never had to deal with it before because there was always someone there to catch me if I fell and distract me from myself . After the initial heartbreak, shock and days spent drinking and crying I started to put myself out there more. I learnt that I don’t need to with someone else in order to define myself or have self worth. I made new friends and reconnected with old ones, I started to cook more, I became closer with my family, I tried new things, I felt and still feel totally fearless, I have absolutely nothing to lose. Its liberating. I have started writing more and the most important one of all is I’ve been learning to love myself again. I’m finally getting my confidence back.

You can reach a point where you think you are not worthy of peoples kindness, you put yourself down and wonder if life will ever return to ‘normal’ but I am hoping this gives a bit of hope to some people who cant see the light at the end of the tunnel at the moment. Learning to love myself, with all my faults has been hard but the people that truly know you and love you for who are will stick around and they are the only ones that matter.

So now I find myself at 29 years old having to start over and I am genuinely truly happy about it. I’m not bitter and I’m pleased to say I am on good terms with most of my exes, I wish them all nothing but happiness. Every experience is a lesson learnt and they have turned me into the person I am today, my experiences have set me on a completely new path of self discovery, so, instead of mourning what I thought my life was going to be I am now excited to see where this new path will take me. It’s exciting.

It’s taken me a good few months and two months of counselling to reach this mindset and some days are still tough but at the end of the day, we are all only human. We can all only do our best. I’m single for the first time in my life since I was sixteen years old and have never really experienced dating and to be honest I’m not entirely sure what the rules are these days. I am making a conscious effort to stay single, enjoy myself and (once this Covid madness is over) I will take opportunities with work, throw myself into my acting classes and travel as much as possible. I’m ashamed to say that previously I would have declined any opportunities presented to me as I’ve always had someone else to consider and I tend to put that person on a pedestal and disregard every other aspect of my life, which looking back now is totally ridiculous. NEVER be the girl who didn’t go to Paris, thanks for that lesson, Lauren Conrad.

Even doing writing this is a huge thing for me. But the beauty of being single is you have absolutely no one to answer to. I have decided to put myself first and not jump straight back in to another relationship as I have a sneaky suspicion that may be where I have been going wrong. I’m still going to date but what will be will be. I have been on a couple of dates after friends recommended dating apps which by the way I find totally overwhelming but I already have some pretty interesting and hilarious stories to tell. So over the next few months to a year, if I can last that long being single, I will be documenting some experiences, talking about heartbreak, answering questions, dating horror stories, what to do/what not to do and just general life and modern day romance advice (if you can call it that).Its all for a light hearted bit of fun and a good read in these uncertain times.

I’ll always be a sucker for a love story and I will always be a romantic at heart, it’s part of who I am but falling in love is not at the top of my list right now. I’m ready to fall in love with life again. With all that being said I’m still open to dating but even if a man doesn’t pull up outside my house hanging out the top of a limousine clutching a dozen red roses screaming my name then eventually facing his lifetime fear of heights to get to me and kiss me I guess I should still give him a chance because right now I’d take real life over the movies any day.