I had never been in love. I loved and I dated, but I always kept my distance; to the point where it became a deal breaker with my significant others. They wanted me to open up more, and I couldn’t, because when I did, I know I would fall in deep.

As a writer, I feel things deeply. I take other people’s emotions and intertwine them with mine. I feel my friends’ happiness and I feel their pain. Sometimes, more so than them.

So when I fell in love for the first time, I fell hard. It was quick and painful and scary. And it was nothing like I thought my first love would be. We did all the things new couples do: We danced in the street and took naps together and shared secrets and even went to prom. We were the ones that were supposed to make it. That’s what everybody said.

I had been fully opposed to marriage before I dated my first love. I didn’t want to marry and I didn’t want to settle down. Having been diagnosed with depression when I was in 7^th grade, I figured the risk of love was too much. Growing up, I had only seen failed relationships, and I saw how unhappy those people were. And I promised myself I wouldn’t be that person and I would be complete on my owe and true love was something fed to little girls to make money.

Little did I know, one person would change all of that for me. I loved deeply. I shared my darkest secrets, ones I would never tell my therapist. I cried to them and I changed my personality in fear that who I was wouldn’t complete them the way they completed me.

I was on top of the world. I was the happiest I had ever been. Until I wasn’t.

Friends, heartbreak is nothing to be romanticized. It’s not something that a meaningless hookup and a night out with the girls will fix. There is nothing romantic about falling on the bathroom floor with your Prozac in your hands and trying to scream but nothing will come out.

When I had my first heartbreak, there was physical pain. I wanted to throw up. I was dizzy and had migraines and my whole body ached. My mother cried for me because there was nothing she could do to make me better. Our mutual friends chose to be with him because he was ok and already dating other girls and there was no drama.

But for me, I wanted nothing more than to stop existing He cheated, he lied, he blamed me, and he let me believe that I was worth nothing- less than nothing.

I ate ice cream and listened to empowering playlists and focused on work. But everywhere I went, he was there. And that’s normal. There won’t be a day where you wake up and suddenly say that everything is ok. You’re going to go months without feeling ok. And you’re going to feel angry. And that’s ok, too. Give yourself time and let yourself feel all of the emotions. Listen to the songs you would dance to in the park and make new memories. Don’t try and shove them back and forget about the heartbreak. Embrace it. Write about it. Talk to strangers about it. Tell people when you’re sad and find a way to co exist with the one who broke your heart. Not for their sake, but for yours.

Because through heartbreak- through hating myself and feeling like dying would be the only way to get him to feel any emotion towards me- grew knowledge. I learned how to love and how to be loved. I learned that relationships are a choice, and you have to make a conscious decision to be with somebody every day.

And I learned that romanticizing life, no matter how easy it may seem, keeps you from seeing life as it is. Rose-colored glasses are beautiful, and pictures make you seem happier than you truly are, but blue will never be blue until you can see clearly. And love will never be love until you learn to accept it as it is- a pain and work and a choice. Once you learn that, then you experience true love.