Welcome to youngladinher20s
Exploring Life in Your 20s
What this blog is all about
Anything and everything in this wild wild world .... and your 20's. A decade of anything and everything.
Breakups, this year seemed like the year of breakups.
Here are some vignettes around the year of breakups
10/25
To wholeheartedly heal, you must not see a person and the relationship with one truth or one emotion and or feelings toward them. You must accept all parts of the spectrum. That they hurt you, badly, and you still love them and know their deepest struggles. To just have anger and rage is not the whole truth. The truth is
​​​whenever I feel like reaching out , I say to myself my silence says this right now and then I write it down in my journal.
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Look at yourself and love yourself, ok girl. ok<3
11/6
Had my second to last in person therapy appointments today. And my therapist said something to me that is going to stick with me, she goes; you can have love for him but not be in love with him. And I do believe I'm not in love but have a lot of love and care for him.
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It got me thinking and upon other things we touched upon, I surrender to having love for you. I will stop fighting that I still deeply care and love for you even though its accompanied with a lot of anger, hurt, and pain. That love and care will always be there, so I won't fight it or push it aside. May it be a reminder of my first love, a person I had a real and deep relationship with. I hope the anger and fury transforms into me respecting myself and my worth in the next relationship, into my confidence in the relationship, into knowing I was too sweet for that lifestyle and his people and knowing when to say that and leave. And may my love and care always be there. The night we broke up I texted him and said I will always have love for you and I meant it. I deserve more from a relationship and my partner, and I can't change that I will always have love for you. So I'm not going to fight to change that, but I will change in what love I accept next and my views on my worthiness in love and so many more things this relationship taught, some the pretty way others the tumultuous way, beautiful all the same.
and that's my truth folks. <3
12/8
In the past​ few days, I have had some feelings about him. In conversations I get many reminders of him. I feel like I seeing things about him everywhere. In talking to a friend and our conversations about him teaching english and history, makes me think of him, I love how he loved history so much. How he had been so well traveled at a young age and loved to see the world. How he was politically with it, we were on same wavelength. Fuck I even liked how he grew up in a liberal ass town in Wisconsin. How he dressed and was a lil brown haired round tortoise shell glasses fella. His love for jazz too, I suppose. I know deep down he is not mature enough and frankly too much shit went down for us to be again. And, I really loved those characteristics he had. I accept that it just wasn't meant to be, and I guess I'm realizing the things I really loved about him in a different light.
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12/14
I know I could have done better in more ways than one in the relationship. That was such a year. I knew the kind of relationship I wanted, knew how I wanted things to be handled maturely, to work through conflict in a healthy way, have a solid rhythm of communication. A mature relationship. Instead it was a rollercoaster. Started off as a dream in the Boundary Waters ended kind of like a nightmare, well they all do. No endings are pretty. And if they are, did you every possess anything real and with depth? But that is not the point of this entry, the point is, had so much shit gone down would still be together? I don't often question this, or rather I didn't in the beginning of my healing because it really didn't matter, you can play that game all day, the facts is shit happened and the ship went down with it all (the relationship is the ship hehe). But I find myself pondering this close to 6 months post breakup. My therapist helped me process by saying you don't know how people are going to handle situations like losing your job, people's mental health struggles, deaths, big moves and changes across the country. Know that I'm listing it all out, we went through all that shit, less than a year of being in a relationship. I think I'm still healing from the unfinished business or the fact that I was in such survival mode or not at my best self, actually a true wave of struggle and self discovery that sure as hell wasn't pretty. He didn't get to see me at the other end, what came after that chapter. I can't help but want to question why he was there for such a tough season for me. I know, again its another scenic route to a dead end conclusion that is just heal and move on, you can spend so much time on the what if's or the why's. But still I'm human and can't think to help and ask why did it fail. I have made my peace and found my meaning of what that relationship helped me with. Still something lingers in me, trying to make complete sense of that, and the answer probably is you will never make complete sense and that is a sign it wasn't meant to be because it just didn't work. Because with the right partner you would have made it through the mud, right? Currently that is all I have though, is a relationship that failed, until I experience one that does work out and is the one I won't have to heal from, all I will have is the lingering of why did that have to happen, why did my heart have to break? Why did that year have to break us? It's weird to heal from a relationship that brought you to a place that is so not a space you normally exist in, its hard to make sense of it once it's finally over. How do you make sense of such chaos? How could I love someone so deeply and wasn't able to let go for awhile and at the same time had this thought always circling of is this me or is this us, something isn't working. If I had been in a better headspace or spot in life, would we have been able to work through our problems? I ended it because my gut and my boundaries and respect to myself said no more. I had reached my capacity. I didn't have what I needed in the relationship to stay. Had it been more a safe space for me, we could have moved through it all, rose above even. Instead the way it played out was I had to experience all that and then let him go to get aligned again. The truth is once it ended, I felt the last misalignment in my life was gone. Call that bad timing or wrong person? I have no clue. I got a conclusion once it ended, but just because I have a conclusion or know the ending, doesn't mean I am not filled with questions about the story.
