Unfortunately, he has always been a jerk, but you never let yourself see it, being enamored by his captivating looks and personality.
You were so caught up in his looks or in how he made you feel.
This kept you from seeing the signs that he was a jerk beneath it all.
Predictably, you didn’t acknowledge the moment that he was rude to his friend, or he swore at a driver who casually entered his lane while signaling.
You didn’t acknowledge it when he made cruel fun of someone he didn’t know, getting a nice laugh out of it.
Regrettably, you laughed along with him.
On several occasions he insulted you underhandedly, but quickly covered it up by giving you a compliment.
You chose to ignore the underhanded insult, focusing on his compliment instead.
When he showed up late for a date and didn’t give you a genuine apology, you let it go.
When he cancelled on a date and didn’t bother to let you know until you were forced to text him to find out what happened, you let it go.
As human beings, we are emotionally blinded when we intensely like someone.
You were giving excuses for his bad behavior and you didn’t realize that you were.
So caught up in how attractive he was or how he made you feel, you refused to look at the numerous clues of his bad behavior that he left in his wake.
He is being a jerk now, but the truth is, he was a jerk before you ever met him.
Sadly, you didn’t take heed of all the signs that he was showing you along the way.
He knows that he now has your heart.
Thereby, he knows that he can get away with even more bad and jerk-like behavior without having to worry about the penalties.
You are all in now and it is going to be a lot harder for you to let him go than if you had just recently met him and barely knew anything about him.
On the flip side, you were already fully aware of his jerk-like behavior from the beginning, but you made yourself believe that this is how he is and he would get better.
Your focus stayed on how amazing he made you feel, or how much he made you want to be with him.
The poignant desire to be accepted by him completely took over.
There were elements of his jerk-like behavior that initially appealed to you.
You saw this jerk-like behavior as a sign of strength, an indication that he wasn’t a guy who would take mistreatment lying down from anyone without retaliating.
Now, you realize that nothing about his jerk-like behavior was a show of strength.
If anything, you are now looking at this behavior as an impediment to his personal growth.
Well, he knows that he can get away with being a jerk because you have consistently cast a blind eye to it.
As long as that remains the case, he will continue being a jerk.
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