eleven years.

Eleven years ago today, I had my heart broken for the first time. It's a bit surreal how detached I am from a pain that ultimately caused a shortness of breath I can never fully get over, as well as an eating disorder, which, luckily, I was able to overcome thanks to therapy and the world's best support system.

But when I think back on that September morning, when I remember how sure I felt that everything was going right in my life - after all, I was living in a real-life John Hughes' movie - I pity myself. And self-pity? One of the most pathetic feelings a human can experience, let me tell you.

But the boy was worth it.

I remember knowing him better than anyone else. Seeing him through these completely naive, but very discerning pair of fourteen-year-old eyes. I knew then as well as I know now, that what I felt for him was real and special and pure and once-in-a-lifetime. But I do wonder, especially now that it's been eleven years of failing to breathe from time-to-time and eleven years of replaying bittersweet memories, if I'll ever fully recover. If I'll ever really get over him. Over it. Over the pain and the fear and the shock.

I hope I get over it. Truly I do. But what I pray for most of all, is that I never forget that I was the only person who really saw him for who he was and who he could be. That I'll never forget those times where it was just him and me and nothing - not his rising popularity or my affinity for reading - stood between us. Where I was the first person he told that he was switching schools. Where I was the only person who knew he hid behind his "funny guy" mask.

Because it's nice to know that when I fall in love, it's all fire and certainty. That I never waver. That I know.

Even if they don't deserve it. Even when I don't know anything else about myself. Even when my heart is lying on the ground, wailing and hurting and cut open and bleeding, it's better to feel the rush of that pain, than the numbness of anorexia. And I know I still struggle. I know. But at least I know I don't want that. And that's enough for me after eleven years.

But I really, truly do pray and wish and hope with all of my aching heart that he's doing well. That he's found what he was looking for eleven years ago. And that he's happy. Because he was hurting eleven years ago. He was lost. And he did want to be true to himself. He just didn't know how.