Unconditional Love

 Today marks a year in a very special relationship in my life. 

While it's normal to celebrate a birthday, and I am very much celebrating that birthday; this has been a year of a new relationship with myself. I'm celebrating that too.

A year ago I was terrified that I wouldn't be able to love this person because of one single 3 letter word. How incredibly stupid is that? But I was absolutely terrified. I'll explain.

That 3 letter word represented, and to a certain extent still does represent a truck load of negative emotions. That word belongs to a relationship that was based entirely on transactional love not unconditional love. I wanted unconditional, but I got transactional. And by it's nature that is not love. I've learned that this past year where I have processed so much of my past and laid the groundwork for my future.

That 3 letter word represented pain, frustration, anger, distrust, failure, fear, hurt, shame, and in varying degrees every other negative emotion I had. What I now see see is that it's just a word, it's not the person with whom I had that level of difficulty, and it's also not the person who I now love unconditionally. It's just a word. 

Back to unconditional love. In my life I have truly felt it from very few people. 4 people, who are all dead, I knew to my core loved me unconditionally. I've had moments of feeling it from others in my life. I'm not saying others don't feel unconditional love for me, but that I don't always feel it. Don't get me wrong, I want to, I need to, more than most things I want in my life. I just don't. 

And yet, I feel it for others. My kids, and now my grandkids, my husband, my spares, my friends. I have been there for them all without any expectation of reward. No thought of what a gift or a need costs me in terms of money or time. I look through my craft projects I've finished and around 90% is made for others. I followed the old CWA Creed of "I would be giving and forget the gift" to the letter. I have no regrets of doing this. It is unconditional. My phone can buzz in some method of communication at any time of day or night and I will respond if they need me. I have helped so many at so many times of the day and in so many ways. Who would I call if I needed someone? I don't know some days.

What I feel is transactional love because it's how I was conditioned by one of my parents. I could get love if I fulfilled a conditional list of requirements. So that's what I learned I could get. I didn't learn I could get unconditional love. Thankfully I had some who could teach that, but they're all gone now. I hear jokes about why people love me, that just reinforces my feelings of transactional love. I get triggered by jokes, by being ignored, by so many things. It would take me to a space I didn't want to be in, and I would react inappropriately. I've learned and I've come so far; but I do yearn for unconditional.

I will continue to search for that feeling. What we focus on is what we get. I'm  focusing on looking for signs of unconditional love towards me. When I looked for signs of transactional love, guess what I found? Yep. Transactional love. I'm looking for the signs of unconditional. I'll keep searching because it is there somewhere and I believe I deserve it too. That's a new feeling for me. That's how I know it will come.

Today marks an anniversary of when someone new arrived in the world that I feel unconditional love for. The most beautiful, innocent, incredible person. I look forward to such to loving them unconditionally and with all my heart. To doing anything they want me to do with them, and for them for the rest of my life. I want them to feel that unconditional love to their core so that it carries them for the rest of their life. I want them to feel whole, happy and loved. I want her to feel confident in herself knowing she is loved unconditionally.


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