Growing up, we are surrounded with the same idea about love. It’s plastered everywhere. We see movies where the girl is hurt by the same boy she was in love with. Ironically enough, he realizes how much he really loved her and, even though he completely shit on her throughout the entire movie, they get together for the better and are in “love”. It’s in the music we listen to. Women singing of constant heartbreak and pain but those same songs all have the same melody in the chorus about how much better off they are without the boy who let them go or the boy who watched them walk out of their lives. But I suppose this is where we have a choice to make on our own. You made my choice for me.

4 years. It was 4 years that I rode a roller coaster with you. On this roller coaster, I could never see the end. I also could never see the major dips that were coming up in our relationship. I never got that privilege with you. I never got that satisfaction. I can very undoubtedly say that you were the love of my life. I had everything planned with you. I pictured us in this cute house, somewhere near the city. I pictured us having children and something about that always gave me a sense of happiness because I’d get to see you light up when you got to teach them something new. Looking back in hindsight, I see that you’re not entirely to blame. I kept myself buckled into the seat while you drove us around everywhere in life. I was dependent on you. Some would think too dependent. However, I know that I loved you with what very little love I had left to give after all of the years that people had let me down. I trusted you enough to hold on when things got hard and that was my fault. I know now that I can never depend on someone to not hurt me just because I wouldn’t hurt them.

When things got too hard for you, you never fought for me. I think I can say, without hesitation, you never had once fought for me. I was so insecure. I struggled with various mental disorders. I am hard to love. I get it. How can you love someone like me? Well, the answer is this: it’s easy. You told me countless times, filling my head with beautiful fantasies and colors and hope, that you wanted a future with me. A future that was just like the one that I wanted with you. Where are you now? Where were you when things got hard? You walked away. You never second-guessed the decision you made. That should’ve been enough to make me never want to speak to you again. That should’ve been the biggest hint right there that I never meant anything to you, like you had made me believe, and I’m sorry for that. I’m sorry I couldn’t fulfill an unrealistic idea you had about what love is. You ran because that was the easiest thing you could do.

But here’s where I struggled the most. When you told me to walk the other way, I walked towards you. I grabbed your hands when you were scared. I loved you when you couldn’t love yourself. I loved you when I didn’t even love myself. I pulled you closer when you tried to push me away. I cried when we laid together at night and you were fast asleep, just so that you wouldn’t have to see me hurt. I hurt myself loving you. It took me a long time to realize this, but I’m thankful for the lack of concern you showed me when you should’ve fought for me when I finally walked away. I didn’t want to cry in front of you for the millionth time, so I bit my lip and walked out, hoping you’d chase after me and tell me to come back inside and hold me close to you. But you didn’t. I stood there for a minute and you never came. I walked away with a broken heart and lost it when I was alone, all while you continued to plan your life without me in it. I don’t think you ever planned a life with me in it. It was just playing a game of house and make believe, for a real life scenario would’ve been too much for you.

After all of this, I’m still confused. You all know as well as I do that your heart and brain never can agree on some things. But this much I do know: I am hard to love. I yell sometimes. I cry and lose my shit sometimes. I blame you for the things I can’t explain sometimes. But I deserve to be loved unconditionally in return. Everyone does. In this life, we are given one chance and if you spend your life settling for what you think you know, you will be miserable. So thank you for walking away from me at a time in my life that I needed you the most. It forced me to be on my own and do things alone and love myself for who I am and not for who you want me to be anymore. You are and continue to be the biggest influence in my life and not a single day goes by that I don’t think about you. Looking back, I know that you will come back to me when the time is right. For the time being, however, I am walking away. It isn’t easy, by any means, but is completely necessary. I am strong and independent. I got this far by myself. I will continue to flourish alone. I am now forced to take long car rides in silence, only to turn the music up louder and sing to my favorite jams. I go to bed alone, only to be able to dream my very own dream. I now go day to day doing the things I did with and for you, for only myself. I am the author to my story.