The Lie I Told Myself Was That They Loved Me as I Loved Them: Reclaiming Emotional Intuition

For most of my life, I believed people loved me the way I loved them.

That if they hurt me, it was a misunderstanding.

If they left me out, there was a reasonable explanation.

If something felt off, the problem was probably me.

That lie kept me soft.

And it kept me in places I should’ve left long before.

There were three of us.

Going through a divorce at the same time.

Kids the same age.

Sitting in the same pews.

Pouring wine and grief into each other’s cups on long nights.

I thought we were rebuilding together.

And then the milestone years came —

weddings, graduations, and big family celebrations.

They invited everyone except me.

No explanation.

No softness.

Just an absence where friendship used to be.

One of them even asked not to be seated next to me at another wedding —

as if my existence said something she didn’t want heard.

It felt like a magic trick:

how someone you’ve sat with in vulnerability

can make you disappear without blinking.

I kept trying to find the version of me she might accept again.

Less intense.

Less honest.

Less… me.

But it didn’t work.

Because it was never about who I was.

It was about who she had already decided I wasn’t.

It’s humbling to know someone you trusted can walk away that cleanly.

But it’s even more humbling to realize how long you begged for crumbs —

quietly, politely, without ever raising your voice.

My instincts were screaming.

And I told them to quiet down.

I will never do that again.

Reclaiming emotional intuition helped me see the truth buried beneath the lie that people loved me the way I loved them

A Slice of Humble Pie

I didn’t lose them because I wasn’t enough. I lost them because I stopped pretending that was true.

Reflection

When have you mistaken shared history for mutual care?

Where did you override your intuition just to preserve a connection that wasn’t reciprocal?

How are you learning to trust your gut again, even when it costs you community?

Affirmation

If my love has to shrink to be accepted, it’s not acceptance, it’s rejection in disguise.