What I Need to Hear Sometimes: Love with an Awareness

It is okay to love after you have survived domestic violence. It is okay to let yourself be loved after surviving domestic violence. By all means do love and let yourself be loved. Yes it can be a terrifying thing to love again, but don’t let your past experiences hinder your future. Instead let your past experiences inform your future. You now know that love can fail. Terribly. You now know that love shouldn’t hurt. Mostly. You now know what love is not. Despite all that Love anyway. Just love differently. Love and be loved constructively, not destructively.  Love with an awareness now. Love with an awareness that loving is a risk. Love with an awareness that being loved is a risk. Love anyway. Love with a hope that this love will work. Love with the belief that love can and does work. Love. Love. Love. Don’t be afraid of love. Don't be afraid to love. Don’t hold the wrongs of your abuser against the new person in your life who is trying to love you. Love is to be embraced and felt fully. Immerse yourself in it. Love. Love. Love. Joy Lyn ©2015

Fragile Survivors

People equate survival with strength, but more often than not, especially after just getting out of an abusive relationship, we are fragile survivors.  We may be resilient, but we don't necessarily feel that way. Many of us barely made it through a hell that we probably kept hidden from the friends and family closest to us. When we build up enough courage to leave an abuser, we don't need judgment or disapproval or criticism or comparison to other couples. We need support, we need uplifting, we need care, we need love. © Joy Lyn 2015.