Dear Future Husband #13 — Learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all

Dear Future Husband,

Hey darling, did you miss me? I like to think you do. I miss writing to you. How are you doing? This time I hope you’re not fine, not in a bad way though. I imagine you being worried sick about me. I am fine, so I give you the permission to be fine too.

Shame to consistency, that word isn’t for me, but, you know I never lose, I’d keep trying, over and again. A couple of years ago, I remember saying I’ll write you a love poem every day of our married life, now I’m laughing at myself. Am I even a poet? I can barely compose a line of poetry. Life has been good to me, and it’s so beautiful to see.

I love Whitney Houston, I love her so much. When people argue about their favourite artist, this is me with Whitney or maybe Rihanna… I think I’ll bet my money on Whitney. I love her. Okay, you know that already. One of my favourite songs from her is “Greatest love of all”, and my favourite line, “…learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all”.

Growing up… oops, no this is not a sad story of how my childhood was loveless, it was filled with different shades of love, or so I like to think, but the world has a standard for everything and if you don’t fit in, you’d be judged. And I was. Writing this is triggering, because all over again I’m pissed, not at them who threw vile words at me, but at they who were meant to protect me, love me, not defend me. I learnt from an early age to not have any expectations from people, I learnt to take care of myself alone cause no one was going to do that. I learnt the art of pleasuring myself. I learned people were damaged and would readily dump their baggage on you if you let them, so I built walls, to protect me.

Don’t we all need therapy?

I was young but fully aware that you don’t dare love yourself and be happy in peace when you don’t meet the world standard. Today, I’d lie if I say I love myself too well. I don’t, I’m learning, to treat myself with love and not the way I want to be treated.

I don’t treat myself the way I want to be treated, I treat myself with love. With an emphasis on love!

I don’t have an inkling of how I want to be treated by you, by people. What I do know is what love is, and I fill my belly every day with love. So when you step into my space, you’re fully aware of how well this baby girl loves herself and you better match that energy!

When it comes to self-love, I’ll keep raising the bar for myself, and you don’t have a choice, you have to love up to it.

With love,
Diseyi Philomena