i gave them everything i never had

I wasn’t trying to control them.
I was trying to protect them.
From everything I didn’t get.
From everything that hurt me.

So I loved them hard.
Covered every gap. Filled every silence.
Offered the roadmap I wish someone had given me.

But somewhere in the process…
my love stopped being a gift
and started feeling like a script.

And they —
the person I wanted to keep safe —
started pulling away.

Not because they were ungrateful.
But because they felt unheard. Unseen.
Like they were living out my version of love
instead of their own.

I thought I was giving them freedom.
But I was just giving them my framework
of what love should look like.

And when they finally left —
I didn’t just feel grief.
I felt betrayed.

How could they walk away
from all the healing I had tried to hand them?

But maybe the real betrayal
was assuming they had to heal on my terms.

✧ quiet prompt:

What part of your love might still be shaped by what you were never given?

🌒 next layer:

→ read: when your love is a trauma response → chapter: underneath