He wasn’t the quiet type.
He talked. A lot.
Explained. Apologized. Defended.
He didn’t shut down — he stormed in.
Over-explained. Over-asked. Over-reacted. Over-loved.
He didn’t stop talking.
He stopped listening.
Stopped holding space.
Stopped hearing what she was actually trying to say beneath the silence.
And that’s when she started to drift.
He didn’t notice it at first.
Because they were still in the same house. Still talking. Still parenting. Still making plans.
But emotionally, she was already slipping away.
She didn’t explode.
She receded — like a Snail pulling into her shell, not to disappear forever, but to protect what was still tender inside her.
And he, in his panic, did what he always did:
He became a Thunderstorm — Fast. Intense. Loud with love. But also chaotic, anxious, emotionally ungrounded.
He came in thundering with a storm — not to destroy, but to protect the love he didn’t know how to hold gently.
He thought being there meant saying more, doing more, fixing harder.
He tried to repair every symptom — without first understanding the root pain.
And even worse, he started involving others — family, well-meaning support — not to pressure her, but to help her feel safe again.
But what he saw as support… She experienced as pressure.
She felt like she was being put on trial — not held. Examined — not embraced.
She wasn’t withdrawing because she didn’t care. She was withdrawing because she was tired.
Tired of trying to explain her feelings to someone who was always “there,” but never truly still.
And him?- He didn’t realize until much later:
“I was trying so hard to hold you,
I became the storm you needed shelter from.
I was so afraid of losing you,
I never stopped to ask how safe you felt staying.”
Looking back now, he sees the pattern.
He came in louder, faster, more emotional — thundering with a storm.
She curled in quieter, softer, more distant — like a snail retreating into her shell, not out of anger, but to protect what still hurt.
And somewhere between the thunder and the silence, they lost each other.
Now, after the storm has passed… He’s learning what love actually needed to be all along:
Not more effort. Not more volume. Not more “doing.”
Just more presence. More listening. More stillness. More safety.
And if she ever reads him again —
he’s not asking for another chance. He’s not performing change. He just wants her to know:
“I see now.
Not just what happened — but what you felt.
And I’m not trying to rescue anything.
I’m just becoming the kind of peace
I should’ve been back then.”
Because sometimes,
We don’t lose people through absence. We lose them by never learning how to be present in the way they needed most.
And now, finally — he’s learning how.
