For anyone who has ever loved someone from a place of fear instead of freedom.
I didn't know I was doing it for years.
I thought I was being loving. Thoughtful. Selfless. I would do things before you even asked. I would show up in every way I knew how — and I would do it consistently, quietly, and at great cost to myself.
And somewhere underneath all of that giving was a belief I had never said out loud:
If I love you the way I need to be loved, maybe you'll eventually love me back the same way.
I was speaking a language and hoping you'd learn it by osmosis. I never told you what I needed. I just kept giving, and kept watching, and kept score in a way I didn't even admit to myself.
That's not love. That's a silent contract the other person never signed.
And when they didn't give back in the way I was aching for — not because they didn't care, but because they simply didn't know — I would fall apart. And call it heartbreak. When really it was the pain of a need I had never learned to voice.
I was so afraid that asking would make people leave. So I gave instead of asked. Performed instead of communicated. Made myself indispensable instead of making myself known.
Desperate love exhausts everyone. Including yourself.
I'm learning what it means to love with open hands. To say what I need out loud, even when my voice shakes. To stop giving as a way of controlling what I get back.
It's the hardest thing I've ever unlearned.
🤍