🦋 This action will have consequences...

Hey, you...

You're like an addiction I didn't know I had. I don't know what possessed me to text you. I don't know why, but I'd regret it if I hadn't reached out. I don't know if it was a mistake. I'm certainly in pain.

I've been through a lot in life. I can't remember everyone I've dated. I've had the misfortune of losing a partner way too young. I've had to stop at least four partners from killing themselves. I've let a bunch of them hurt me horribly, and I've hurt the rest horribly myself. One of them said to me that it's a miracle that I still love, tho I don't know if I believe that.

Someone said to me that love is forgiveness. Someone said it's acceptance. Someone said it's choosing the other, no matter what. Someone said it's walking away for the other's well-being. I would have said it was loyalty and resilience. I don't know. I don't know what it is.

I know this tho: I love you unconditionally. I've always seen you more clearly than either of us would have preferred. I've always accepted you, even if it hurt. I'll always forgive you, even if you don't ask me to. I love you. I'm not sure in what way, but I love you... and I apparently love myself.

You've taught me a lot, you know? You've changed me for the better. I look at myself with kindness and acceptance because that is how I look at you. I love myself because I love you. There cannot be a condition to unconditional love, so the condition cannot be that you aren't me. I would still love you if you were me. I can love myself. That was hard to accept.

Trying to understand my own boundaries, choosing myself in the face of oblivion, is the hardest thing I've ever done. Realizing that our dysfunctional dynamic is a waste of my time and energy has been hell. Removing you from my life again has been hell. Keeping my promises to myself will be hell.

I don't think you'll reach out to me because I don't think it's in you to change. We won't figure each other out. We won't meet in the middle. We won't stop hurting ourselves. That's just not who we are, and I cannot change us. I cannot save you. I cannot show you how worthy of love you are. I cannot show you that you're worth the pain of self improvement.

I cannot forget you by looking for you in other people.

I cannot forget you.

Years from now, if you somehow reach out, I'll have to have forgotten you. That will be hell. That terrifies me even more than you do.

I don't know how to end this, but this action will have consequences.