Dear Reader,

September 18th, 2026

I’ve mentioned it so many times throughout this blog that I’ve been actively in therapy for about a year now. Therapy has forced me to look at parts of myself that I would honestly rather avoid. And one of the hardest things I have had to admit is this:

I want to be loved so badly.

Not liked. Not wanted when it’s convenient. Not tolerated.

Loved.

Deeply. Safely. Gently. Fully.

I have wanted that kind of love for as long as I can remember. And I think I have gone without it for so long that sometimes the smallest glimpse of love feels enormous to me.

Someone gives me a little affection. A little reassurance. A little attention. They make me feel chosen for a moment. And suddenly I see everything they could be instead of paying attention to who they actually are.

I think, Maybe I can love them enough. Maybe if I am patient enough. Maybe if I forgive one more time. Maybe if I explain my pain differently. Maybe if I stop reacting. Maybe if I become easier to love. Maybe if I need less. Maybe if I give more. Maybe if I become exactly what they need me to be, they will finally become what I need them to be.

And that thinking has destroyed pieces of me.

Because I have stayed in places where I was starving emotionally simply because every once in a while, someone handed me a crumb.

And when you have been starving long enough, crumbs start feeling like a feast.

That is painful to admit.

I have begged people to love me who were actively hurting me. I have cried while trying to explain how badly someone’s actions were breaking me, hoping that seeing my tears would finally make something click inside of them.

I have begged for loyalty.

Begged for reassurance.

Begged to be honored.

Begged to be cherished.

Begged for affection.

Begged for basic kindness.

Begged for someone to care enough to get up when I was crying and hold me.

And there is something incredibly humiliating about realizing that you are begging your own spouse to comfort you. The person who promised to love you. The person who is supposed to be your safe place.

And you’re sitting there completely broken, hoping that maybe this time your pain will matter enough for them to come toward you instead of turning away.

There have been moments when I have cried so hard that I could barely breathe, and the thing that hurt the most wasn’t even what started the argument anymore.

It was realizing that the person beside me could see me hurting like that and still leave me there.

That kind of loneliness is hard to explain. Because technically, you aren’t alone. Someone is right there. And somehow you have never felt more alone in your life.

I’ve been married twice. And somehow, in both marriages, I eventually became a woman begging to be loved.

That realization hurts.

Because after enough rejection, you stop asking, “Why are they treating me this way?”

And you start asking,

“What is wrong with me?”

“Why am I never enough?”

“Why am I so easy to hurt?”

“Why doesn’t losing me scare anyone?”

“Why can someone watch me cry and feel nothing?”

“Why do I have to beg for things other people seem to receive naturally?”

“Why does loving me seem so hard?”

And if you ask yourself those questions long enough, eventually they become beliefs.

Maybe I really am too much. Maybe I am too emotional. Maybe I expect too much. Maybe I am difficult to love. Maybe if I were prettier, calmer, quieter, less anxious, less damaged, less sensitive, less me, someone would finally love me correctly.

That is the part I am trying to unlearn.

Lately, besides therapy, I have been spending more time in my Bible, and I keep finding myself thinking about the woman at the well.

After having five husbands, I wonder what she carried inside of her by then. I wonder how many times she thought someone was finally going to love her. I wonder how many times she believed, Maybe this one will stay. I wonder how much rejection a person can carry before they start believing they are the reason everyone leaves. I wonder if she was thirsty for far more than water.

Because I understand that kind of thirst.

The thirst to be chosen. The thirst to belong somewhere. The thirst to finally feel safe enough to put your guard down. The thirst to have someone look at all the broken pieces of you and say, I’m still here.

And then Jesus met her.

Jesus already knew. He knew every husband. Every relationship. Every mistake. Every rejection. Every part of her story that someone else could have whispered about, judged her for or used against her.

And He still went to her.

He still sat with her. He still spoke to her. He still saw her.

He did not make her beg Him to care.

And that wrecks me.

Because I have spent so much of my life begging human beings for the kind of love my soul has been desperately searching for.

Please choose me.

Please don’t leave me.

Please don’t betray me.

Please don’t hurt me.

Please care that I’m hurting.

Please love me.

And maybe I have been standing at my own well this entire time, thirsty and exhausted, trying to get people to fill something inside of me that they were never capable of filling.

Maybe rejection does not mean I am unlovable.

Maybe someone betraying me does not mean I wasn’t worth being loyal to.

Maybe someone refusing to comfort me does not mean I wasn’t worth comforting.

Maybe someone failing to cherish me does not mean I wasn’t worth cherishing.

Maybe their inability to love me correctly was never supposed to become the measurement of my worth.

That is what I am trying to learn now.

Because I am tired.

God, I am tired.

I am tired of explaining why something hurts.

I am tired of begging for apologies.

I am tired of asking people to treat me like I matter.

I am tired of giving another chance because maybe this time will be different.

I am tired of being hurt and then somehow becoming the problem because I reacted to being hurt.

I am tired of abandoning myself just so someone else won’t abandon me.

That one hurts to write.

Because I think that is exactly what I have done. I have abandoned myself over and over again trying to keep other people from leaving.

I have ignored my own boundaries.

Silenced my own intuition.

Accepted apologies without change.

Forgiven things that were still happening.

Stayed when every part of me was exhausted.

Lowered my expectations.

Made excuses.

And convinced myself that surviving someone’s version of love was better than having no love at all.

But I don’t want to live like that anymore.

I don’t want to beg another human being to see value in me. I don’t want to convince someone that I am worth kindness. I don’t want to have to completely fall apart before someone decides my feelings deserve attention. I don’t want love that makes me question whether I am loved.

And maybe learning to love myself means finally accepting something I have fought against for a very long time:

Sometimes you have to believe people when they repeatedly show you how little they are willing to give you. You have to stop falling in love with their potential. You have to stop surviving on the memory of who they were when they were trying to win your heart. You have to stop confusing occasional kindness with consistent love. And eventually, you have to stop asking someone to become the person they have repeatedly shown you they do not want to be.

I cannot love someone into loving me correctly.

I cannot cry enough to create empathy inside another person.

I cannot explain my pain perfectly enough to make someone care.

I cannot sacrifice enough of myself to finally become worthy of being treated gently.

And I cannot keep destroying myself trying to prove that I am worth choosing.

I am worth protecting.

I am worth comforting.

I am worth being faithful to.

I am worth being spoken to gently.

I am worth someone getting up when I am crying.

I am worth someone caring that their actions hurt me.

I am worth peace.

I am worth safety.

I am worth love that doesn’t leave me wondering every night whether I matter.

And even typing those words is difficult because there are still wounded parts of me that don’t completely believe them.

And maybe, eventually, I will love myself enough to walk away the first time someone shows me that loving me is a burden to them.

For now, I’m going to keep reminding myself:

I am worth it.

I am enough.

I am deserving.

And I’m going to keep saying those things until one day, every single part of me finally believes them.

Love always,

Kelsey