07/11/2025
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Feral Notes ~
Feral Notes | Loving Loud, Leaving Louder
I loved you as honestly as I knew how, from the place I was standing in at the time, knees scraped, hands calloused, heart cracked but wide open.
And maybe that’s the thing: I didn’t love you perfectly. I loved you big.
Messy, holy, unfiltered. The kind of love that doesn’t sit quietly in the corner sipping chamomile, it shows up muddy-booted and late, carrying takeout and some wildly inappropriate joke that makes you forget how bad the day was. That was me. That is me.
But I’ve learned something about love, real love, the kind that stays, and it’s this: It doesn’t shrink you. It doesn’t ask you to press mute on your passion or apologize for your wiring. It doesn’t make you feel like you’re “too much” just because your brain spins at a thousand RPMs and your emotions don’t clock out at 5.
Looking back, we would’ve broken each other slowly. You needed neat edges. I live in permanent scribble. You wanted a partner who could color inside the lines. I wanted someone who could toss the coloring book and build a bonfire with me instead.
You might’ve loved me in theory. But in practice? I would’ve exhausted you. And your restraint, your need for control, for image, for tidy resolution, would’ve gutted me.
I used to think love was about how hard you tried. How many pieces of yourself you were willing to set aside to make it work. But I don’t believe that anymore.
I believe love should feel like permission to breathe. To be. To fall apart and come back together without fear of being discarded for the cracks.
Now? I’m loved by someone who doesn’t flinch when I unravel. Who sees my chaos and doesn’t try to fix it, just pulls up a chair and stays. He is steady but not suffocating. He is my anchor, but never my weight.
And the truth is, he was someone else’s problem before he became my forever. He had to stumble through his own fire, get real about his own wreckage. Just like I did. When we found each other, we were a hot mess. A beautiful, stubborn, broken-in-two hot mess. But we both showed up. Willing. Not perfect, just present. Ready to do the work, ready to become who we needed to be, not just for ourselves but for each other. To become the best versions of ourselves. Because we saw it, that thing. That rare, undeniable thing that says, “This. This is what we don’t let go of.”
Someone who finally understood all of the messy pieces and was willing to be there and walk through all of that together. We are each other’s perfect imperfect person.
And damn, I wish we had found each other sooner. But maybe I had to burn through a few illusions first. Maybe I had to learn what almost feels like, to recognize what always really means.
He gets the version of me that refuses to dim. The version that’s done begging for space at someone else’s table and decided to build her own instead, wildflowers, war stories, flaws and all.
That’s love.
Not the kind that edits you.
The kind that echoes.
And maybe that’s what redemption really looks like, not starting over with a clean slate, but showing up with all the grit, grief, growth, and still saying yes. Still choosing each other. Still choosing this.
Even when it’s hard.
Especially when it’s hard.
Because some things are worth the mess.
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