For as long as I can remember one of my core desires has always been love. As a child I craved nurturing from my parents or acceptance from my siblings and peers, but most of my memories from age 15 to present day has included me longing to be chosen and cherished in that special way by someone whose willing to accept every part of me. It’s a desire I still bear to this day, but over the years I’ve grown more content and accepting of the possibility I won’t get it. Not in a pessimistic insecure “nobody will ever love me” way, just acknowledgment that life doesn’t always work out the way you want it to. But I crave love so much because I went so long never truly feeling it. Growing up I struggled to connect with anybody. Peers at school or, my family even. From being talked over in group discussions to my input getting shot down the second I finally got a chance to speak. I was already very timid but it felt like I was never truly wanted in any space I entered. Even if it wasn’t conscious ostracization on my friends part, I could tell they all enjoyed each others company way more than mine. I could tell that they had something meaningful that I was just an observer of, and it all left me feeling isolated. 

These experiences lead me to isolate even further just to avoid that feeling of rejection. I buried my personality so far down the only type of expression I could muster up was this perpetual state of robotic contentment, I hid my interests and kept my opinions to myself. I became a complete shell of what I wanted to be. Every snide remark, judgemental stare and shift in energy at my arrival that I received from the people I craved approval from just affirmed to my young fragile mind that every part of me was something to be ashamed of. This was what my life was like from the moment I was able to retain memory to middle school. Once I reached high school things were different; at first I still struggled to make friends or find community with anybody, that was until I discovered the joys of dating. 

Before then, I was never really interested in relationships. Partially because I understood I was young and love wasn’t a priority, but another part of me didn’t bother because I felt like I didn’t have a chance. If my family or friends barely wanted to be associated with me how could a lover? That was a mindset I had internalized for a long time. But when I got to high school and ended up on the receiving end of romantic (but mostly sexual) attention I relished in it. It felt like the thing I was missing for so long had finally fallen into my lap. For once I felt appreciated, valued, acknowledged. The butterflies, physical affection and praise I received from any boy I found cute enough felt euphoric to me. I spent most of sophomore and junior year falling into relationships and looking for love. Even though I eventually made amazing friends I wouldn’t trade for the world, I didn’t really place the same amount of significance to my relationships with them at the time. I had long given up on trying to seek fulfillment in platonic or familial dynamics. Relationships felt safer to me, more deliberate. It wasn’t just someone obligated to like you because you’re related or around each other everyday, it was someone that saw you, your essence and decided that it was worth being a priority. That became my new high to chase.

I spent so long letting love consume my entire being that I completely lost sight of who I was, but it’s not like I ever had a good idea of who I was to begin with. I spent so long pushing it all down to avoid judgement from others, and dating in such an underdeveloped and lost stage of my life made it so much worse. I became an extension of whoever I was with rather than my own person. All of my time revolved around whoever was giving me affection in that moment, I was nothing more than a girlfriend or a fling and that’s exactly what I wanted to be. Because at the time all that mattered to me was that any part of me was wanted. Before that point my whole life was me feeling shunned, undervalued and insignificant. It didn’t matter if it was just my body or the desperation that made me behave in lovesick ways that would boost any teenage boys ego. I just wanted to believe any part of me was likeable. 

It was only worsened when I began being sexually active. I’ve always struggled with hypersexuality, and when I finally got the opportunity to live out the thing I thought I would only ever experience in fanfiction and movies it unlocked a new type of dependence. Being touched became the new thing I used to prove I was worth someone’s time. I oversexualized myself out of worry that my partner might tire of me if I came off too human. I reduced myself to a body and gave myself to uncommitted flings, but deep down I knew I wanted something more serious, more intimate. Regardless I accepted whatever was handed my way because even part of me being wanted was better than none of me. 

Despite the lack of committment I was still deeply devoted to these surface level connections. I loved with my entire soul and laid under every partner with unwavering loyalty. Even if I knew they weren’t good for me, even if I was unsatisfied with the way things sat in uncertainty. I felt that if I stuck around long enough, if I proved myself to be loving and nurturing enough that they’d eventually want something more like in the movies. But did reality crash down on me, and every time it did I lost it. Whenever those flings proved to be arbitrary and short lived I couldn’t handle it. I expected every partner I ended up having to be my last, HOPING it would be my last and that we’d live happily together. Whenever that fantasy was disrupted it felt like my entire world was collapsing. I’d blow up at them, miss so much school due to how depressed I was, and became more codependent with my friends to avoid the detrimental solitude I’d be locked into after. 

As time has passes and I transition into adulthood I still carry some of these habits albeit with more self awareness and control. Finding out about the possibility of BPD made my world make a lot more sense. Now I have a better idea of who I am and what I want out of life, and I now know I want to be so much more than someone’s girlfriend. But I’m still learning how to be a “me” as Mr. Peanutbutter said in Bojack Horseman (my fav show lol). My actions need time to catch up with my brain, the male centered yearning for intimacy still permiates my motives and how I move around life. I recently came to the realization that I can desire love, there’s nothing wrong with that. People love to paint those who want to be wanted as desperate or pathetic when love is something that everyone needs no matter where it comes from. For a long time I internalized that, I felt like me wanting to be held was a sign of weakness. That the way I fell apart during breakups made me incapable of being a strong woman, and by extension a disappointment to feminism. Especially as a bisexual woman who hasn’t had any experiences with other women. I know there’s a stigma around us in general, that we’re just pretending to like women for male attention and when it comes down to it our endgame will be some guy that we left a genuine, caring woman for. It’s hard to have our identity separated from our proximity to men but especially if you’re someone like me, whose only ever been with men her entire life. I often feel like a disappointment to my community for not having any luck in finding queer women who are also interested in me, but that may be another topic for another day. 

But I learned that my loving nature didn’t make me pathetic, just the way I acted on it. Losing myself completely, feeling like my world meant nothing when yet another talking stage or relationship failed, using it as proof that my siblings and every community I tried to find solace in were right to ostracize me, letting my feelings hold me back socially and academically. Since graduating high school, I began to see what great qualities I have as a human being, not just a love interest. I guess leaving such a toxic and overwhelming environment cleared my head enough to finally think more about myself. I know those things are true, that I’m capable of being on my own and I have a bright future outside of whoever I decide to marry. But I still find myself falling into similar habits after breakups, spiraling, overthinking, letting their existence consume my every thought, becoming an empty husk begging the universe for a lover to fill me with life. 

I’ve been improving, I know healing isn’t linear and in the grand scheme of things I’m just at the beginning. But don’t get me wrong I still do want to be in love soooo badly. There’s something so pure and rejuvenating about being chosen and loved despite your mess. As someone whose mess drove people away just as much as my squeaky clean front, it’s been a lifelong dream of mine to come across someone I can’t scare off. Someone that’s comfortable with me and everything that makes me complex. But until then I’m learning to hold and accept my complexity on my own. Of course self love doesn’t really cancel out wanting romantic love, but I guess I only really want it so bad because I’m pretty lonely in my day to day life. I have amazing friends but they’re so busy with their own lives and relationships that we don’t talk often as I’d like. It’s usually just me, my thoughts and my notebooks. But in a way I appreciate the solitude,  it proves to me that I don’t necessarily NEED someone to be the person I’ve been for myself these past 2 years and it made me realize that I already possess the traits I’ve always desired in a partner. And that is something beautiful to me. :)