ollibear

I wonder if I will get emotional.

Lately, this show has had a tendency to make me feel numb. The story has hurt me, since the moment Bay took the fall for Daphne. I felt like I was the one Bay abandoned, instead of Emmett. It sucked. And Bay's trip to the beach to "make it work" was too little, too late for me, too.

I don't know how I will feel going into these last 10 episodes.

When I first saw the news of Switched at Birth's cancellation on Lizzy Weiss's Twitter feed, it was like a punch to the gut. Ironically, it happened within seconds of me tweeting to her that she had ruined Bay and Emmett. (A couple of hours earlier, Lizzy Weiss had posted a picture of Bay and Emmett with the caption "all the feels," and I had felt compelled to let her know how numb I was to all of those "feels," as soon as I had seen the picture. Then, two seconds later she tweeted that the show had been cancelled, and it was definitely like a sucker punch to the gut.)

I wasn't really numb. I had just been deeply hurt. I was losing hope and feeling a need to not be so vulnerable, when I made my tweet.

Besides, isn't that the word Bay uses to confront Emmett, "You 'ruined' us" and wasn't their reunion episode called Love Among the Ruins?

I used to think that the ruins were everything else around them (Matthew's catfishing scheme, Tank's decision to leave his fraternity, Bay & Emmett's choice to forgo birth control). But now, I think that the writers meant that Bay & Emmett's love was still among "the ruins" of his original cheating with Simone. I think the writers are trying to tell us that Emmett's cheating is something that cannot be overcome, at least not with Bay. She was right at Blue River Road. Emmett ruined them.

Bay gave it her all in their second relationship, but her feelings for Emmett weren't what they needed to be, in order to sustain the relationship. Bay didn't love Emmett as deeply the second time, and Emmett felt that. Or maybe Bay loved Emmett so deeply that she had to hide it. I don't know which it is, but whichever way, I do believe the problem was caused by Emmett's original cheating.

It might even be that Emmett's night with Simone opened up the door to him thinking about himself as a loser and a flake. Maybe that's why Emmett abandoned Bay, after what happened between Bay and Tank. Maybe Emmett doesn't believe he is a a strong enough person to stand by Bay. Or maybe like Bay said to Daphne, Emmett is just a weak person and always has been one. Maybe that's why Emmett originally cheated with Simone and that's why he broke up with Bay after what happened with Tank.

All of it seems to hinge on Emmett's original cheating, though. As Kathryn said in the episode where it happens, "It's about mistakes, accidents, errors in judgment and how these moments define who we are and the paths we take."

Emmett's path was defined the moment he made his mistake, and as much as I believed the story would show Emmett overcoming his error in judgment, I no longer believe Emmett can regain what he lost. In real life, some people can, but in this show, even as much as Bay and Emmett both tried, it wasn't possible.

What Bay & Emmett rebuilt during their second relationship wasn't as good as what they had during their first relationship. Bay and Emmett can still have decent lives, separately. They will just never get back what they lost when Emmett cheated. Maybe that's why Emmett cheated in the beginning. Maybe what Bay and Emmett shared was never all that great, after all.

The writers don't leave us with a lot of other options, in which to believe. If anyone has a perspective that's more hopeful than mine, please share. I need some hope!