I just want to fall in love...
I just want to be in love...
I want to understand
I want to know what it's like...
What it's really like, not whatever emotion I keep fabricating based on the words and impressions of others...

But I'm scared...
Terrified, even.
Love is supposed to be a beautiful thing, but it hurts. It hurts a lot. It is pain, it is suffering. Psychological warfare, a constant battle to find the truth of one's inner self...

How can I love someone if I don't know what emotions are genuine?
I can flip like a switch, shut down and hide.
My emotions make no sense to me, and every time I try to understand, I end up in tears, lost and confused and hopeless...

I am 18 years old and I've only ever had one "legitimate" crush in my life. And even then, I wonder how much of it was true, and how much was just a manifestation of my desperation to fall in love and the pressure of others around me...

It hurt. It hurt like hell, but I felt like I cared for someone, and it made it all worth it...

But I was terrified. I wanted to be with him, I wanted to fall in love, wanted to know what it was like... but I didn't want a single thing to change. The thought of actually becoming more than friends... it made my stomach churn, caused my anxiety to burn...

I'd rather pine quietly from the sidelines... rather suffer than risk it...

One day I told myself that I'd rather be his friend than lose him forever. To soothe my pain, we became closer. He felt comfortable around me, considered me a friend, and that meant everything to me. I only wish we'd been closer, wish that we'd had that connection, wish he'd confided in me, found comfort or solace in me...

And now I will probably never see him again. I'm at that stage in life where I'll probably never see a lot of people again. And I will never tell him how I felt, because I don't even understand...

There was someone in my life once that I "loved." I cared about them dearly. But I didn't love them. Not in the way love is "supposed" to work... and it hurt. I felt sick, constricted, confused, panicked, utterly horrible and wrong when I told them that I loved them the same way they loved me. I hurt them a lot... and I still don't know why I fell apart like I did. Every step I took, I thought it was the right one, thought it was what I had been dreaming of. Had I not been fantasizing about buying them gifts and Valentine's presents? FaceTiming them late at night, smiling gently at their tired eyes and soft hair? Then why, once I had it all within my reach, did it all feel so wrong? Had my feelings been fabrications of a confused and desperate heart? Or... something else?

I hurt them terribly. Horribly and cruelly. I pulled them along, toyed with their heart, and nearly destroyed the one I cared about the most at that time. But I didn't know.... I was blind, terrified, panicked and confused. I stumbled and struggled and felt nauseous and anxious and sick and miserable and just... wrong...

If you're reading this, though I doubt you are, I'm sorry that the things I've been struggling with hurt you the way they did. I've been fighting this fight for years, but I thought I had gotten everything figured out... then it all reared it's ugly head again and you were caught in the crossfire. I'm sorry I can't figure myself out...

......

What even is love...? Who can truly define it?

I yearn for love, I yearn to understand

I just want to understand...

This vent doesn't have much of a direction, and I'm sorry. I just...

I don't understand. I can't understand. I feel connections, passion, adoration, affection... but love... Love. It's such a painful, confusing, unfathomable thing...

And the more I try to explore myself and understand, the more it hurts. The more confused I get.

Maybe I simply expect too much of the world. Perhaps I'm yearning for the soulmate that will never come.

I'm not entirely sure it's romantic love I'm looking for anymore... but that's all I see around me, so what else am I supposed to do...

It hurts. But it's all I've ever known...