Acceptance

I inhale pain. I exhale love. 

I embrace my pain. I accept my pain. 

I forgive you.

Photo by Ansar Naib on Unsplash

When I think of you, it is a desert that comes to mind. A desert where emotions are abandoned to die.

When I think of you, pain appears in my chest. It suffocates my breathing and makes me dizzy. You were so, so long ago, and yet the pain chokes me. This fault is with me. I accept it. It is a curious aberration in me, and the baggage of my years. It is my sorrow at being abandoned. 

I accept it. I accept the abandonment. I accept the desert. 

I accept the memories. I go out into them. I think of the moment when I realized that my life would only be right with you in it, with you right next to me. That moment when I realized I couldn’t imagine a life without you in it. 

I accept that realization. 

I have spent years trying to convince myself that it was a lie. A delusion built on shifting sands. I have spent years thinking of that moment as a conduit to all my sadness and sorrow. I have spent the years cursing that memory and turning it aside. But now, I walk on in, and allow the memory to swallow me up. 

I remember us side by side, on the kerb, playing with the smallest kitten I ever saw. I remember looking at you, and feeling my heart fill with the warmest glow. 

Your smile was the sweetest thing I had ever seen. The gentle way you handled the kitten was the only thing I needed to know. 

I wasn’t wrong, or deluded. I accept that. I was incredibly happy in that moment. I was filled with love like I have never known before it, or since. I accept my happiness. I accept my hope. I accept my expectation of a better future – one we would build together, in equal partnership. I accept that I loved you like no other. I embrace that moment, in all its happiness. I accept the tears that this memory brings me. 

The tears are relief – relief because the pain in my chest finally has somewhere to go. Relief because I will face the fact that nothing else has mattered to me for years. I accept that this is all that has mattered to me. I accept that my emotions and relationships have all been built around that perfect moment, and you.

I accept that I loved you. I accept that I may still love you. I accept that I see this as my greatest weakness, my disgrace and shame. I accept this in me, as with all other things. 

And then I rise from the kerb, and away from my memory of you. Instead, I look you full in the face, you as you are today. I look at the things I have brushed aside or angrily ignored for so long. 

I look at the things you've achieved, and I feel my pride in you. I accept my pride in you. I look at the horrifying things you've done, and I feel my anger and disappointment. I accept my disappointment in you. 

I accept that I love you. Every single part of you. Your crimes and your growth. 

I despair that your growth may only be a trend, an effort to fit in. I accept my despair. 

I hope that your growth is true, that you have finally seen many of the things I tried to show you. I accept my pride in you. 

I accept my disappointment that you never tried to credit me for trying to tell you these things before. 

I accept my love for you, and the pain it causes me. 

I inhale deeply, and I feel the pain in my chest. I close my eyes and exhale. I absorb the pain.

I inhale pain. I exhale love. Love that has nowhere to go. 

I accept that I have no one to love. I push my love forward, into the desert. I send my love to us wandering that desert, bereft of emotions. Bereft of acceptance. 

I accept us. I accept everything that has ever happened to us. It was beautiful. It was tragic. I embrace it. 

I embrace my pain. 

I forgive you.