12/29/25
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It's officially the 6 month mark. I miss the banter and laughing every day. Truthfully now, after all the processing and grief stages, I'm just really missing the lightness of the what a relationship can bring. I laughed a lot with him. It was kinda cool how he could break me out of crying by making me giggle.
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I honestly learned so many things from that relationship, it's weird its been six months already, half a year.
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I want to take some time to reflect on how that relationship helped liberate myself, I've been losing sight of that recently, since the pain has faded.
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I saw this saying and I really resonated with it.
It goes;
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"The chaos exposed the truth.
The lessons rebuilt me.
The losses redirected me."
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My first love ultimately taught me that I am worthy of great love. Not because he gave me that consistently but because he didn't. He is gone and out of my life for good, and because of him I will never question whether I am worthy of a consistent love that treats me right. That is a gift. May I never lose sight of that. I was walked home to my worth. That loss redirected me to my core. And now my core feels quite unshakable.
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Shit, I didn't know I had so much love to give or that I would have such a damn hard time letting go of a relationship I knew wasn't right, for both of us. For if it is not right for one, it is not right for either one. Or that relationships are messyyy and can be chaotic as hell, its like the limbo for how low can you go ~losing normal emotional regulation~. I saw myself handling things at my lowest, and I was like what the fuck is this, that is now how I wanted this stuff to go down. But I really loved him but god damn, it was just not right and put me through the ringer. Learned some stuff the hard way for sure and now we have some skills on how to handle conflict with loved ones and what I need during conflicts, again I think that is pretty cool.
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AND jeez whiz did it expose my insecurities. I hate people seeing me at something new or that I don't feel confident in. But even that I'm glad for because I learned about myself, I getting to understand who I am at a deeper level.
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Realized I'm either singleeeee or very committed to the relationship I am in. I can't be with someone who doesn't have similar level of commitment.
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I now appreciate and have more confidence in my self. I take up space and I won't ever be feel small by a close relationship again. Through his love for me, I was able to accept myself in a way I hadn't before, I think I needed that. To see myself through someone else's eyes, for they can love you for parts of yourself that you hate. That is a blessing love gives us and one we should always lean into.
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He broaden my horizons, showed me his interests, got to grow in ways I wanted to with him. Although a bit pretentious interests, kind of makes them more unforgettable. Like what straight white 22 year old male loves Fran Lebowitz. He was something special.
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Most of all, I know what it shouldn't feel like. So when the right partner arrives, I'll know because it will be everything I didn't get but needed from my first love. I feel more myself I needed to go through this heartbreak and relationship in order to accept the right love that is coming my way.
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I'm looking back to over a year ago and I'm like jesus I was young, if I only I knew what I know now. The relationship struggles so nivea, the arguments stupid, the tears plentiful and consistent, the pressure intense, and love for myself smaller.
