If we’re fortunate, we all experience that special someone in our lives who shows us what it really feels like to be in love.  For a privileged few, that relationship lasts a lifetime. But for most of us, it’s one hell of a ride that eventually ends. And although the reasons these romances end may vary, DeAndre shows us that, if nothing else, they teach us how to love, and be loved.

I was 20 years old and I’d just gotten out of a yearlong relationship with someone who was very abusive and violent. I left that house and moved in with my brother and his fiancé. And not too long after that, I met him. It was a time where I felt lost and didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life.

All my friends were older than me, so most of them had already been in relationships for years or months and had their own apartments. Since I was the baby in the group, that motivated me to want to do something with my life. He just happened to walk by. He caught my eye, even though I wasn’t looking for anything.

He treated me very well. He truly cared about me. He did everything, even when I didn’t ask. With him, I never felt threatened or jealous. Eventually, we ended up getting an apartment, both found great jobs, and things were going well. But living with each other was different because we got to really see everything about one another. But I can still say he cared for me very well, especially since I’m not easy to live with.

He just happened to walk by. He caught my eye, even though I wasn’t looking for anything.

Not long after I turned 21, I decided to go into porn, after being a big fan of Channel One Releasing and its Bolt book since I was 17. Something about it really resonated with me. So, that’s when I had pictures taken of me and I began to converse a lot with the director. I wrote her and shared that the first porn book I had ever seen was hers, and that’s when we started talking, and she decided to fly me to where she was in Los Angeles for my first scene.

When that happened, I told my boyfriend about it and that I wanted to do it. I asked him before I did it if he would mind. At first he said he didn’t mind. And based on his response, I felt like he wondered why I would even ask him for permission to do it.  Once we discussed it more, and I told him that I’d be coming back with money and would only be gone for two days, he told me to just go have fun–that it was okay since it was for work.

As soon as I got to Los Angeles, he got drunk and sent me all kinds of text messages, asking how dare I go through with it. Things weren’t good. I finally got him to calm down, even though he was threatening to break everything in our house.

I did my scene and came back. We had literally just left the airport when he went off on me. It got so bad that he asked me to let him out at a gas station. When I turned back round 15 minutes later, he was gone. And that was the beginning of our off and on relationship for nearly seven years.

I decided to go into porn at 21….He told me to just go have fun–that it was okay since it was for work….It became one of my biggest regrets because it turned the man I loved into a completely different person.

I continued doing porn for two years. I had fun traveling the world and got into a lot of places doing it. It was amazing. But I don’t think it was something I should have done. Back then, I didn’t think doing something like porn would hurt him, but it did.

It wasn’t until later that I realized my decision really messed up our relationship, and that it was something I should have never put him through. It became one of my biggest regrets because it turned the man I loved into a completely different person.

Three days ago (before doing this interview) would have been four years since our relationship ended. And he’s still the only person who has ever shown me the power of true intimacy.