Dear First Love,
I have had you on my mind a lot lately. Maybe it's this season of life that I am in, where I'm seeing all of our old friends getting engaged. Maybe it's the memories that are associated with our story and the arrival of spring and summer. Yet maybe it's me thinking about it being three years since our relationship fell apart. Whatever the reason, I've been thinking about you.
When I shut my eyes and let my heart go back, I can see your face and hear your voice so clearly. I hear you tease me about this or that with nothing less than love and kindness. I see your eyes so tenderly looking into mine with a sparkle that I know was echoed in mine, and I remember the feeling of hope that our love would go on forever.
I had dreams where we would be the ones getting engaged after graduating college. That we would be the ones making wedding plans together in the fall. That we would be the ones our friends were jealous of. Yet, fate had different plans... Or maybe you had different plans all along.
Regardless of it all... I want you to know that it was you.
It was you who I wanted to love forever.
It was you who I wanted to grow old with and die with. Of course, I would have had to go first, because I never wanted to live without you by my side.
It was you who I wanted to live life with.
I wanted to share our dreams together. I wanted to have a family together. I wanted you to be there at the bottom and at the top with me.
It was you. It was always you.
Yet, life intervened and changed those wishes I had for us. If I'm being honest, I knew the day you left to pursue your dreams in another county across the state that I was losing you.
When you got in your truck and drove away after saying goodbye that day, it took everything in me not to chase after you and beg you not to leave me. Yet I knew if I really loved you, I had to let you go live the life you dreamed of having... Even if that life was not with me.
And you did.
You lived a life to where you had one person in your new life and came home to me on the weekends.
You lived a life to where you told me you loved me, yet were texting her the same thing.
You lived a life to where you told me that if I waited for you, then you would finally wrapped your head around things.
Yet in the end, you chose a new life with her, knowing that she would never love you like I did.
Still, you told me that my love would not be enough for you any longer.
First love, I now know that I was not your first love. I know that she was. I know that she hurt you like you hurt me. Yet I still will say that you will never know the hurt that I still feel in my heart today.
The hurt that comes when you come running back to me when your relationships fall apart knowing that you'll only be back in my life for a little while.
The hurt that comes when you choose another girl over me, even though I am the one who has stood by your side the longest.
The hurt that comes when my friends give me sympathetic looks when I have to tell them that you aren't in my life anymore.
The hurt that comes from having to be your best friend, instead of everything we used to be.
The hurt that comes from when you tell me that you still love me.
But that I'm still not enough.
For three years, I have fought this battle with you. Up and down I've let you play me like a yo-yo. You can hold me close then throw me far when you don't need me.
I have let you grow in the relationships you chose for yourself, but chastise the ones I try to grow into.
I've let you say time and time again..
"He's not good enough for you."
"He's not your type."
"He's not into you."
"You deserve better."
Yet, I have to realize in order to grow in my relationships with others... I have to let you go. It's time that I say goodbye.
First love, you will always be in my heart. There will be a corner only you will call home.
But the time to say goodbye is here.
So goodbye, first love. I will always love you, but I just can't be in your life anymore. I can't let you keep ruining mine any longer.
I'm sorry. It's just time.
Maybe in another time and another place we were meant to be, but at least in this life it has to be this way.
Sincerely,
The girl whose heart you will control no longer.
