So, I know that you know I wrote a few articles about you in the past, confessing that I will always love you, telling the new girl that there are certain ways in which she needs to love you, vowing to anyone who asked that, no, I would never, ever stop loving you because you were everything and God-forbid I gather self-respect and love myself instead. I loved you, and that's all that would ever matter to me.

Cringe-worthy, right?

Yeah, I thought so, too.

I'll be honest, I spent a long time missing you. I spent a long time wondering why I wasn't enough for you, wondering what I did wrong, wondering what I could have done differently.

Then one day, I realized it wasn't me. It was you.

I remember the day so clearly. I'm not going to go into detail, because a revelation like that, earth-shattering, life-changing, is something I want to keep for myself. It was my proud moment that has absolutely nothing to do with you. So no, I won't go into detail.

But, here's what I will tell you: The moment was awesome.

I thought I would spend forever writing articles about how I missed you, about how your love was unlike anything else, and then I thought about this one instead.

I think this one's a lot better, but that's just me.

Now that I'm well into my new chapter, I think almost daily about how I would not be here had you never left. I wouldn't be at the school that I love, surrounded by some of the best people, some of which I now call my best friends. I never would have met some of the people I care so deeply for now because I never would have started partying just to have some time to forget you.

I never would have had to learn what it was like to be alone and be OK with being that way.

I probably would have dropped out of school and willingly picked up your habits, if only because that's what would have made sense to me. Anything to keep you, right? Even if keeping you meant becoming this shell of myself that I didn't recognize, it would have been worth it to me back then.

Now? Not so much. Now, I'm just months away from being done with college, with an amazing internship lined up for the summer, and my future at my fingertips.

All without you, because I was forced to go on without you.

You probably would not have been happy in the end, either. Who would be happy with someone they had to settle for in the way that you would have been settling in spending forever with a girl like me? After all, who wants a girl who tries to change you for the better? The person who loves you wouldn't want to change you at all, right?

Thank you for leaving. Truly, thank you for hurting me and making me reinvent and rebuild.

I am so sorry that I wasn't what you wanted, and I am incredibly happy that you have found happiness.

You deserve it.

But I deserve it more.