Welcome to Interviews With My Ex-Girlfriend in which Autostraddle writers get back in touch with their ex-girlfriends to ask them Five Simple Questions:

1. How long did we date?
2. Why did we break up?
3. What did you learn from our relationship?
4. What do you miss most about me?
5. Would you invite me to your wedding (why/why not)?

Meg was my second girlfriend and the third major relationship of my twenties. When we met, I was just graduating college, and she was about a year out and just out of a seven-year relationship. Our relationship was intense and immersive, with one of those protracted, bumbling endings where we broke up and got back together, still spending nearly every day with each other, for months.

Suffice to say, Meg and I had a very painful breakup. It took a few years afterward for us to start talking again, and even then a few more years of me being alternatively wary of and heartbroken all over again when talking to her. I ended up moving to Brasil for half a year soon afterward, in part because of heartbreak and in part because I was in my early twenties and I didn’t know what to do with my life.

Eventually, however, time did what it does and while we don’t talk often, I consider us good friends. She’s someone I go to when I need to talk to someone who knows me. A head’s up: Meg and I tend to overlap and talk over each other a lot. It’s a habit of two people in constant competition to get to a joke first (she usually won).

Raquel: Hello! This is not going to be clean, I think. I don’t know. How do you feel about this? How’re you feeling?

Meg: Fine, I feel good.

Raquel: Yeah?

Meg: I feel chill. Are you going to quote me on that?

Raquel: Yes.

Meg: “With a gimlet in her hand, she was feeling quote-unquote ‘chill’…Despite the 100-degree weather…”

Raquel: Should I do like a New Yorker Profile on you? “shaggy-headed and golden-framed…”

Meg: Yeah, exactly, ‘Half-zipped shirt…”

Raquel: “Fiona Apple crawled under the table…and…” Anyway. How long did we date? I think this might be a question under some contention.

Meg: I think it might be. I think in total we dated for like… a year and a month.

Raquel: Okay, I usually say a year and a half, but I might be adding things.

Meg: Well we met at the beginning of April 2012? 2013?

Raquel: I think 2013, because that’s when I graduated.

Meg: Yeah so it was 2013. I met you before you graduated!

Raquel: You did!

Meg: Because I came to your senior show and all your friends were staring at me.

Raquel: Oh god, I forgot about that. I had that awful haircut.

Meg: You were blonde. And I think you were wearing a tie, and I was wearing a Tintin t-shirt.

Raquel: Ha! I love that T-shirt.

Meg: I still have it. Also, that was the first time I met [friend] and she STARED at me. So did all your friends.

Raquel: How did you feel about that?

Meg: It kinda felt good, ’cause I assumed it meant that you’d said good things about me to them, ’cause you were excited. Then I went to the graduation party at your house—

Raquel: Oh God.

Meg: And your ex sat next to you! And I sat at the children’s table.

Raquel: You guys chose where to sit!

Meg: And I built you a really nice wooden box and you rushed it away and then lost it.

Raquel:  Shut up. Okay. First of all, this is not making me look good, but that’s fine. Second of all, you guys relegated yourselves to the garden table.

Meg: Somebody had to sit there, and nobody else was!

Raquel: I’m actually very deeply sad about losing that box. So, a year and a month?

Meg: Yeah.

Raquel: When would you say we broke up?

Meg: When we came back from San Antonio.

Raquel: Okay. I feel like…

Meg: Well we also broke up several times before that. We broke up in January, but that was really brief. And then my birthday was in April, and you got really mad at me…

Raquel: Because you put an arm around me, and an arm around [your ex], and said, ‘”I hope every birthday, I’m flanked by two exes!” Which is very funny, but also so fucked up! Especially because I was still in love with you. So, a year-ish?

Meg: A year-ish, yeah.

Raquel: Okay. Why did we break up?

Meg: You’ve probably been wanting an answer to this for a while!

