I realize that in my last relationship - aka my first love - took a lot from me. It took time for me to fall in love with my boyfriend at the time. When it finally happened, I loved hard. I loved him so much that he was literally my other half and I couldn’t be whole without him. Breaking up after two and a half years is tough when you become that attached to someone. You feel empty, incomplete. The fact that I broke off the relationship didn’t make anything less easy or less painful.
I hated feeling that way and there was no way I was going to be depressed over some guy who didn’t support me in my pursuit of success for my future - which would have been our future, but whatever. Hence, I turned to feelings of bitterness towards my ex, convincing myself that he’s no good for me, we can’t be friends, and I have NOTHING to gain from his existence anymore. I have to admit I tortured myself for about a year after the breakup trying the “let’s just be friends” thing, still keeping up with him by stalking him on social media, and so forth. I forgot what triggered it, but one day I finally gained the courage to completely DELETE him from my life. It hurt like a bitch - like your computer crashing 10 pages into an essay you didn’t save. But this time, it was invigorating. Kind of like getting your eyebrows waxed.
So I went on without him. I was in nursing school at the time and it took up about 95% of my life for a good 12 months. In that time, I made new friends, reconnected with old ones, and I fell in love with nursing, and I learned to love myself. Now the latter is actually a huge deal for me. I grew up being bullied about my weight and appearance, so one of the things I loved about my ex was that he always made me feel beautiful, sexy, attractive, and just good about myself. He was my cheerleader, my confidant, and my rock - so you can imagine how dependent I was on him for my wellbeing. But there I was, so busy with nursing school and having so much fun that I didn’t even have a chance to think about my ex - or any guy.
SO YEAH. I basically did my own thing. I focused on school, my family, my friendships, and myself most of all. In the midst of all of that, I found love.
Instead of expending energy on feeling depressed and empty, I found myself pouring my heart into everything else I did. Here I am about 3 years later finally realizing that. I find myself saying or thinking “I love this” or “I love that” so often. Or caring about someone or something way too much. Especially as a nurse, a lot of caring, compassion, and patience goes into my profession and I wholeheartedly give my patients my services, which is not easy. What can I say? When I love, I love hard every time. I know what love is and I don’t use it loosely, but everything and everyone in my life has just been so special. I’m thankful for every moment and every obstacle that comes to me because I always learn something from them.
I’m not saying that after my breakup, every day and every second has been great, every moment is happy, and nothing bad ever happens anymore. I just know that I’ve changed in a way that allows me to put my best foot forward and use my huge heart to better myself and heal others. The most important thing that I observed is that on my bad days or days that I feel needy, it’s because I haven’t found something to love or be thankful for that day. I haven’t made any resolutions for the new year, so I guess something that I should do is: fall in love every day.
It doesn’t even have to be with someone. Another thing that helped me realize this is my lunch date with my ex last week. We had been intermittently exchanging conversation in the last few months and I’d like to say that we’re civil and we’re in a good, mutual place in regards to where we stand in our new platonic relationship. For the last 3 years since we’ve broken up, I’ve denied the saying about how your first love never dies out or whatever. Having lunch with him last week and having this new sense of self helped me change my views on that saying. I realized that I really am not in love with the guy anymore, but I’ll always have love for him and the people he brought into my life. If there’s any other human being that knows about me as much as I do, It would probably still be him. I don’t have any more *feelings* for him, but I do appreciate having him in my life still.
I guess I’m writing this because I’ve been going back and forth with myself whether I need/want a boyfriend at this time. I know that I can have one if he happens to come into my life. I also know that I don’t need anyone to feel a certain kind of way. I just feel like if I do have a boyfriend, it will be hard for me to fall in love with him again just because I’ve filled my life with so many things to love AND although I’m open for a relationship, I’ll be hesitant to fall in love in that romantic kind of way. I guess we’ll just wait and see who stumbles in. I guess with a heart as big as mine, there’s always room for more love.
