today i confront my attachment to romantic love. and i write that attachment a love letter.

dear mason’s attachment to romantic love,

hello! how are you babe. i have a crazy thing to say to you.

i love you. deeply.

i love the way that you care deeply about how people feel about you and treat you. i love how much effort you put into making mason feel safe as possible, because i get it, i want him to feel safe too.

i totally understand where you’re coming from! romantic love is scary! and the only love you’ve really known has not been the best. you grew from what was undoubtedly an unsafe household when we were growing up. i mean think about it, it all seemed fine and safe and then it wasn’t again and that happened on and off over and over again.

as that happened, you grew. you became used to it. this was the only love you knew. your role was to tolerate the fighting, to get used to it happening over and over again. you were supposed to be fine throughout all of it, and you were supposed to fix the issues when they arose without batting an eye.

well i have something to tell you. that is not love.

there is a reason that you obsess over the validation form romantic others, past and present and even possible ones. it is because you exist, and you make me feel like deep down i am only worth the love that iwas given as a child and because that is all i know that is all that i am ever going to have in the future.

well i have something to tell you. that is not the sort of love you are worthy of. despite only habing that for years, and growing up in a home htat made this the mantra, you are worthy of unconditional love. the sort of love that forgives, does not obligate. the kind of love that is consistent.

when you come about attachment, i will remember why you are there. you are my brain trying ot recreate erxpereinces i had when i was little because you believe that is all that there is. you are trying to make me safe by putting me in scenarios that i can handle because i have done it before. and i loev you for trying to provide that protection.

but i am stronger than you think. i can handle hareatbreak and i did it really well. but, most imoportantly, i know that i can handle love. i can handle unconditional love and i can believe that it is truly unconditional. i do it all the time. that unconditional love comes from within me. i feel it for myself. i feel it for so many other people. and so manh people, my parents (who really fucked up but still) who had weird ways of showing it, but do love me unconditionally.

today i am going to say goodbye to this attachment to romantic love. and i will not continue thinking i don’t need romantic love. instead, i will think i love myself unconditionally, i love others unconditionally, and i am loved unconditionally.

may this remind me of the power i already know i have.

i love you mason, deeply. i love you even when you’re doing everything you possibly can to recreate what happened to you when you were little. i love when you mess up. i love you, truly, and that will not change.

now. let’s dance. 🙂