I’ve never been one to deal with emotions. Yet my self-proclaimed capacity for them is the size of a great whale. After all, I am human and humans are known to be emotional beings. I have always been troubled with the idea that love can conquer all, and yet, the hopeless romantic side of my heart still pushes past the worries and fears I have for falling too soon for someone I care about. This summer I did just that.
He was handsome, British, and had a smile that could light up the entire room. It sounds clichéd, but we met working at a sleepaway camp I grew up going to. We were both camp counselors and we both understood the taxing ups and downs of the job. We quickly bonded over it, and soon began to tell eachother everything under the sun. We laughed, we smiled, and by the third week of working there, he kissed me.
He had his own thoughts and desires but for a while I wasn’t sure if I was paying attention to mine. I began to put him first, worrying about him and his feelings every second of every day. I forgot how I felt because I was so concerned with what he wanted, like making things official with me. I never thought of what I wanted, and soon he became too dependent on me lifting his spirits up. But I loved him, and he loved me.
How can you truly care about someone when you don’t care about yourself? Sometimes looking back on it I feel like I left him because I thought he was too clingy, but that’s not the case. I love myself, and I needed to do it for my emotional health. He would have been gone for tenth months in Europe, and I would have been here. My heart would constantly ache in his absence, and I’d rather go through a three week crying binge filled with tubs of ice cream and Riverdale than the continual pain. His love for me was reassuring, but not enough. I needed to learn to love myself, my curves, my personality, my tweaks, etc. If I can’t truly accept who I am, how can I accept his love for me?
This realization, no matter how big or small, is something I have been wanting to have for a very long time. To know that it’s okay to put yourself first. I am here to tell you that it’s okay to want yourself to be happy, to be relaxed, to be free. You don’t need to feel love inside by searching for someone to love you. Just be open and accepting to yourself and all that you can offer the world; that in itself is the key to love.