Pregnant & dumped: Why I’m glad my ex left me
Amy Nickell is a single mum to Freddy, three. Here, she writes an open letter to her ex, who cut off contact when she was two months pregnant…
Dear Matt, I know you decided to close any line of communication, but I wanted to
get in touch just one last time. Mainly, this is a thank you letter. You said that your decision was for all three of us and you were right, it was. Thank you for having the foresight when I didn’t to see that you wouldn’t be necessary.
To fill you in, as we haven’t spoken since I was two months pregnant, when you told me not to contact you again, my pregnancy was horrible, hideous, an emotional car crash of absurd proportions. I hated pretty much every second, convinced my life had collapsed around me.
In those months, I wished for you to text, phone me, ask about me. When I didn’t hear, I would alternate from grieving a loss to anger – indulging in the occasional fantasy of paying for a billboard to tell everyone what you had done. Meanwhile, our mutual friends stuck by you, something I still struggle to accept.
I was lost, convinced I was heading for the death of my career, social life and perky boobs in exchange for the birth of your son. I didn’t want your son, my body felt like a prison, I felt trapped. I’d made a terrible mistake.
We met after you gatecrashed my 23rd birthday. I have a theory that you can be pretty successful in all areas of your life, but sometimes one has to give – my area of shortcoming was, at that time, men. Well, one man anyway – you. We dated for about two months. Before I found out you had a ‘sort of’ girlfriend, who you were ‘sort of’ still seeing. I managed to wake from this temporary insanity of liking you, and realise you weren’t Brad Pitt and start to try my damnedest to detox myself of you. That was in december 2013. By January I was pregnant. You said that at 24 you were too young to be a father, but let’s be realistic, that was an excuse because you were terrified. I was terrified, too.
so I had to move back to Berkhamsted in hertfordshire, the town I grew up in, getting fatter and fatter by the day and feeling like more and more of a failure as the bump grew. My mum had to tell her friends that her daughter was now a single mum, friends who acted all concerned but felt relieved that it was her daughter and not theirs.
up until then, I felt like I’d only ever done stuff to make my parents proud of me – I’d been working as an entertainment presenter for two years and things couldn’t have been going better. I’d just been asked to have that meeting with the new agent – do you remember how excited I was? But suddenly I was the ‘problem child’, who had very much messed up, let them down.
I felt so embarrassed to be so self-indulgent as to actually have a baby. at one point, I considered faking my own miscarriage so that I could change my mind and have an abortion and no one would have to know. a happy news clearblue advert, I wasn’t.
But then my son came and, as he entered my life, the life you’d left for good. I realised that he wasn’t the mistake – you were. I won’t say ‘our’ son because at that moment
‘I considered faking my own miscarriage so I could have an abortion’
‘Freddy’s made me feel totally happy and confident – he has made me feel complete’
he stopped being yours, he’s mine. Thank you for keeping to your decision just as I have mine. oh, and by the way, none of that other bad stuff happened either – my career is actually still going from strength to strength. and my boobs? Well, ok, maybe slightly less perky but that’s a small price to pay. he has changed me in so many ways. he’s made me feel totally happy and confident, something I could never have imagined four years ago when you left me. But most of all, he has made me feel complete.
People say he has my eyes, but I know they are yours. likewise, I know he doesn’t get his sporty side from me. But my son won’t miss you because you were never present. he won’t mourn you because he never knew you. he understands that families come in all shapes and sizes and his is just a tinier bit smaller than most, but with just as much love. love from just one parent and two grandparents because your leaving also left us with another gap on the family tree – I often wonder what your parents think, how they feel about a grandchild they will never meet.
You said you wouldn’t be providing financial support, adding that all your decisions were for the ‘good of the three people involved’. I’ve never pursued you for this because, like I said, he’s not your son. But for the record, having no financial support is definitely only benefitting one of those three people – and it isn’t us.
Freddy is three and a half now, and we haven’t seen you once. apart from that christmas eve two months after I’d given birth – you saw me in that pub, and your vacant stare said everything that needed to be said.
I heard you told someone you would be back when you had sorted yourself out. But you have already missed out on too much to be able to just step into the role you’ve erased. Just like I couldn’t go back on my decision, it’s best that you stick to yours, too.
so, go on with your childless life, the last I heard you were playing football in australia, and we will go on with ours as a family of two. You could have made it three, you decided not to, and that’s the way things will always be. so have no regrets, we don’t. With love, Amy