Thank You For Leading Me On

Thank you. No, seriously, thank you for leading me on.

Thank you for the consistent breadcrumbs of a real relationship whenever someone else tried to come into my life. Thank you for telling me that you cared and then doing the exact opposite. Thank you for not being ready for either of us to be in a relationship.

Thank you for appearing and then disappearing over and over again. Thank you for missing the events that were important to me. Thank you for making me wait by the window for a car that wasn’t coming.

Thank you for never wanting to make a plan more than a day in advance. Thank you for shooting around me in every social media photo. Thank you for making me wait by the phone. Thank you for taking but never giving.

Thank you for the constant mixed signals. Thank you for holding my hand in dark theaters and letting go when the lights came back up so no one would see. Thank you for making me feel like I was overreacting.

Thank you for trying just a little bit harder every time I built up every ounce of my strength to leave. Thank you for testing how many times I would forgive and forget. Thank you for breaking me down. Thank you for consistently making me cry. Thank you for making me feel like I was not worthy of you.

Thank you for talking about how amazing she was. Thank you for not seeing the person right in front of you. Thank you for trying to keep me as your back up plan. I truly mean it. Thank you.

Please believe me when I say that you were not a waste of my waste of time. In fact, you are the reason that everything in my life is a little better today. Why? Because I needed you then.

I needed the rush and the butterflies. I needed the adventures with you. I needed the lonely nights without you. I needed the highs and the lows.

I needed to put my guard up. I needed to know what having strong feelings for someone really was. I needed the anger. I needed the push to make myself the best that I could be.

I needed the pain. I needed the break downs. I needed to stop fearing conflict for peace today and war tomorrow.

I needed to learn. I needed to grow. I needed the strength.

I needed to give myself permission to be angry. I needed to give myself permission to stand up for myself. I needed to learn my standards. I needed to learn how to let go.

I needed to learn to wait for the right person and not the convenient one. So thank you. You gave me everything that I needed in order to find him.

Because of you, I will never forget to thank God for what I have standing right in front of me. I will be thankful every time he reaches for my hand as we walk down a public street. I will never take for granted the random bear hugs, the forehead kisses, the smiles, the laughs, the sarcastic flirting, the little moments when we catch each other’s eyes from across the room and the moments that he brushes the hair away from my face.

Because of you, the tiny gesture of bringing me a coffee or sending me a good morning text will be a huge deal. Every picture of us that he puts on his social media will mean that he is proud to be mine. I will melt every time he introduces me as his girlfriend, his fiancé, his wife. My heart will skip a beat every second that I hear the words “I love you.” I will see the beauty in us every day.

Because of you, those little things that I have taken for granted in so many of my previous relationships will mean the world to me.

So thank you.