Raquel: Yes, I would LOVE to know. But do you want to hear my theory before I hear whatever your answer is?

Meg: Yeah!

Raquel: My theory is that I was a fucked-up little ball of angst, and I didn’t know how to deal with that. And you were a fucked-up BIG ball of angst —

Meg: Wait, why am I bigger? Because I’m physically bigger?

Raquel: Because I’m 4’10″ and you are 5’10?

Meg: 10 ½ I think, on a good day. When I’ve been doing yoga.

Raquel: And neither of us quite knew how to get over our respective bullshit, even thought that was a big reason why we were with one another. YOUR way of dealing was to externalize, and my way of dealing was to internalize, and that eventually completely imploded on us. That’s the only answer I’ve got.

Meg: No that’s good! There’s a lot of truth to that, I agree that those things were happening. For me, I didn’t have the maturity — there wasn’t really a concept for either of us to work on ourselves or the relationship. So it just tailspinned, and then my M.O. was just to sabotage and ruin it, because that would be a lot easier than having to be frank about my shittiness. I think that I definitely blamed you. Well, not blamed you, but —

Raquel: Blamed me??

Meg: Not blamed you! But like, I definitely offset a lot of the “who’s crazy” onto you. Not consciously, but —

Raquel: As a self-defense mechanism?

Meg: Yeah. For sure.

Raquel: Interesting. I think I took on a lot more of that than I should have because I was already so prone to believe that I was crazy. That’s only half your fault.

Meg: The fallout started in January, and what sucked is that there was never a lack of love or interest in you, just the inability to keep it healthy.

Raquel: I was convinced you were going to break up with me during that horrile New Year’s on our friend’s farm, do you remember that?

Meg: Oh, god. I definitely said something —

Raquel: You said something that made me die.

Meg: I was under the influence of that horrible guy that was there! Remember? That racist guy who kept saying [awful thing I won’t repeat here]?

Raquel: I forgot. I should’ve punched him in the face.

Meg: And then [friend] and I got in a fight after that because she said I was too hard on him.

Raquel: Everything about that situation was weird and bad. Our relationship was in a bad place, and everyone’s relationship with everyone else was in a bad place, and it was like… why are any of us here??

Meg: (At the same time) Why are any of us here! Yeah!

Raquel: We were also in that weird distant bed and everything felt so disconnected.

Meg: I’m pretty sure the mattress bag was still on the mattress.

Raquel: That was horrible.

Meg: I was just like, I have to get out of here.

(long pause)

Raquel: Okay, next question: what did you learn from our relationship?

Meg: Absolutely nothing.

Raquel: Cool. Next question!

There are not a lot of non-blurry photos of us?

Meg: Okay, I think, outside of things I learned about our interpersonal relationship, I think I learned a lot of interesting and awesome things about design.

Raquel: For the record, I just rolled my eyes.

Meg: I learned how to say some really fun phrases in Portuguese that I still have!

Raquel: Okay, give me something real.

Meg: (mocking voice) Give me something goood!

Raquel: Giiiive me something reaaal!

Meg: I think that the relationship made me aware of how selfish I was. I’d just been in this seven-year relationship where there were no checks and balances on my own behavior.

Raquel: Really? Wow.

Meg: I was just fully enabled, and none of my behavior was questioned. And that’s the relationship I was in from the age of 17 until I was 24, so it’s like I crossed a really important life milestone without actually changing. It wasn’t until we dated — and you were someone who had normal expectations of their partner — that I realized that I needed to change. I’m not saying all of that happened in the span of our relationship, but it definitely was the impetus.

Raquel: I will respond in kind. I learned a lot from our relationship about how much I’m willing to give, to an unhealthy degree, and how little I cared for or paid attention to my own needs and asks, until it hurt so bad that I fucked everything up. I had my own shit of dating when I was 18, being in an emotionally abusive relationship and now knowing what the fuck was going on. So we both were set up to sabotage ourselves in that sense.

