It’s Okay, I Wasn’t Ready To Love You Either

I know what you’re feeling. 

I don’t pretend to know the extent of your pain. I’m not here to dismiss the traumatic experiences you’ve bravely survived. 

But human to human, I know what you’re feeling. 

I know the fear of sabotaging something beautiful. 

I know that nauseous pain that you’re no good for anyone. 

I know the darkness that accompanies abandonment. 

I know what it’s like to hurt in places for which there’s no medicine. 

I know the worry that nobody around you understands.

I know the concern of being a weight too heavy for others to bear.

I had been sabotaged too. 

I had been convinced that I was no good for anyone. 

My zip code was once the darkness of abandonment.

I, too, hurt in places no prescription could repair. 

Just like you, I once felt that no one was capable of understanding or lifting me.

I know what it feels like to feel broken beyond repair.

Or at least, I thought I did. Then I met you. Just like you, I wasn’t ready to love someone else yet.

I was barely ready to ask for your name, much less your phone number. 

I wasn’t ready for your bravery and survival to show me a walking miracle. 

I wasn’t ready for the butterflies that followed our very first day together. I wasn’t ready for the deep talks that led to as many tears as smiles. 

I wasn’t ready to discover the one girl in this world that quotes all the same movies as I do. 

I wasn’t ready for the unmatched beauty that can intimidate me at times. 

I wasn’t ready for the reality that you had to move away because you no longer felt safe in our area.

I wasn’t ready to feel more heartbroken over your experience than I was my own. 

I wasn’t ready to educate myself on details of the past you’d survived.

I wasn’t ready to be the only person available to be by your side on one of the hardest days of your life.

But I’m glad I was. 

Because that was the day I had fallen so deeply for someone, I stopped caring that I wasn’t ready.

I wasn’t ready to love you. But I did. I wasn’t ready for the long sleepless nights that love would deliver. But I welcomed them. I wasn’t ready for the possibility that it may not work out. But I accepted it. 

Because behind all the walls, behind all the things people may consider baggage, behind all the darkness and self-doubt was someone worthy of things previously unknown. 

I don’t believe in love at first sight. 

But I do believe in love at first fright. 

The first moment I felt afraid of letting you slip away was the moment that it no longer mattered what I was ready for. 

That’s your worth. That’s your value. That’s your impact. 

So take your time. Find a way to love yourself even more than I do. However long that takes, remember what I told you.

The worthy will wait.

I may not have been ready to love you, but I’m glad I do.