I Stalked His Facebook Page

 

When we snoop, we have to be prepared for whatever we find. I think we may consciously be looking for that which we hope we won’t see. It’s a thin line between hoping we find something of interest, at the same time hoping we won’t.

Facebook is a wonderfully accessible place to dig for dirt or what we may or may not hope to see. I’ve found my boyfriend’s ex girlfriends’ photos out of a morbid curiosity about who preceded me in his life. I’m not sure about what the exact motivation was there, but those of you who have done this know. You just wanna “see”. And when you’ve “seen”, nothing changes.

I very briefly dated a man last year whom I thought was going to be “it”. He was handsome, educated, gainfully employed, funny and sweet. He also had a very handicapped accessible apartment which I was finding out was going to be an important factor for me going forward in my dating life. He even showed me the shower his adult Downs syndrome son uses, explaining that it might be good for me with my disability. I “fell” awfully hard for “Tom”. I believed we were going to have a future together. It was all wine and roses until I slept with him.

He texted me the next day that “You’re lovely, but not the lovely I’m looking for.” I am so naive that I convinced myself he should have known that before he invited me to spend the night in his bed. I have slowly improved at being able to see other people’s point of view as making complete sense even when it makes no sense to me. Still working on that.

I started to wonder whether Tom had found the “lovely he was looking for”. He certainly had a lot going for him. So I checked Facebook to see if there were any clues about his social life. I decided I would be an adult and give him the benefit of the doubt and not assume a lack of photos on his Facebook meant he had no social life. We aren’t teenagers, after all. Mostly I saw evidence of what a great father he was to his disabled son.

I also very clearly saw how he was right to cast me aside as someone who would not fit into their lives. The hurt I felt back when this happened was transformed into a sense of relief and peace about things turning out as they should.