I am a self-proclaimed selfish woman.

No, this statement does not come from a place of self-depreciation. I'm not saying this because I'm angry at myself or feeling hateful. This is something I choose to tell the world because I'm quite honestly proud of it.

I have turned into a selfish human, and I couldn't be happier with who I've become.

I have become a girl who will never sacrifice her well-being for another's. I have become a girl who will be in relationships because they make me happy, not for someone else. I have become a girl who does not believe that love is putting someone else before herself. I have become a girl who might not always love herself, but who will sure as hell try every step of the way.

Some of you might wonder how I can be in fulfilling and happy relationships, platonic or otherwise, with this mentality.

When I share these views, I often am told that I don't understand the nature of love or that I only care for myself. Yet this is not the case. In my relationships, I do things that, ostensibly, give me no benefit. When my friend is sick, I'll take a long bus ride to Walgreens to pick something up for him. If a potential partner wants to talk about something that is of no interest to me but that they're passionate about, of course I'll let them. Yet I will be the first to admit that I don't do these things out of just the goodness of my heart, receiving nothing in return.

When I do things for the people I love, it makes me feel happy and fulfilled. If my sick friend has the medicine he needs, I feel better about his situation and feel like a good, dutiful friend. Listening to a rant about something I don't care about to make my hypothetical partner happy would make me happy, because I love seeing passionate people loving things wholeheartedly. Anything I do for other people ends up, through some process, making me happy or making me feel fulfilled. Otherwise, I shouldn't be doing it.

I've been in a situation where I gave to others without any benefit to myself, where I did things that made me unhappy because I "loved" someone. That situation was quite accurately labelled by my therapist as abusive, and I'm still working to recover from the long-lasting consequences of it. While I was in that situation, I was a fundamentally unhappy person, a person who didn't want to kill herself but also who didn't want to be alive. I was trying to pour water from a cup that was empty, fully exhausting myself doing things for others without a single care for myself. Some might call it noble. I call it being victim to a one-sided, manipulative relationship borne of hatred for myself and forced attachment to someone else.

And it's a situation I don't care to be in again.

That situation has taught me infinite life lessons. It's taught me that typical notions of romantic love and friendship often help romanticize codependency, that they encourage people to either latch onto someone else or accept that someone else has latched onto them and "needs" them. They teach people to look for someone who makes them "whole", a "missing piece" or someone that will put their needs before yours.

I am not that person. I refuse to be anyone's other half, or their missing piece. I refuse to tolerate being treated poorly because you "need" me.

Yes, I will make your life better if you're in any sort of relationship for me--I'd hope I do. However, I will not be in any relationship with someone who doesn't make me happy, with someone who drains me or makes my life harder. I will not give to you if you don't give in return, I refuse to be unhappy so you can be satisfied. I'd hope anyone else entering into a relationship with me feels the same way.

So if this makes me selfish, I will shout it from the mountaintops. Yes, I am selfish. I am a selfish woman, and it has taken me years to be this way. It's taken me a very long time to love and care for myself enough to understand that I should be living my life for one person and one person only: me. Even if I bring others into it who I want to make happy, my ultimate question will be: do the things I'm doing bring me satisfaction?

If not, something needs to change, because I am a selfish woman, I live for my happiness, and I will not be shamed for it.