No one shows your heart how to love, but then isn’t that what hearts just do? My heart was a pure organ; delicate, naive and inexperienced. Love just happens, they told me. Slowly you took and hesitantly I gave. The motion of taking and giving grew until one day I did it without a thought. Effortlessly. Like your breath, each inhale and exhale they shift with ease, one after the other. I began to love like I breathed, steadily, fluently.
Then, one day, the gray clouds gathered above and I chose to ignore the gloominess. The overcast spoke silently. I disregarded the signs. Not because I wasn’t aware, but because I was comfortable, sharing and giving. I was breathing just fine, effortlessly.
Without a signal the storm rocked my existence and I was left staring out at nothingness. Numb to my own thoughts and to the wounds that appeared. I was unsure what broke first, my heart or my soul. One after the other the pieces tore apart. The morsels continued to fall as I tried to gather them, but I was buried deep. With each piece I bled deeper.
I grieved, anger set in and I fought with denial and just like the process demanded, depression overpowered. I bargained with guilt. Just as you mourn death, I mourned the parts of my heart that had no pulse, the parts that were silenced, the parts I couldn’t bring back to life.
I no longer wanted the give and take, it revolted me. I gave love in abundance because it satisfied me and yet I rarely asked. I withdrew from taking because I felt selfish. The scraps you fed my heart were enough for me to survive on, until you mocked my innocence. Your harsh derisive blows demeaned my empathic soul.
I tired from the never ending blows, I was exhausted from continuously trying to pick up my broken pieces. The final stage is acceptance, so they say, except I didn’t master this stage. My heart changed with this episode. You see, with each soul who sets foot within these boundaries now, becomes an intruder. Acceptance means I’m willing. I bargained with the paradox of tolerance. Tolerance demands discomfort and I’m not ready to be uncomfortable again.
I wanted to go back in time, to the place where my virgin heart was left to beat alone, silently, rhythmically. Now emotional intimacy seems much harder than it is because it involves exposing pieces of my damaged organ. Tying strings means compromises, expectations and loyalty and my heart isn’t ready to display such traits.
I ponder from time to time. How many hearts have torn like mine, how many mended, how many just settled and how many hearts continue to bleed a slow agonizing death. I moved on from the endless giving, the scars will remain but the aftermath left a different version of me. A toughened heart, one that still manages to beat and yet somehow foolishly yearns to be loved. My heart was never taught how to love. Love they told me, just happens. And as easily as that, I have taught myself how to unlove.