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I created some art and wrote on something like "Am I enough for love? Am I worthy of love? "
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He saw it of course, peeping through my art one night. He reassured me sweetly and told me he never wants me to feel that way in this relationship. And in a letter he wrote to me, after I told him, "the more I get to know you the more I wonder why you like me" he said in that letter that he was punching above his weight in dating me oh and preceded to end the letter with a "how could I not like you". While were in the mix of it, I did get some nice handwritten love letters and a real dreamy first love story on the Gunflint Trail, that was a super special summer that I will cherish till the end of my days. Getting more back to original topic at hand, I think to myself now how silly that was to think that, to put someone on a pedestal and me below it. I think oh girl, you have come so far from thinking like that, and may I never say that to a man again. I will be saying "are you fucking ready for all that I am?"
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So thank you to my ex, my first love, for now I know just how damn worthy I am of love. There was a lot of bullshit in that relationship, and I forever grateful it didn't work out because it changed me, it rearranged me completely.
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He made the blueprint, now it's time to find the one who will actually build the damn thing with me. But right now I'm sitting pretty with my freedom and my lessons and my growth and my newfound sense of self.
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This and That
a section for all the thoughts
​​​Had a breakdown for half of my 40 minute drive home from work. Looked at my best friend's reels she sent me on insta dm. Put on a red leather jacket, beanie, n scarf. All the essentials I live for, for if not those life wouldn't be as grand. Bought some mead, asked the lady working register if she ever had this mead and then plugged back in my wire headphones blaring Gwen Stefani. Then bought myself a pack of spirits and 10" pizza. Fixed myself a bubble bath threw some fake candles
on for ambience, and well the
illusion of things being
ok returned.
Not to quote Sex and the City but ... as Carrie Bradshaw says "some love stories are short stories but doesn't make them short of any love"
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If it's the duality of man, it should be the plurality of woman - a quote from my dear dear friend
I am currently working on being comfortable in spaces alone in public. So I took myself on date the other day in the city. I truly had the best time and went on a wonderful hike, where I could hear and see a football game going on, and I thought to myself whenever I am at a sporting event I think to myself, I just want to be sitting by a creek. And when I was hiking and hearing the roars of the stadium, I was first happy people are enjoying themself in that environment that holds a special type of energy and I was happy to be exactly where I was at. In certain environments around people its easy to feel like you don't always belong. But in nature I always feel I belong there. I feel the most myself on a hike, normally alone. I get to be with my thoughts more, in a mindful way.
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I ended my day with myself going out to dinner alone. I went to this first place and the environment was intimidating for me. So I ditched the busy place and went to another Thai restaurant. I got myself a booth for one and ordered myself a nice glass of sauvignon blanc, usually its the cheapest so that's what I go for. Still feeling uncomfortable, I tell myself there are no rules and read my book while waiting for my food. While eating my food, I look across the booth and think how nice it is that I am taking up this whole space, not sharing any energy or definitely not in a space where my energy feels small, cuz I have had plenty of that this past year. Then I write in journal, "There is a certain sweetness being alone with your own energy."
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I paid my bill, took my leftovers, lit a spirit on my walk back to my car feeling liberated and proud of myself for pushing myself into being more comfortable going out alone in public. For a woman comfortable with herself, is a woman society fears.
Some Art <3
Humans have many complex feelings and in general I would agree with the statement that we are emotionally complex beings. We hold two truths at the same time. However when we see through humans, and really see a person, it comes down to simple things. I knew a man, I loved a man who carried deep mental struggles everyday, when it comes down to it we are simple beings in the terms of our struggles. Our struggles are usually simple, it’s our actions and feelings from that struggle that get complex. People who hate themselves more than they love themselves, that is their struggle and that becomes the truth of their actions. When I see through people who have that struggle, I see a person who is in deep pain with their true being. Their behavior exemplifies that, they hate themselves, they spread that pain unto others, if they lack awareness, which goes hand in hand usually with a lack of self love. See when you love yourself, you must be aware of all parts of your being. Love isn’t denying yourself, love is embracing all entities of yourself. Loving someone else is understanding their own connection to their struggle and seeing them through for it. Sometimes seeing them through for it is saying you are not healthy and my love will always be here for you and we must love each other at a large distance. To let you go completely is how my love will forever be with you. You hurt me, you chose not to change and be healthier, and for me, I chose to always have love for you. May you become a piece of my mosaic of life, you saw me, I saw you, but we just might have failed to see through each other's hardships at that time.
