I Hate Myself...But I Love You

Is it possible to love someone else when you hate yourself? I thought so.

Life is funny. After more than 20 years of always being "the other half" of someone else, I found myself alone with two young teenage boys in a strange new home, a stack of unbearable credit card bills and an empty shell of a soul. My life had been devistated by a 7-month break-up from the man I thought I'd grow old with. I was lost.

I was 35 then. I should have known better. I should have been prepared. I should have.....

Life is funny how it teaches its lessons. I blamed God, blamed myself, blamed what I did and didn't say, blamed myself for not being skinny and beautiful. If only I had said and done those things and looked a certain way, none of this would have happened.

For three months I stayed in this mode of self-pity and hatred. I looked in the mirror and hated what I saw. I cut myself down. How stupid I was...I couldn't do anything right...No one liked me.

You see, there is that funny little saying that states, "You can't love someone else until you love yourself". And it's so very true. Self-love and self-esteem should be the base you build everything else around. Being in a relationship without it is like building a house with no foundation. It won't be safe or last very long.

Hard as it was, those seven month were the best months of my life, although I didn't know it at the time. That much time alone forces a person to soul search, cry and come to terms with feelings and regrets from the past. I took baby steps everywhere from being able to express my feelings to changing my whole outlook on life and how I fit in to the scope of things.

Through a long hard look "in my own backyard", I realized I had interests, dreams, desires, wants, needs and hope. I realized that even though my "other half" was absent, I didn't leave with him. It was time to make myself better...be a person someone else could love. Be responsible, accountable, loving. Be a person with interests, goals and hobbies. Through loving myself I was able to re-enter our relationship and be a whole person. A whole DIFFERENT peson. I realized finally that I didn't NEED a man in my life to make me a whole person, but I WANTED one to share my life with.

This soul-searching "trip" I went on was undoubtedly the best experience of my life, from every emotional point of view.