Under My Skin

There is a phrase in these messages that changed the way I understood a lot of what happened:

“I tried to get under your skin.”

At first, I asked what that even meant.

Now I understand it quite clearly.

To get under someone’s skin means to deliberately irritate them. To bother them. To provoke an emotional response. And in this case, the message actually explains the reason: because he believed I cared about someone, he intentionally used that person to get a reaction from me.

That matters.

Because there is a significant difference between accidentally hurting someone and admitting that hurting, upsetting, or provoking them was part of the objective.

And eventually, I did break down.

I cried. I apologized. I questioned myself. I asked for help.

But I wasn’t asking someone to help me “change the bad parts of me,” as it was later characterized. I was desperately trying to figure out what I needed to say, change, acknowledge, or apologize for to make the hurtful behavior stop.

There is a difference between accountability and surrender.

At that point, I thought perhaps if I apologized enough, explained myself better, admitted enough faults, or accepted everyone else’s version of me, peace would finally arrive.

It didn’t.

Instead, even my apologies became something else to judge. They weren’t sincere enough. They weren’t complete enough. I hadn’t acknowledged enough. There was always another indictment waiting behind the previous one.

And eventually my thinking changed.

I started thinking: If everyone else believes it is acceptable to publicly criticize, mock, provoke, discuss, or humiliate a former friend or partner, why am I apparently the only person who isn’t allowed to respond in kind?

That wasn’t necessarily my healthiest conclusion. But it was a human one.

And looking back, the bigger realization isn’t about who said the cruelest thing or who won an argument.

It’s much simpler.

Someone told me plainly that they had tried to get under my skin.

Then, when I reacted to what was intentionally designed to provoke a reaction, my reaction became further evidence of what was supposedly wrong with me.

That’s the part I couldn’t see while I was inside it.

I can see it now.

And perhaps the most important question isn’t why I eventually reacted.

It’s this:

My apology wasn’t good enough. Their apology is nonexistent.

Why would I want to remain close to someone who admits they were intentionally trying to get under my skin in the first place?