I Was Yours, But I Needed To Be Mine

My best attempt at loving someone else was always going to be challenged by my inability to love myself well.

I have never been a weak person. I never allowed myself to be. I’ve been resilient, resourceful, and independent. I learned early and well how to enjoy my own company and to need little else. But I, like any other human being, harbored a desire to be seen, to be known, and to be loved. I didn’t need a prince on a white horse to sweep in and rescue me, but I wanted to share my life with someone I loved who loved me back.

For a little while, I thought I’d found that person. I was swept up in it. I was still strong, independent, and capable, but I also found myself loving him more than I loved myself. If I was his, then I wasn’t mine. And I desperately needed to be mine. What happened is this: I was so busy loving him well that I put my needs on hold.

I twisted myself up into shiny bows of anxiety while trying to figure out how my perfect love story had gone wrong. If I had been the cause, and trauma had taught me to believe this to be true, then I would need to work harder to earn back his love.

Of course, I didn’t think of any of this in such clear terms. My mind was a muddle, and I just couldn’t see a way to get my needs met within the relationship. But I also couldn’t see a way to leave someone I loved. I was stuck, and it was only in the aftermath of the inevitable breakup that I realized that it was past trauma that kept me stuck. My abandonment issues made it impossible to leave and just as impossible to believe that he would stay.

Until I healed from trauma, I gave myself up in relationships. I didn’t mean to do it. I would never have done it intentionally. I had a nervous system that was programmed to people-please and self-sacrifice in the name of love and belonging, and I didn’t know any other way to be.

I’ve always had a growth mindset, but there was just no growing around the pain of the past when I was tripping on it everywhere I turned. My best attempt at loving someone else was always going to be challenged by my inability to love myself well.

“It’s all about falling in love with yourself and sharing that love with someone who appreciates you, rather than looking for love to compensate for a self love deficit.” ~Eartha Kitt

I didn’t want to belong to another human being. I hoped to belong with one. I wanted a true partnership. I wanted a person who would wake up every day and choose to love me even in the face of bad moods, bedhead, or morning breath. I wanted to be able to be flawed and still loved. I wanted someone to see the best in me but still love the worst. I wanted the commitment to nurturing that love for a lifetime.

If I’m honest, it’s still what I want. I’ve just learned that I can’t have it if my needs aren’t actually being met. Love would leave the room, but I kept waiting in case it decided to come back. I know now that I needed to love myself enough to leave. I needed to love myself enough not to stay and suffer in the vain hope that love would come back to me if only I was steadfast enough in its absence.

But of course, that’s not how relationships usually work. In the end, I found that the absence of that relationship left me with some very necessary space. I learned more about myself at that time. I explored interests I’d never had the time or energy to investigate before. I made new friends and set new goals because I knew the future was going to be very different from the one that I planned with a partner who was gone. I grieved, but I grew.

“Document the moments you feel most in love with yourself — what you’re wearing, who you’re around, what you’re doing. Recreate and repeat.” ~Warsan Shire

There are days when I would like to pour my love into a partner, but I turn instead to the life that I have and am grateful. I have a strong bond with my children. My pets love me so much that they follow me from room to room just to see what I’m doing. I have friends and family that I enjoy spending time with, and if there’s a little loneliness tucked into the mix, I’ve decided that’s better than the inherent suffering of the wrong relationship. I’m still a person with a desire to share my life, but I love myself enough to focus on what I have, not on what I don’t.

Still, I woke up today and thought about how easily I once gave myself up. I don’t regret how ardently I loved, but I wish I’d given just a little of that love to myself in those months when I was grieving the loss even before it arrived. I wish I could go back and tell that version of myself that it’s going to be okay.

That it would hurt — perhaps worse than anything had ever hurt before — but I would survive. I would go on to buy a house and create the life I’d always wanted. I would plant a garden that would grow well and wild, and in the space the relationship once took up, I would find the kind of friendships sure to last a lifetime.

And I wish I could go back and tell that version of myself to love the man enough to let him go. At least, for a little while. I wish I’d taken the space to grieve without trying to shift into friendship before I was ready.

With distance and time, we might have been able to make that leap, but I was so hurt and in love that I could not be my true self with him after the relationship changed. There was damage done because I had not healed — and could not heal without the space to do so.

But for all of that pain, I was driven to sit down in a small office across from the person who would give me the tools to change my life. Trauma therapy soothed a nervous system that had never truly been at rest. When I was no longer activated a majority of the time, I could see my relationships clearly. Many of them healed because I was no longer reactive and was able to have the conversations I couldn’t before. I set the self-loving boundaries I needed, and I watched my relationships flourish.

If I’m making this sound easy, it wasn’t. If I’m making myself sound completely healed, I’m not. I’m a work in progress, but I’m loving myself through that work.

One day, I’ll likely fall in love again. It won’t be perfect. I’m sure I’ll make some mistakes along the way. But I believe that people can belong with each other and still manage to belong to themselves. I believe we can fall in love and then make the conscious commitment to choose to love that person every day. And I believe that if the love leaves, we should exit with as much grace as we can muster because it is the most self-loving thing we’ll ever do.