Soho Photo Gallery :Susanne Middelberg
June 4-28, 2014
This video holds a lot of precious memories for me because of the wonderful time I spend in New York and because of the very special people at the gallery there.
But the video is also very painful, because of the man in it – Dennis van der Burch, the man I loved dearly.
After I became seriously ill, Dennis told me that he didn’t know whether he would stay with me. He said he did not want to be with a sick woman.
We had had a long, loving relationship. I asked him to give us some time. I asked him not to give up on our love simply because, for the first time, we had to experience a difficult time. He agreed that he would do this.
Two weeks after our conversation he cheated on me with a woman he had never met before. Then he left me to begin a relationship with her.
I lost all trust in the man I deeply loved. I lost trust in life and in myself because I truly had felt and believed that I was living with an honest and loving person.I truly believed that we were good for each other.
After more than 1 ½ years, my grief was still so strong that I could not allow myself to trust again. I felt insecure, useless and abandoned.
I decided I had to do something. I went to Dennis to ask if he would be willing to meet with me, to talk, to help me to understand why he did what he did, so that I could move on with my life.
He replied that he is still with the woman he left me for. And then he said…
“It does not fit in my life anymore to help you.”