What doesn't kill you makes you...hurt like heck!

Tonight I had a friend call me and she was very upset. She is hurting so badly that she could not even think and to be honest, I believe she was in a state of shock. It wasn't a physical hurt but an emotional hurt. Let me give you some background...
My friend is in a really bad relationship, the kind you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy. She is 'stuck' in that relationship due to financial reasons and I honestly believe that right now, there is no way out for her. She is doing everything possible to get out of it however. This last year has been a very turbulent and painful year for her. She met this person, a person that she absolutely fell head over heels for but, didn't see a way to have a relationship with this man because of the state of her own situation plus, she wasn't sure if this man felt the same way she did. Anyway, she ended up moving away from this man, and then finding out that he felt the same, or he indicated that he did. So, here she was, miles from this man, feeling as if he was her knight in shining armor and not knowing how in the world to get back to him. He as all she thought about. He was everything she dreamed of. So, she put a plan in motion, get a job, save some money and get out of the current relationship, move back to the area she had left and start a 'real' relationship with this man. She believed that he felt the same and was going to wait for her, meantime, they would have an 'email' relationship. Apparently, he didn't feel the same. She told me that he told her never to write him again, that the "rollercoaster world" she lived in was too painful to him and he needed something 'real'. My friends' whole world came crashing down, again, in 2 lines of an email.
The thing is, she told me that he was right, that her life was a rollercoaster! She has been recently diagnosed with 2 magor illnesses and has been fighting those, she lost her job, and is in this awful relationship that she is desperatly fighting to get out of. This other man was her lifeline I think, her hope for a better future and her last final belief in love, that love really does exist. She has now lost that last bit of hope she was clinging to and her self esteem, gone, totally and unquestionably gone. She told me that she understood that this other man could not possibly love someone like her, she had too much baggage, was too fat, too old and too sick. How could she ever have believed that he would wait for her? She said that she had put unrealistic expectations on their relationship, that she had not meant to but, that she had. She believed that the only way to keep their relationship alive and well was to communicate thru email since that was all she had. She had told him her thoughts. She emailed him but, he never really had the time to email her back and she constantly told me that he was just too busy with drama in his own life. I told her that should have been a clue. She agreed. I told her that life IS a rollercoaster! Some days are up and some are not! Sometimes we all expect too much. Sometimes we all say things we don't really mean in the heat of the moment or even do things we wished we never did but, that is how human beings are! I told her that if it had really been love, he would have 'talked' to her and not simply emailed her a 'Dear Jane' email. That, of course, is the easy way out. I told her that I believe that he did not have the love level she did nor the committment level that she did and yes, she did put too many expectations on him. She thought he was the most awesome man she had ever met, that he was funny, intelligent and gorgeous! I told her well, then he sounds too good to be true. Then she said, yeah, I guess he was. I built him up and there was no where for him to go but down. She said she just regrets that he didn't care enough to talk to her about his concerns or anything else. I agreed, that was sad and perhaps, he gave up just too easily on something really special.
Ah well, I believe that my friend will heal in time. I don't believe however that she will trust again and maybe, just maybe, she will never let her heart get away from her again but, she will live. After all, a broken heart may hurt worse than the physical abuse she lives with but, it won't kill her......
Mental out