time heals everything, baby

It’s late on a Saturday night, ‘Malibu Nights’ by LANY is playing, I’m drinking green tea, there’s a caramel scented candle burning and I’m about to dissect my darkest, most private thoughts for a blog entry. Just casual.

I think we can all agree that being in love is fucking awesome and being heartbroken is fucking awful. I’ve spent far too much time (anxious, existential dread time) wondering if being in love is worth it – if it compensates for the heartbreak. I’m hoping that if I reflect on that here, I’ll come to some kind of conclusion about it all. 

I was fourteen when I first loved someone and I remember everything. I remember looking at him like he hung the stars in the sky and being with him felt like home. We talked on the phone for hours and promised each other dumb stuff. We were so young and so stupid, but we loved each other very much and that was all that mattered.

It ended, like most things do, and being truly heartbroken was nothing like I expected it to be. I did not eat ice cream in my pyjamas and watch sad movies till I fell asleep. I did not cut off all my hair in some bold attempt at reclaiming my sense of self. I did not burn his clothes in a raging fire. The experience was not a cute, month-long journey to self-discovery. I did not emerge confident and graceful and all the wiser.

Speaking candidly, it was pretty much the most painful thing I’ve ever experienced. I think I spent most of winter 2018 crying, and I’m giggling as I type this because it sounds like such a cliché, but I don’t think there was a day from May to August where I didn’t cry at least once. On the bus home, in the school bathroom, at the dinner table, in class, with my friends, on my own, at work, in bed, on the shower floor, at the gym.

It’s funny, I can recall the relationship so vividly, but remembering the breakup is difficult. The days blur into each other. I know that there were lots of panic attacks, and lots of counselling sessions, and not much sleep, and suppressed appetite, and subsequent weight loss, and dry hair and breakouts, and so much music, and complete hopelessness. I really wish I was exaggerating, but I was a giant mess. 

I desperately sought a way to make things easier, but the truth is that there is no cure-all fix to getting over someone. I think that is what I struggled with most – it is such a personal experience and what works for one person might not work for someone else. Heartbreak is not one-size-fits-all, it is not romantic, it is not empowering. It sucks. 

There is one conversation that stuck with me, though. I confided in one of my friends – a very special woman who means more to me than she’ll ever know – and she told me that I had to fill in the gap that he had left. Love is an energy, and like all energy, it cannot be created or destroyed. I had to find people that I could love wholly until I could love myself again.

Finding worthy people was incredibly easy. I leaned so heavily on my friends – they picked me up off the floor and made me laugh till my ribs were tight and held me through every breakdown. My pain was their pain and they made the load a little lighter. I could see them flourishing and I wanted to do the same, and it was through them that I found myself again. Loving them was effortless.

I didn’t think I would ever love anyone as much as I loved him, until I spent some time with myself. Now it comes naturally.

It took about three months for the crying to cease. After six months, I no longer felt the need to see my counsellor. Eight months on and I had fully made my peace with what had happened. Sometimes, you have to hit your absolute rock bottom before you can find the light again. You have to allow yourself to be hurt, and wallow in it for a while, and then begin to pick up the pieces.

For most of us, heartbreak is inevitable. If you are collapsed on the bathroom floor and you can’t see through the tears and the emptiness is expanding in your chest, I want you to know that their absence does not make you less worthy of love. You are so beautiful. You are brave for giving yourself so entirely to someone else, and I am so proud of you for that. Vulnerability is not weakness – it is trust in its purest form.

I don’t know if I will ever experience anything like that again, but I know that I cannot let it hold me back. Love really is all we have, it is why we are here, it is what motivates us and fulfils us and gives us hope. We must choose love, always.

You are going to be okay. Time heals everything, baby.

Sincerely, Grace