#losingyoufindingme

[persimmonsrain]

To let him go like I let him in

I loved him hardcore. With everything. With the kind of love that rearranged my routines, my priorities, my sense of time. I thought about him in the middle of conversations, in between lesson plans, in the silence of a shower. He was in the fabric of my day. I didn’t ration it. I didn’t hold back. I loved like my hands weren’t shaking. I gave like I didn’t know heartbreak. I softened parts of myself that took years to harden. I let him in.

And now, I want to let him go the same way I let him in fully. Not gently. Not quietly. I want to let go like tearing roots from soil. I want to scream into a pillow and then sip tea right after. I want to cry on the floor if I have to. I want to delete the pictures, write the poems, feel the ache until it leaves my body. Because if I loved without holding back, then I deserve to grieve without pretending.

Letting go isn’t graceful right now. It’s ugly. It’s unfiltered. It comes in waves. One moment I feel like I’m free, the next I’m checking my phone like a prayer. But I’m learning to accept that love and loss aren’t opposites. That I can still miss someone and choose to move on. That I can still cry and still mean it when I say, “I deserve more.”

This time, I won’t pretend to be fine too soon. I won’t romanticize the pain, but I won’t deny it either. I’ll feel it all. Fully. Because that’s the only way I know how to love.

I didn’t lose him. I released him. And in doing so, I found the parts of me I used to give away too easily.