My parents divorced when I was 5, and like a lot of couples, it wasn’t exactly “true love” when they found each other. This is where my skepticism with love began.

As the years have gone by, I have searched for answers to better understand, and prove to myself, the existence of the love that is found in fairytales.

I buried my nose in books attempting to uncover universal truths about relationships, listened to thousands of love songs pursuing emotions the artist manifested, studied couple’s habits and behaviors, and spent countless hours pouring over poetry, art, films, and whatever else I could get my hands on to get a glimpse of what “true love” looks like.

I wanted to believe in it; I wanted to have faith in its existence. But I gave up my hunt for proof and lost hope in fairytale endings a long time ago.

“True love” was unrealistic. Irrational, and made up by Hollywood as a marketing tool to boost their sales. I was acting childish for wanting to believe in fairytales and forced myself to grow up. Physically, the evidence wasn’t trustworthy enough; everywhere I looked, I was surrounded by divorce, infidelity, and broken and toxic relationships. So I made everything have an explanation or excuse; everything was rationally thought out and calculated. Love stories became fictions of the author’s imagination, they weren’t real. Love songs became the product of another over-dramatic musician using a relationship to sell their music and make a profit. I had everything figured out, or at least I thought I had.

Like most teenagers, I started to date. And while friends around me were hooking up, getting into relationships with their high school crushes, I was left dissatisfied and bored. I didn’t date with intentions of finding my Prince Charming because he didn’t exist. I did it for the fleeting thrill that came with attention. And shortly after those ephemeral feelings passed, I got over it as quickly as it started.

Dating isn’t the perpetrator. But as I watched relationships crumble around me, it was hard not to see the destruction of not believing in something more than society’s hookup, and quick-to-divorce culture. I don’t know if there is only one true love out there for each of us, or if we can expect our relationships to look like Hollywood’s cinematic portrayal of them. Those are questions that I don’t have answers to. But I do have one answer: I’m done settling.

I want to find a love that is wild — consuming every thought, and every feeling I have. A love that makes me question my securities and accept my weaknesses. A love that makes me want to be better, that challenges every doubt the world has planted deep in the chasms of my heart. The kind of love that seems impossible, against all odds and every wicked trick of fate. I want to stop taking calculated risks and take a chance on true love’s kiss and happily ever after’s.

There has to be more than what we are settling for. Call me crazy, with insurmountable expectations, but after all my years of my skepticism, I need to believe that love is more than just a concept for dreamers.

I would rather wait my whole life for something magical than date inconsequential boys who I find attractive at the time. So bring on forever, I’m ready.