I’m not sure if I ever wrote about it on my blog, but there was this issue with a house key that really triggered me once, about 9 months ago. I was newly in love with D, but I would still go back and visit G at the diner just keeping that one thread of connection tied to him. I no longer loved him, but I guess, at that point, I still needed him in a certain way. At any rate, I told him that D and I were in love and then just kind of joked about it (like, “Oh, you didn’t want me anyway…”), trying to make him not feel so bad. We had that kind of relationship where we laughed a lot. But then he went to go give me back my house key as a final act of saying goodbye and severing our ties and the second he did that I went into a panic, like a deer in the headlights. I felt this enormous loss and I said to him, “No! You can never give me back that key. It’s yours. Hold on to it forever.” Then, of course, I ran out of the diner all dramatic, and he ran after me, and quite frankly, I didn’t like the emotional bond we had built within those next few moment, and yet, I still didn’t want my key back. It was then that I realized I wasn’t attached to HIM so much anymore, as I was to the memory of him AND to the part of me that I didn’t want to let go– the love addict part of me that I had known for so many years.
I’ve burned pictures of G, erased old letters, gotten rid of gifts he’s given me. I rarely visit him, when he calls I don’t usually call back. But I will never take back that key. It’s a symbol to me that has very little to do with him. The fact that he holds it is secondary, incidental.
I love my new life, I love D so much deeper than I have ever been able to love any man, but I have odd connections to my past that I have finally made peace with and no longer see as a threat.
Some PoAs will be erased completely, others will not. That’s OK as long as you don’t act on those little nostalgic thought bubbles that pop up from time to time or make those thoughts a central focus of your life. We all must mourn the dead, but there is no benefit in exhuming them 🙂
Girl Rebuilt 
In praise of the last sentance, so well put lady 🙂
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hi
I had the same feelings about explicit pictures i had sent to my POA. I didn’t want him to have them any more but couldn’t stand it when he asked me if I wanted him to delete them. and that happened every time I decided our relationship had to end.
As soon as he said that I’d say ‘No you’ve got to keep them . don’t ever delete them they were acts of love and are yours forever’
I really hope he has deleted them now that it’s over but I still don’t want to know either way. It just hurts too much almost as if he would kill a part of me if he did delete
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