Hostage

Just when I thought that I knew all there was to know in regards to Jordan and Bertha, the other shoe dropped.

Tuesday, after coming back home from work and the gym, Jordan text-messaged me to say that he had emailed me back tonight, since I had emailed him a few days earlier. He said, "Please understand that this is going to shock you. It isn't bad just explaining some things better." So I text-messaged him back to ask him "Do I really want to read this?", to which he responded "Yes."

So I read the email. In the email, Jordan confessed that he knocked up Bertha back in May, but didn't find out until mid-July. At that point, they decided to stay together for the sake of the baby. Come to find out, Bertha had gotten pregnant to trap Jordan (although he didn't exactly say how she "trapped" him in this fashion considering he's anti-condom).

Recently, due to fights over his faithfulness (although I'm still sure she doesn't know about me), her possessiveness and drug use, she soured on him. She decided to get a late-term abortion and pretty much wanted Jordan to leave her alone. He said that if she doesn't change her mind by the weekend, he's letting it go and letting everyone know he's single again. He didn't want to have a child, he didn't think he was ready for that, considering he still lives at home. At the same time, he said he'd be damned if she would raise his child without him. While the way everything went down was messed up, he said that As far as I'm concerned, he said that he wanted to put everything out on the table so there are no secrets. No matter what happens with us, he wants to be able to see me and spend time with me, and that he will make sure he makes time for me when I come back to town.

So I later talked to him on the telephone. I told him I wasn't surprised because from reading Bertha's webpage, I knew she was pregnant. I just wasn't completely sure it was his. I said to him that I was planning to ask him about it, but I didn't because I didn't think it was my place, and because I wasn't sure if I really wanted to know...but I do know now. I could understand better why he was with her, considering the circumstances. He admitted to me that he met her in December, had started seeing her in March, and they were together on and off. He didn't really feel a connection with her, and she rubbed him the wrong way because right away she was jealous and possessive, and she was on drugs. Furthermore, they had very few of the same interests, and her favorite music is the same music he hates the most (country and rap). However, against his better judgment, he kept seeing her because the sex was really good.

Well, we see how well that worked...

Anyway, so we stayed on the phone for about an hour and talked a while. It was good to talk about things, whether it was about the situation with Bertha, about us, or about interests and life. It reminded me as to why I like Jordan in the first place. Even though on paper he seems so not a match for me, when we're together, whether on the phone or in person, we are just so right. It's the kind of thing I know can't be duplicated.

So since Tuesday, I've had a chance to think through everything, and take note of some developments. Bertha and Jordan have gone back and forth online the past couple of days talking about how much they love each other, yada yada, which makes me wonder what Bertha is ultimately going to do in regards to the baby and their relationship.

On one hand, I commend Jordan for wanting to stay with her for the sake of the baby, but at the same time I wonder if, considering the fact that they have such a volatile relationship, it's a really bad idea. I really think he needs to grow some balls and make some decisions regardless of those that Bertha makes. He's being taken hostage by her instability. And I feel like I'm being taken hostage by his indecisiveness.

Jordan and Bertha's relationship is like watching a really bad train wreck in slow motion.

I also have a sneaking suspicion concerning the situation, of which I don't have evidence of except for an understanding of male-female relations and human nature...as well as from my experience with silly females from in and around Detroit:-).

It dawned on me yesterday as I was talking to one of my best friends. Here are some things to consider: Bertha is very possessive and smothering (which is clear even on her webpage) towards Jordan, and then she turns around all of a sudden and says she wants to have an abortion and cut ties with him? On top of that, practically speaking, she is in her fifth month of pregnancy. It is very difficult to find a doctor that will perform a late-term abortion. In addition, she is always talking about in her messages to him how "horny" she is. But usually women don't get their super-libido until the last trimester of pregnancy. She is a big girl, too...a really big girl. I know from personal experience that many big women don't have regular periods (amenorrhea), so conceivably she wouldn't have to take that week per month to not have sex because of menstruation.

I'm wondering if she may have trapped Jordan, but not in the way he suspects. I wonder if she had invented the pregnancy so that Jordan would not leave her, because she had to know that he wasn't as interested in her as she was in him. Considering that he was continuing to sleep with her, but would not claim her as his girlfriend, would make it pretty clear to anyone, naive or not, what his intentions with her truly were. She may have been hoping that if they continued to have sex unprotected, he would get her pregnant for real. However, by the fifth month, with no pregnancy, this strategy becomes untenable and she has to find a way out. The easy way out would just to claim a miscarriage. However, considering Bertha's penchant for the dramatic, going down in a blaze of glory may seem more exciting to her.

I don't know, it's only speculation, but to be honest I don't think I will completely believe there is a real baby involved unless or until I actually see a real baby.

This whole situation seems like a good case study for the darkness of human nature, particularly the depths to which people go due to the emotions of desperation and selfishness. I also notice that even my own feelings denote a degree of less-than-noble intent. Deep inside the dark reaches of my heart, I do wish that Jordan and Bertha would break up so he could be with me. This is the first time I've really felt this kind of connection with anyone, and I don't want to lose that. At the same time, there is another part of me that knows that Jordan is, in a sense, trying to do the right thing, and I can't fault him for that at all. I do want for him to get his life together, because it is a mess and being with me isn't going to fix the things that are broken.

I told him, against every fiber of my being, that if Bertha goes through with the abortion, and they break up, he needed to be by himself for a while and not worry about dating or women. That was hard, because I would so love for him to run to me, and try to make a long-distance relationship work. But it may not be the best thing for him to rebound into something else given the seriousness and gravity of the current situation. And while I feel selfish about it, and this situation is killing me, I can't be self-serving and still be able to look in the mirror.

I wish that Bertha would just do what she's going to do and not drag Jordan through changes. I wish that Jordan had a backbone. But my wishing isn't going to change the situation. I am really considering taking a break from it all until everything is settled and I truly know what I'm dealing with.