It Was Easy for Me to Love Because I Had No Boundaries: Reclaiming Boundaries

There was a time when I believed love meant giving without limit.

Being soft.

Being flexible.

Being understanding to the point of self-erasure.

I wasn’t easy to love, not because I was unlovable,

but because no one ever had actually to love me to stay close.

It was easy for me to love.

Too easy.

Because loving others required nothing more than disappearing parts of myself.

I absorbed everything:

The mood swings.

The silence.

The backhanded comments.

The friendships where I was the crisis hotline but never the celebration call.

The relationships where my empathy was a resource to mine, not a connection to honor.

I told myself I was loyal.

I told myself I was steady.

I told myself I was giving.

But the truth?

I was boundaryless.

I believed that if I ever said,

“This hurts,”

or “I need something too,”

or “Can you meet me where I am?”

They’d leave.

And sometimes they did.

Because what I thought was love

was really my willingness to carry the entire relationship on my back.

What I mistook for a connection

was really convenience.

And the moment I stopped shrinking,

the bond snapped.

I used to call that heartbreak.

Now, I call it clarity.

Reclaiming boundaries helped me see the difference between genuine love and relationships sustained by my self-abandonment.

A Slice of Humble Pie

If they only stayed because I needed nothing — that wasn’t love. That was access.

Reflection

Where did you confuse being endlessly giving with being loved?

Who remained close only as long as you had no needs of your own?

What becomes possible when your love no longer requires disappearing?

Affirmation

I no longer offer myself to people who only value what I can carry. My boundaries do not make me less lovable; they reveal who is capable of loving me at all.