In high school, I wrote about him for an English assignment. After years of being bullied, and called out for being fat, I was somehow able to believe him when he told me I was beautiful. Not only that, I was able to write about it and read it out loud in front of my new-to-me honors classmates and teacher.

Maybe self-love shouldn’t depend so much on others, but I did read somewhere that we learn to love ourselves by the experience of being loved. I don’t think it’s unusual or odd that as I grew up my self image was intertwined with his image of me.

It feels recent and also a life time ago that he would tell me I looked beautiful, pretty, like a visiting story teller … in the morning before I went to work.

It feels recent and also a life time ago that he kissed me, that he loved me.

It feels recent and also a life time ago that he let Heather change his mind.

She told him she was the gold standard of woman, and that he deserved the gold standard.

The. Gold. Standard. He let her tell him that.

She told him that thin men should only make love with thin women.

She told him that maybe I should have sex with her husband, since he was bigger too.

She told him that he should feel the love of many women.
She told him about specific other women who were ready to give him the love he deserved.

She told him I was trapping him.
She told him our life was too big for him that I was too big for him.
She told him that he deserved so much more than me.
She told him that I wasn’t enough.

He believed her.
He betrayed me.

It feels recent and also a life time ago that he loved me.
How can I be I too much and not enough at the same time?