B is for the Broken Ones
What do you think of when you hear the word “broken?” I suppose there are any number of possibilities, both literal and figurative. I know that when I think of the word broken, I think of a porcelain doll, face down on the floor, face shattered...shattered into so many pieces it seems impossible it could ever be repaired or ever being made whole again.
In trying to write an entirely different post I became inspired to write this one instead, or rather, first. (Sometimes I don’t feel I am really the one deciding, but the story itself that demands to come out of me...herein is the true decider.) I recently experienced yet another heartache, and, despite other times in my life, I felt inspired to write about it. Not about him or it specifically, but about brokenness. While I may imagine a shattered doll when I think about the word ‘broken,’ the truth is that I carry an invisible brokenness within me every day. I often wonder if we all carry a brokenness within us, but I can’t say that I know that to be a universal truth because each of our life experiences are so incredibly different.
With that said, I want to write this post specifically to the broken ones. Those of us who have experienced the heartache, the loss, the pain of disappointment, of love, love lost, love not returned, rejection…the list goes on. I think it goes without saying that you know who you are. If life has blessed you to not know what this is like, you can stop reading here. Your naïveté is both astounding, surprising, and, frankly, a little annoying. So, please, go now, and we can remain cordial (although I don’t think we’re friends...are we???). I digress. This post is for those of us who have been broken on the inside, but who get up every single day and function, as if everything is normal. We live with our cracks on the inside, trying to put the pieces back together again the best way we know how to. This is for you. B is for the Broken Ones.
I haven’t always felt this way. I think it’s a natural gut reaction when everything isn’t okay; when everything is going to hell we want to tell ourselves that it isn’t—that everything is fine, even when it’s most certainly not. A month and a half after my ex left me I started going on dates. I repeat, a month and a half later. Pausing to let that sink in I still can’t believe I did that, but I know why I did. I wanted so desperately to have things to be ‘right’ again, to feel ‘normal’ again. But it wasn’t okay, and it wasn’t normal. Eleven years of marriage ended; my best friend left me. I wasn’t ready, plain and simple. I remember hating the way it felt, when I told men the D-word: “divorced.” Instantly feeling like I had to convince them that I was okay, that it was over, that I didn’t want them to treat me any different; but I was different. It wasn’t that I expected to date someone seriously immediately, but I felt this overwhelming desire to “figure it all out.” Dating, men...what I wanted/didn’t want; what I liked/didn’t like. I went into it all blissfully ignorant, and came out the gate with a pretty badly broken heart (and, to be honest, a slightly bruised ego). I don’t look back and berate myself, however; I know that there was a lesson in each experience I have had thus far. With the passing of time and the hurts, disappointments, and heartbreak I have felt in the last two and a half years, I have been forced to take a breath; to look inward; to examine my broken parts. I don’t say broken because I believe them to be irreparable. That would be grossly untrue. I know what it is to heal...to pick oneself up from the dark place that you’re in and to move forward. But, what I have found, in the two plus years I have spent falling (in love, then flat on my face...rinse, wash, repeat)—is that it’s just not possible to be completely whole again. I know how that sounds, and trust me when I say I actually don’t mean it as a bad thing. (I’ll explain.)
Your cracks, or your scars, they are what make you infinitely more beautiful. You have lived and you have tried. Do not be ashamed of your scars. But don’t allow their existence to keep you from moving on—from living, either.
I believe that in the mending we are left with cracks. A place on our hearts where we are left forever altered. Something about that person: a look, an expression, a memory that you’ll never be able to forget. I say all of this not to say it’s a bad thing, but I’m not going to sit here and lie to you—it doesn’t make it any easier either. No one grows up imagining what it will be like to fall in love to have him/her fall out of love with you, or to have unrequited love, or to never fall in love at all. But here’s why I don’t think it’s a bad thing either: Your cracks, or your scars, they are what make you infinitely more beautiful. You have lived and you have tried. Do not be ashamed of your scars. But don’t allow their existence to keep you from moving on—from living, either.
There is a quote I recently came across that I absolutely loved and, while I want for most of the words here to be my own, I felt I would be remiss if I didn’t share it here, as it puts into words exactly what I’ve been trying to share with you.
“Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but—I hope—into a better shape.”
What more can I say? I feel the truth of these words so acutely in my life—I at least hope they are true. I hope with all that I am that I am made better, not worse, for having lived through so much pain. Is it better to have loved and then to have lost? I don’t know...but I am living it. I choose every single damn day to wake up, with all of my brokenness, and hope to someday meet someone who sees all of me, even my broken parts, and who loves me completely.
“To be fully seen by somebody, then, and be loved anyhow - this is a human offering that can border on miraculous.”
Sometimes it feels like it will take a miracle. I remain (somehow) optimistic that someday, one day, it will be true. I am, at my core, an eternal optimist, even as jaded as I sometimes feel after dating in my thirties.
So, I wanted to share this piece of me with you. Because I feel keenly that it must be shared, and because I want you to know that it is okay. I think, by now, at this point in our lives, if you have dated, or are divorced, separated, widowed, it’s complicated, etc.—you know what it is to have brokenness. Whatever that looks like for you, know that it’s okay to be broken. But also know that you are not meant to stay that way. You are not irredeemable and you are worthy of love. But you have to love you first. So try. Love you. Trust me, I’m learning how to do just that each and every single day, but I’m trying.
Especially as we come upon one of the biggest couple-centric holidays of the year, I would say to love you, celebrate you. You deserve so much love. Love you and all of your broken pieces. I know that’s what I’ll be doing this year. Knowing that even in all my brokenness, I am beautiful. And I am loved.
Much love to you,
Sabrina Michele