You May Have Made Me Cautious, But Not Even You Could Ruin Love For Me

There was a point in time where I honestly believed I would never love again for the rest of my life.

Perhaps it sounds dramatic now, but anyone who has suffered heartbreak from someone they loved with everything they knew how to might be able to relate to this idea. It feels like you somehow used up all the love you believed you possessed in your whole body. It feels like you poured yourself out and left nothing to spare. And when they leave, it feels like they took all of that love with them. How could you possibly recover? How could you ever love someone again?

I can’t pretend like you didn’t have an effect on me- to avoid that fact would be impossible. The imprint of our relationship tends to follow me wherever I go. However, it doesn’t seem fair that I keep myself contained because I am convinced that someone will hurt me the way you once did. I have always felt like love is one of the best things this world has to offer. And to miss out on it because things didn’t work out between us? It just isn’t acceptable to me. Even in the ways that loving you changed and even scarred me, it still isn’t going to stop me from loving someone else just as fully as I once did with you.

It doesn’t mean I’m not a little more guarded now. I don’t just let anyone in these days. There are times where your memory seeps in and causes me to doubt and question, I have to remind myself that this person in front of me, isn’t you. They are an entirely different person with different ideas, thoughts, experiences, and ways to show their love. I’m not going to hold them to your mistakes

It’s true that these days, it’s hard for me to open up to others the way I did with you- because I never fully know who wants to get to know me or who wants to get to know what could break me. I trusted you in ways I never trusted anyone else. I can’t run wild with my heart the way I once did, because if you showed me nothing else, it’s that being that reckless is the best way to break it. I may not trust right off the bat, but I do still trust- because I have to remind myself that the person in front of me isn’t automatically going to break me.

Not everyone is like you.

I don’t love as quickly as I once did, because I spent every ounce of love I had in you, and in return I walked away empty. You knew how to take and take but never return the favor, and so it takes some time for me to judge a person’s intentions. But when I do finally meet someone who is just as interested in investing as I am, then I am all in- because I know the love won’t be one-sided.

I don’t plan things for the future as quickly as I did before, because I daydreamed my way through all sorts of future hope with you, all to watch it vanish right in front of me. When you walked away, it felt like I lost not only us, but everything I imagined we would have been. These days, I take it one step at a time, because getting my hopes up is tiring after awhile. Yet once someone proves they want to stick around, I start letting my mind wander once again, picturing a potential life down the road.

I don’t always express my love as loudly as I used to, because with you I was always declaring my adoration all over the place, only to be met with lukewarm reciprocation. I have never had a problem with expressing my emotions, yet doing so with you always made me feel like I was over-the-top and too much. You never appreciated the way I adored you, and so now I tend to keep quiet about my feelings. Yet when I meet someone who is just as crazy about me as I am for them, it won’t be difficult for me to raise my voice again to tell anyone and everyone who will listen that I’m in love, and am not afraid to show it.

Truthfully, I have no guarantees that someone won’t hurt me the way you did. Someone might even hurt me even worse, as much as it pains me to think about. Yet it’s also just as possible that someone might love me deeper, fuller, and better than I could’ve thought possible. I could end up building the kind of life i always hoped for, with someone beside me who cherishes and cares for me deeply.

Anything is possible, when you think about it, and I choose to hope for the best.

You may have made me cautious, but not even you could ruin love for me.