It Was a Privilege to Love & Let You Go.

“my thoughts cannot move an inch without bumping into some piece of you.”

This is a particularly hard piece to write. I am working up the courage to write this. It is a level of vulnerability I am not accustomed to sharing online. A little more than a year ago, I alluded to meeting someone and feeling excited about it. A couple of months later, I extinguished that feeling with the phrase “Never mind. College men are flabbergasting.” Between those two sentences lies months of a roller coaster of emotions, ranging from the highest of highs to the extremely low lows. “Flabbergasting” was the most lighthearted word I could use, but to be completely honest I was devasted and angry beyond measure. In the past year, I have had to sit with the fullness of my emotions and embrace the journey that they took me on. This was one of the most difficult things I had ever done.

“Remember to live while you’re busy surviving.”

If you know me and my story, you may find that hard to believe. My life has been one for the movies. However, heartbreak was novel to me. I could do fires, loss, death, and devastation. These I knew I could overcome — but heartbreak? Heartbreak seemed quite fickle to me. A silly thing that I was dealing with. I couldn't understand how I was still stuck with an ache in my chest when I had overcome things that I couldn’t even speak of publicly. it seemed quite juvenile, and very girl. I needed that. The life I have lived has taught me to live life in survivor mode well. Fight or flight is the homeostasis of my systems and mechanisms. Rest and digest were not.

“i am out with lanterns looking for myself”

Living a life that flowed and quieted down, allowing me to fall in love and grieve love lost was a new thing. I hated it with everything in my being. But, it was so necessary. It has been about a year and a half of ups and downs. I don’t want to say, I am at the end of the journey because every time I say so I realize how far I have to go. I am far enough along to pause and breathe and debrief on what has been so far. In the last year, I have learned a plethora of things about myself, and my beliefs. I did a lot of thinking about my thinking. (very metacognition - I know!)

“You who opened suns in my heart”

In the beginning, I yearned for a balm. A way to tear the sadness out of me. I pleaded with God to rid of any memory of the love I carried. He refused. I raged. In the middle, I found some relief. A moment of peace. Reprieve and I thought it was healing. I went away, and absence had starved my love cold. Or so I thought. That was far from the truth. The in-between followed. A limbo of ups and downs. Conversations with my friends on repeat. My friends living a nightmare of a Groundhog Day, watching me swerve like a pendulum. “He loves me. He loves me not. I love him. I love him not. I think of him. I think of him not.” Sentences said over and over again but never finished. “He crosses my mind from time to time. (all the time.) He never enters my mind. (because he never leaves it)” My thoughts and emotions ravaged me — and I was just a girl clinging. It was a breathtakingly devasting journey.

“it was a privilege to love you and it was a privilege to let you go. both helped shape me into the person i have become.”

I think I am nearing the end. I have learned an incredible amount about the beauty of love, even after its loss. I have learned the depths of heartbreak, and how close it can bring you to yourself. Most importantly, I have learned that if you feel lost and far from yourself, if you feel tired and weary, incapable of continuing, anything and anyone, any day can be the beginning of you returning to yourself, and living once again. Though the heartbreak was devasting, it led me to learn the beauty of returning to myself.