I hate when people say that you have to love yourself before you can love anyone else, Because it’s not true, and here's why:
We were inseparable; best friends for years, and as the years passed and we got closer, I found myself falling hopelessly, inescapably in love with her. She was the first person who ever looked at me and said Yes , I see your flaws and your imperfections, and I don't care, I still want to be with you. We shared our dreams, our plans, our hopes for the future, our music, and our secrets, and I loved her more than life itself. As long as I could love her, I didn't *Have* to love myself. Loving her meant it didn't matter if I hated looking in the mirror because I couldn't stand to see the man looking back at me, meant I didn't have to confront my insecurities, meant it didn't matter if I wanted to end it all every time I was alone. Being with her made life more than just bearable, it made it wonderful and exciting, it made it beautiful, it made it feel like I was the luckiest man alive. For the first time in my life, when I looked at her, and she looked at me, I Almost felt like I was Worth loving. Loving her made me confident in a way that I never expected and could never explain. She made me feel...human. And for that, I'll always be grateful. She let me feel what it was like to be in love, and it was dazzling.
I thought she was the one. I would have married her in a heartbeat and worked my fingers to the bone to give her the perfect life we always talked about.
But, and there's always a but, one day she just cut me off, removed all contact, stopped talking to me, and we never spoke again. I never got an explanation, she never told me what I did (or didn't do) wrong, and it destroyed me.
It's been over 10 years since then. Now she's married to someone else & has a family. He's a good man, treats her right, and I'm happy she found someone who could make her happy in all the ways I clearly never could.
I just never want to feel that way again. I will never allow myself to feel that way again. It took me the better part of a decade to get to this point, and if things didn't work out with him & she wanted to come back into my life now, I'd say no.
But I've never given my heart to anyone else.
They say it's better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all, but I'm not convinced. I don't know if I'll ever really decide if the high of loving her was worth the pain of losing her for good, because I didn't just lose the one I loved most, I lost my best friend, too.
As for me, I'm doing okay now; I've got a decent job, a home to go to, and a dog to keep me company, but I still don't love myself. I don't have a reason to, and I don't think I ever really will.
But even if I never loved myself, I loved her...I know I loved her..
