The Hardest Love Lesson You’ll Ever Have To Learn

There’s a lesson that no one tells you about when you start to fall in love for the first time. It’s a lesson you don’t get to experience until you’ve experienced a special type of heartbreak. It’s a lesson you will only recognize when you have been told you are no longer loved. And it won’t really set in until you have had multiple people tell you they no longer love you. It’s the cruelest lesson any human should ever endure – being told that the one person they loved to their core, just doesn’t love them anymore.

Protect your heart, beautiful. There will be a boy who comes along and makes you feel things you never felt. He will make you feel like you are a galaxy. He will make you feel like you are his entire universe. His grand gestures will be the most important things in your life in that period. But then something may switch. You suddenly find yourself sitting in your massive college bed, drunkenly talking to this boy you thought you were in love with and they will take your vulnerability and violate your heart, just because they can.

Because they’re selfish. In a split second this person, this boy, your galaxy will look at you and tell you, with tears in their eyes, that they just don’t love you anymore. That they haven’t for weeks although they continued to tell you they did, they continued to sleep with you within your universe. They immediately transform from a comfortable warmth to a burning sensation behind your eyes. You will feel crushed. You will feel blindsided. Your universe just collapsed. It will never be the same. They will beg for you back, and you, still believing in the magic of love, will stretch open the collapsed universe and invite their galaxy back in. Only because you can’t imagine not feeling loved. You’ll learn.

Protect your heart, gorgeous. You will feel scarred after the first time, it will take you years to allow for that overwhelming feeling of love to come back, but you will. You will start to believe in love again. You’ll miss the comfort of another galaxy existing in your universe. So you’ll let someone else in and you’ll love this person more than you have ever loved anyone. You’ll realize it is the first time you were ever in love. It will feel like you don’t just have another galaxy in your universe, it’ll feel like you share one galaxy within your mutual universe. You’ll feel it in your bones.

Eventually, you will tell them about the damage you carry as scar tissue on your heart from being told you were no longer loved and you’ll say, “please don’t ever tell me that. That’s all I ask of you.” They’ll promise, kiss you, and tell you they love you. You’ll think your heart is safe with him.

Over time you two will grow apart, you’ll realize it isn’t working although you still love them more than any other alternate galaxy. You’ll let them go because you still think they are in love with you. Knowing this will be your comfort in the change. And this boy, after a couple months will tell you he still loves you, he will tell you he misses you, he will tell you that you are his person, his galaxy. Then one day you’ll receive a message, out of the blue, at 1:00 pm. You’ll read it over and over again, realizing it feels familiar. Not comprehending what is happening.

Then it will hit you.

That one sentence you feared ever hearing again, “I am not in love with you anymore.”

You suddenly feel the familiar burning sensation behind your eyes creep back in. You start to see the edges of your universe curl inward like a burning piece of paper, suddenly collapsing into itself. You will feel paralyzed. And then it will hit you. You are about to add another layer of scar tissue to your heart. You are no longer loved. You didn’t protect your heart like you should’ve.

It feels like you are never going to be the same.

It feels like you are empty. Worthless.

It feels like you are unworthy of love. Or even a simple phone call.

All you were worth was a text message. One message that collapsed your entire universe into a tiny piece of nothing.

Then it will hit you. The lesson. You need to protect your heart. Too much scar tissue will ruin you. You will make a subconscious pact with your mind, soul, and body that you are going to protect your heart from then on out. You’ll realize these two insignificant boys were capable of ruining a portion of your heart through a single sentence. You’ll promise yourself you will not let a boy in again. Instead, you’ll wait for the man who can fuse your galaxy with his, he’ll validate his love for you every day. He will rebuild your universe with you. You won’t need to protect your heart anymore, because he will do it for you.

But in the meantime, you need to remember this lesson. The worst lesson. Protect your heart special girl.

You deserve a universe. You deserve a galaxy. You deserve a man not a boy.

So, Get mad. Get sad. Get heartbroken. But use that to fuel your guarded heart. Love will happen again. I promise.

Listen to your lessons. Listen to this lesson.

In the meantime, to the two boys who broke me, to the person who broke you, and to the individuals who have broken whoever else is reading this. Fuck you. I hope your universe collapses on your heart and you think back on me, on us, on your person and say “Wow, I miss my galaxy. Maybe I did love her.”