Painful Love

I never knew until this summer how much pain I could feel for hurting someone I loved. It was a rough summer and Ben and I were apart for way longer than we should have been. Communicating solely through the phone, letters, and internet can be pretty tough. You miss out on all the nonverbal cues you have in normal conversation which can change the meaning of a sentence completely. So many times this summer I said things I wished I could have taken back. I was just being stupid and careless and not thinking about the things I said and how they might sound from his end. So my words hurt and the fact that I had hurt a person I loved so much caused me more pain than anything he could have said or done. It’s a kind of pain I can’t even now describe. Everything in me wanted to take it back, but there was nothing I could do. I could only sit there and try to heal the damage I’d caused. I couldn’t even wrap my arms around him. It was awful. If that is really how bad hurting someone you love feels, I think I need to do a better job of showing love through what I say and do. I also need to learn to love everyone better so that if I hurt anyone, it will cause me that kind of pain. I don’t think I can ever love anyone else enough for the pain to be that extreme but I should be able to at least feel a small measure of it. And that would be enough to radically change the way I love people.