Broken Heart

She took the risk and in the end, she chalked the loss up to timing; it never being right. And, they could never seem to get on the same page. What they each wanted was different. But, those reasons, (the ones that she thought would give her a peace of mind) didn't keep her from having a million questions and they didn't keep her heart from breaking. Just because she knew she had to let it go, (for her sanity, her soul, & heart's sake) didn't mean it would be easy. She knew having to face and sort through the aftermath of a broken heart would be hard. She also knew, her unresolved emotions and unanswered questions would remain just that, unresolved and unanswered. She wanted closure, but that was something she'd have to find on her own. Her strong-willed mind was already there; ready to close it, let it go, and move on; she knew what was best. It was her heart (the one that held on for so long, the one filled with hope for a future) that struggled to catch up. She believed it would,eventually. She just wanted it to be sooner. No one wants to feel the kind of pain or loss that seems to make your world stop spinning. But, the truth is, there is no escaping the aftermath. At least not for her; the amount of love she had for him is the amount of hurt she would endure. And, just as expected, a wave of emotions would overwhelm her, hitting all at once. With tears in her eyes, she wondered, “just how do I get my heart to stop loving him? How do I stop the (literal) ache in my chest because I won’t see his face or hear his voice anymore? How do I get rid of the knots in my stomach because his absence is painfully present? Why didn't he tell me how to let him go before he walked away?” Just how do you convince a broken heart that what it believed to be real, what was there just yesterday, isn’t there anymore? She’d eventually realize you don’t. There is no ‘shutting it off'; not for her. There was nothing simple about the way she loved him, so there would be nothing simple about letting him go.

This was something she would have to go through until she just didn’t have to go through it anymore. And she would do that by going with what her mind already knew. By changing her focus and simply taking it day by day; while making the conscious decision to put herself first. By appreciating it for what it was and learning from what went wrong. By not letting it make her feel like something was ‘wrong’ with her or her love. By not letting it create self-doubt, or low self-esteem. By not letting it change her (for the worse). By taking time for self-evaluation and allowing room for growth. By learning to set boundaries and sticking to them. By learning to guard her heart, just a little bit more. By not only forgiving him but also forgiving herself. By believing what was meant for her would make its way to her; and it became painfully clear he wasn’t the one for her. She would keep living and loving the way she knew how and eventually she wouldn’t feel the sadness that still lingered. A sadness she wanted to avoid but knew she couldn’t. It was an intense, overwhelming kind of love and heart break that caught her off guard. But, even off guard and through heartache, (one, she thought, she would never recover from) she swore, none of it would make her bitter. She would never let it change how she loved. And she would never, lose hope. She would survive the aftermath.