Lessons on Love

 "...Begging for love is suicide...You deserve more attention than his phone, you deserve quality time not just time, you deserve effort not just routines, you deserve to be treated as if you are priority not the last thing on his checklist. "

 1. Love can be paralysing

You wondered why you couldn't leave him. Everyday you practised your farewell speech which was based on how you knew he didn't love you anymore and you deserved better. Things were different from how it was when it began. You no longer got his cute morning texts, he stopped calling and he took hours to respond to your messages. You felt like you were begging him to love you each time you complained about how things were not the same. How can you be with someone and still feel so alone? Everyday you felt a new pain, everyday you wanted to leave, but instead of the farewell speech, you called him in defeat with your voice reeking of neediness to 'check on him and find out how his day was going' because somehow his name took root in your throat and everything reminded you of his mouth. How could you possibly leave when you had drowned yourself in him and you felt completely helpless?

2. Unrequited love is one of the most horrible things in this world, but loving someone who loves another is worse.

Where did you learn to find the unavailable so attractive? Your first kiss was with a guy who would bully you in front of his friends but call you to the empty classroom to reach for the under of your skirt. Your first love was a guy with a girlfriend. And she was beautiful and perfect in a way you felt you could never be. You would watch him carry her up in his arms with his eyes full of love. After years of loving men who never chose you, you never felt enough. You tried to change and become more like her - softer, prettier. You closed your mouth more. He didn't need to hear about how your day went, your achievements and your big dreams. He didn't need to know what made you smile. You tried being a girl you thought would be easier to love. But was that enough still?

3. Love the one that loves you. It's safer.

Why do you do this - want the one that doesn't want you? Leave the one that wants to stay? You pick the one that makes you worry he's with someone else when he's not with you. He tells you no man can live up to the one in your head. That you're being too needy, too sensitive. When all you want is to feel loved. How hard is it? You don't notice the one that leaves 5 missed calls on your phone and messages. You don't notice the one that keeps begging for a chance.

4. Learn from your mother's silent regrets.

Your mother learnt to live with a closed mouth and a fat body full of disappointments; all the years of being an accessory to a man – to feed his ego 'his silent obedient wife who cooks good meals, cleans the house, washes his clothes, gives him children- more importantly male children'. A silent obedient wife who looks the other way when her husband comes home drunk and reeking of adultery. A silent obedient wife that does not question his authority. "Marriage isn't about love, it's about tolerating the other person". How long can you tolerate a person for? Every year the same weak smile, the same sad eyes, the same grave nod in agreement to whatever her husband says, the same silence. Is that living?

5. Go spiritual 

Prayer is the key we are told. After how many heartbreaks is someone allowed to run mad? Sometimes you would wonder how inhuman and cruel what they did was; come into your life like that, turn everything upside down, make you love them and then leave like nothing happened while you're left to hold together the pieces of what is left of your heart. There should be a special place in hell for people like them. There should be an eleventh commandment condemning such an act. "Thou shalt not destroy thy neighbour's life in the name of love". You asked God time and time again, "Why did you let this happen?" "Why did you let me meet this person?" "Was I not just fine by myself?” Each night night you recited the name of all the demons that had broken you like a song while clutching to your chest. Will the pain ever go away? You wish them hell, you wish them pain, you pray someone destroys them the same way they destroyed you.