I was in middle school when I realized what the word "love" meant. Of course, my parents loved me and my sister loved me, but when it came to relationships I had no idea.

There was a cute boy in my class who I called my boyfriend. I had my first date, my first kiss, my first relationship with this boy. It was middle school, but to me, he was my first love. After about six months, our relationship ended and I was heartbroken. I loved and lost in those short months.

About a year and a half later, high school happened. "What's meant to be, will be." I found my way back to my first love and when we were together, it felt like we were never apart. I know some people will look at this and say I had no idea what love was when I was only twelve or thirteen, but I believe that I did.

For almost four years I fell in love all over again every day for the same guy that I had my first kiss with when I was twelve.
He taught me how to love, how to laugh at myself when I messed up, how to not beat myself up when I felt guilty about something or felt like I had done something wrong. He taught me what it was like to miss someone, to feel those butterflies that people hear about in songs, how to drive stick, even if I was terrible at it and got mad when I had to try over and over again until I got it right.

Just shy of that fourth year in our relationship, I lost that love again. Heartbroken, just like I was thirteen all over again.
I never really knew what it meant to "move on." Having my best friends talking to me and making sure I was okay. "It's okay, Alex. You just have to move on." I didn't even know what that meant.

For a while, I had to learn how to find myself because, in the midst of it all, I didn't know who I was without him. I avoided coming home for a while after I left for college because it's a small town and I wasn't ready for anything that could have happened.

I can barely look at a traffic light or sing along to certain country songs without having that stupid guy in my head.
My future for a long time only had him in it and I had to make a lot of adjustments. I think Thomas Rhett said it best, "You make plans and you hear God laughing."

I'm not really sure if you ever truly let go. Let go of your first love and the feelings you had. I firmly believe in "what's meant to happen will happen." So if being on my own for a while was meant to happen, then so be it.

For all the people out there who think they'll never be happy again, the people who say, "there will never be another person like them," or if you even believe that you "don't deserve love" after you've lost your love: you're wrong.

It pains me to say that it takes time; it takes time to heal and to be able to feel like you can breathe again on your own.
Perhaps I lost my first love, but he won't be the last person to love me. I believe there is someone out there for everyone, whether that someone is a man or it's my cat or it's me living with my college roommate in my seventies (sorry Victoria, we all know you're getting married eventually.)

I stopped believing in love for a long time, but eventually, I'll get there and I hope you do too.