The Truth Is, You Couldn’t Love Yourself Enough To Ever Love Me

You left me in May, and while I know that the healthiest parts of me are craving separation from you, part of me is still stuck to you like glue to a torn paper.

It was nine months of being tied to you, bending to every whim of yours. It was a cruel game that you played, one that left me feeling hard to love. I’ve never liked to lose. You knew that, too, and while vulnerability never came naturally to me, I’m not afraid to admit that there are parts of me still in need of healing after what you did. You’d take credit for it too-that’s just the way you are. Everything, good and bad, has to be because of you. Every victory and every battle I had to share with you.

There were plenty of warnings right from the beginning, but the desperation to be attached to someone convinced me to overlook them all. I could overlook the cling with which you hung on my every word. I could overlook the way you changed every part of you to fit me. I could overlook the way you pretended to engage in every conversation, laugh at every joke, and love all the same things I did.

But the truth was evident, even when you thought I couldn’t see it. When I looked away for a moment, you turned your face from mine. When we talked about things we loved, I didn’t make the list.

You used me to validate your own insecurities. You were lost in a field of lust. Nothing about me made you want to stay, and even now, so many months unattached, you still can’t see it. You couldn’t love yourself enough to ever love me. That’s easy for me to see now, but it doesn’t make the ache hurt any less.

I was once so angry at myself for feeling the natural feelings of heartbreak after you left. Something about it left me feeling so frustrated with my own human emotions. I didn’t want to feel sad because it wasn’t you I missed. It wasn’t you I missed at all. I missed the connection. I missed the predictability. I missed being able to turn my phone on in the morning and know there’d be a message from you. I miss having someone to stay accountable to other than myself. I missed the idea of being in love because that’s what I’ve craved all this time.

I love being in love. That’s part of my nature. Something that you claimed to love and promised to cherish. I feel taken advantage of, even now. I feel as if you took the parts of me that were most vulnerable and you torched them.

I wish I could look back on the nine months I spent on you and say it was worth it. I wish I could conjure up some memories that I am thankful for. I wish I could look back and do anything other than apologize for putting myself through that.

Maybe one day I’ll be able to look at myself and treat myself with more respect than I did then. Hopefully I will soon find the self worth to not settle for far less than I deserve. Perhaps in the future, I will have the forethought to not ignore my internal feelings.

But maybe a partner will come along one day and see what you professed to see in me. Maybe one day, a partner will treat me the way I begged to be treated. Maybe one day, a partner will see me as a jewel to be cherished, not glass too fragile to touch.

Maybe someone will come along and treat me like how I deserve to be treated.

One thing I know for certain: that person will never be you.