Meg: For sure. Also, you were my first girlfriend, and so that—

Raquel: Oh my god! I forgot that!

Meg: For the record, she just did a fist pump. [I did] So I think I was learning how to define myself outside of my previous relationship for the first time, but also was trying to understand who I was and how to express myself as a queer person.

Raquel: Yeah, that’s huge.

Meg: And I…wasn’t great at it. But we had a lot of fun!

Raquel: We definitely did. Um, this segue ways well into: What do you miss most about me?

Meg: Ohhhh. Internet cafe! Where we would literally just lay on the couch on our independent laptops and just share things on the internet! No, not just that. Good question. I wish I could go back to the six months after we broke up, because I missed you a lot, and it was like deep pangs, and I don’t know if I was ever really able to exactly identify anything specific about the origin of the pangs. I think, just having a partner in the very straightforward sense of it: we did everything together, we morphed into liking the same things and the same foods and the same places — or maybe you were pretending? I don’t know.

Raquel: No, I think you introduced me to so much!

Meg: And I would be obscene and you would think that I was really funny! And I would always call you a freak because you were A Freak.

Raquel: Fair.

Meg: I don’t know if that really answers the question. I was looking through my phone earlier today, because I was trying to find an embarrassing picture of the two of us, and I rediscovered our snapchat exchange where you’d send me pictures every day at work in the work mirror and I would send you pictures of where I’d cut myself at work that day —

It was this one.

Raquel: For the record, Meg was a carpenter.

Meg: Where I BLED that day, really.

Raquel: That was when I was at [marketing agency], where YOU got me fired!

Meg: I did not get you fired!

Raquel: Okay, I got myself fired because I would call in sick every Thursday to hang out with you all day.

Meg: That’s true.

Raquel: I was not ready to have a real job, and I haaated that job so much.

Meg: Looking back on the things that were enjoyable and fun, that definitely makes me miss you. For better or worse, I mean, maybe we indulged each other too much, but…

Raquel: Maybe a little! No but you taught me to get drunk on fancy cocktails instead of like, Everclear Punch.

Meg: Four loko.

Raquel: Oh my god, four loko. Not good. I remember when we went to San Antonio the first time —

[Note: I was going to reference a lovely trip we took early on in our dating life, where she took me to a fancy bar called the Brooklynite and plied me with the best whiskey sours I’ve ever had, but my oblique reference derailed into talking about our second trip to San Antonio, where we definitively broke up.]

Meg: Ohhhhhhhhhh

Raquel: Sorry.

Meg: (Sucks air in through her teeth and groans)

Raquel: That was horrible.

Meg: It was horrible for both of us. It was worse for you, but it was definitely bad for both of us…

Raquel: I was just convinced that it meant we were getting back together. Then the sudden realization that it we definitely were NOT was really hard for me.

Meg: I didn’t really even want to go on that trip on the first place! It was a surprise birthday trip with all of my friends like a month after my birthday, and also…

Raquel: Oh, I forgot it was for your birthday!

Meg: Because [friend] felt guilty that she wasn’t there for my birthday so she planned this whole thing and I was just like, this is not the right time…

Raquel: It was so bad.

Meg: I mean, when we got back you left my house and then never contacted me again. And I knew I couldn’t reach out to you.

Raquel: I told you not to talk to me. I don’t know if you remember that, but I told you not to ever speak to me again. Which is not what happened, but—

Meg: This is actually the first time we’ve spoken since!

Raquel: (Laughs) That’s a lie! I will say I spent a year in Brasil painting “Fuck You Meg** Ca****” on every hill I saw.

Meg: Nuh uh!

Raquel:  Not actually…

Meg: Not paint, but like, you know…one can journal. One can journal.

Raquel: Oh yeah, my journals are… (shakes head) I still have them, and I haven’t read them since. I’m literally scared to.

Meg: Oh wow.

