Actually, I'm not fine… blog

Part 2:

I used to leave. That was my pattern.

If something didn’t benefit me, if I couldn’t control it, if it got too loud or too heavy, I walked away. I didn’t care to fight for what I didn’t understand. I told myself it was strength, but really, it was fear disguised as indifference. I was an expert at shutting doors before they slammed in my face.

But with my partner, I ran; not because I didn’t care, but because I cared too much. His presence scared me in every possible way. He forced me out of my comfort zone. He confronted the demons I tried so hard to silence. He asked me to sit with my pain instead of burying it.

And when I crumbled under the weight of my own emotions, he never threw them back at me. Instead, he created a safe space, a place where I could fall apart and still be loved. Even in my explosions, there was always a blanket of patience stretched over the chaos.

He was the calm in my storm, the flower growing out of the ruins of my mind. He has been that way since we were young. I didn’t understand it then. I only knew he was the one person who could push every button I had, who could make me furious and nervous and alive all at once.

It took years (decades) to understand that it wasn’t anger, it wasn’t frustration, it wasn’t fear, it was safety. He was the only person I could be my full self around, even when that self was messy, broken, or unbearable.

And the hardest truth? When I ran, he didn’t chase me. He respected my words, my boundaries, my choices, even when they were laced with fear. That confused me. I thought love meant pursuit, the kind I saw in movies, where if they didn’t chase you, they didn’t really want you. But he taught me something I never expected; that real love doesn’t need to trap or chase. Real love stands steady and waits for you to see its truth.

I hated it. I hated him for it. Not for who he was, but for what he made me confront in myself.

But now I see it clearly. The truth he gave me was the very thing I needed to grow.