You May Have Broken Me Once, But I’m Not Broken Anymore

When I met you, I truly believed that you would be one of the people who were here for a lifetime. You were perfect to me. I will never forget sitting with you at Panera and just simply being amazed by this man across from me. I could write about the way you laugh at idiotic memes on Facebook until you can’t breathe. I could write about the way your eyes light up when you talk about your dreams. I could list out all the reasons I fell in love with you. I won’t do that though because I know that none of it matters anymore.

When you broke up with me, I went from thinking that you were one of the people who would be here for a lifetime to thinking you were just meant to be in my life for a season. I don’t think you will ever be able to understand the way my world changed when you left me. I was broken; You broke me. During the two year run of our relationship, you were the person who built me up. You taught me about life, about God, about friendship, about trust and about true love. Then you taught me about heartbreak. You were the one person on this earth that I trusted whole-heartedly, the one person I thought would never hurt me, but I guess that was my mistake.

While I lay alone trying my hardest to reconstruct myself, I discovered that you were placed in my life for a reason. When our relationship ended, I felt things that I had never felt before: lost, hopeless, worthless. I realized that I had planned my entire future around you, once again my mistake. I had no plan for the future, because “my plan” had always actually been just to follow your plan. You were placed in my life, and then taken out, to teach me about myself. I didn’t truly know who I was until I had to start over completely.

Now we can get to why I am saying all of this: Thank you. Thank you for loving me when I didn’t love myself. Thank you for helping me to grow a stronger connection to my faith. Thank you for supporting me through my fight with anxiety. Thank you for proving that someone cared when I wanted to kill myself. Thank you for showing me how joyful living can be.

Our relationship, and ultimately its demise, may be one of the best things that has ever happened to me. Since breaking up my life has changed in so many ways, and what’s crazy is that you are still the person I want to share these things with most. I have been re-applying to schools all over the country, I have been writing almost every day and I have grown exponentially closer to my family. I honestly hope you are doing as well as I am since you made the decision to end us.

Now I am sitting alone at Panera, and I can’t help but just be simply amazed that I always thought I needed you. I still miss you more that you know, but I now know that as much as I want you, I don’t need you. I have finally found myself. Thank you.