Raquel: It was maybe the most depressed I’ve ever been. This is not totally your fault, it was also that I was unmedicated, and I hadn’t realized that I have major depressive disorder which can’t have helped our relationship. A lot of like — Getting the medication! Getting a good therapist! Actually taking care of myself! — Has helped a lot.

Meg: Right. I regret that.

Raquel: It’s hard to say how much of this is me punishing myself, and how much of this is real, but I think you had a lot to deal with, in the unfettered version of me that is not really me that I regret.

Meg: I guess I feel the same way. But in the opposite way.

Raquel: I think that’s growing up, you know?

Meg: Like I would not want to think back to that time and think, yep, still true to exactly how I was.

Raquel: I’m very happy that we were there for each other, because at least for me it was just such a painful part of my life, and you helped a lot with that. You hurt a lot, after, but I think we needed each other for a little bit, and that was important to me. Honestly what I miss the most is the training you gave me on being a bougie-ass bitch.

Meg: More of that! You’re now elevated to way above me.

Raquel: Thank you. No, what I honestly miss the most are just our long conversations on your porch until fucking 2 am or whatever. And any time you’d deign to give me some glimpse of your inner parts, I would jump at it.

Meg: Was that not… very common?

Raquel: No…I’m sorry…no.

Meg: (Laughs)

Raquel: But I tried to be supportive, and then also it meant so much to me because I wanted to know you.

Meg: Yeah. Definitely. I don’t know if that stands true today, I don’t think so.

Raquel: In what way?

Meg: I think I’m a lot more open than I was.

Raquel: I think you are too. I think I am too. That’s part of feeling less broken and vulnerable, in general. Like there’s always still a hidden part, but…

Meg: Yeah, for sure.

Meg:Your answers are a lot better than mine but I think you had time to prepare!

Raquel: Noo! That is not true. I’m just more eloquent than you are.

Meg: Ohhhh!

Raquel: No, that’s not true. Do you have anything else you want to add?

Meg: That I miss? Those beautiful blue eyes…

Raquel: I don’t have blue eyes.

Meg: No, I definitely miss our conversations, for sure. I would second that. Now I just get to read you in 140 characters or less.

Raquel: Ugh, that is not a beautiful version of me. Yeah, I miss our friendship. Not that we’re not friends now, but we don’t have that like — I don’t know. Okay, next question: would you invite me to your wedding? Why or why not?

Meg: That’s a good question, I mean I think that would be a liiiiittle ways out?

Raquel: Yeah.

Meg: If I was having a big wedding and we were still in contact, yeah.

Raquel: Yeah. Same. It’s like a maybe? But also like, probably.

Meg: You would not invite me if you were marrying someone who didn’t like me.

Raquel: I think I would! I think we’d have a conversation, but they would respect my wishes. Obviously not if it was a small wedding, but I’d like to have you at my wedding if we were still friends, and I hope we will be.

Meg: I’d say the same thing, I think. You’re the only ex of mine who other people that I dated didn’t hate.

Raquel: I’m glad I got that on record.

Meg: Every person I date hates all of my exes except for you. It sucks.

Raquel: I weirdly, really like all of the people you’ve dated since me. I mean, I hate that [ex] hurt you but when I met her, I liked her. I don’t know. I want you to succeed.

Meg: Yeah, and everybody you date has liked all your exes except me.

Raquel: Well, I’ve also dated a bunch of dudes, and they didn’t know anything about you, so!

Meg: (Laughs)

Raquel: I went through a period of time when I dated a bunch of developer boys because they were really sweet and smart and it was easy, but I was like, ‘I don’t actually… really…like any of you…’ I’m a bad bisexual!

Ok. Before I end it, any questions?

Meg: No, I think that’s good.

Raquel: Thank you for doing this. I know it’s hard…but I think it will be a good article!

Meg: We’ll see…

Raquel: We’ll see!

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