Be Careful What You Fall in Love With - Bravester

Two years ago as a single mom in my mid-thirties I fell in love, head over heels in love. I can’t say it was unexpected, I was a broken person searching for love. I had accounts on several dating sites, trying to find my Mr. Right in MrWrong.com world. Maybe I was on the verge of giving up, maybe my realization of finding a needle-in-a-haystack difficulty was kicking in and I was feeling helpless. It was the holidays, I was lonely. I watched as friends went to their spouses’ Christmas parties, and spouses came to my work party. Here I was alone, wrapping gifts at midnight by myself…alone. There is no worse time to be alone, no time that weighs heavier on our hearts, our broken hearts.

Then it happened… I met the man that I would fall in love with. I met the man that would take my broken heart, my broken soul, and with his gentle but masculine hands he would hold it all together. Or would he? Who or what was I falling in love with? Was it his hands that had me head-over-heels or was it his reassuring words of how he could single-handedly mend what years of bad choices, bad men, and broken love had done to my soul.

This person, my Mr. Right was going to fix years of damage with a cell phone and a brick.  Yes you read that correctly. A cell phone and a brick would rebuild a broken soul. But only the broken could have thoughts such as these and only the broken could believe these statements. Because only the broken need so desperately to find hope that they find it in false hope.

The cell phone. We were standing at a restaurant waiting on a table and he had forgotten something in his truck. My Mr. Right turned to me and said, “hold my cell phone, I will be right back.” He ran to his truck and came back a couple minutes later with his jacket on. Later he told me that he handed me his phone so I knew he was returning to me. Because I have had so many Mr. Wrongs just disappear (read about ghosting) he wanted to reassure me that he was definitely coming back.

A brick. We were walking down the beach on what was our 5th date and our 1st kiss. As we walked the words he spoke were reassuring. He said, “I will help you take down your walls, brick by brick, because you are worth it.”

I have years of brickwall building in my heart and around my soul. This brick wall didn’t just appear. It took years of disappointment, bad decisions, and broken moments to build. And here we were, I have found the man who was going to remove this wall and show me what love was–brick by brick.

During this time when I fell in love with a cell phone and a brick there were many things I was overlooking. This man who promised to mend my heart had been divorced four times and was more broken than I was. So how does the broken fix the broken and remove brick walls? They don’t. They will only break you more and add bricks to your already large wall around your heart and soul.

So while you are busy falling in love with empty promises remember the lips speaking these words can be covering up your next moment of weakness and pain.

Amanda, Late 30’s single parent of Ryan and Madison, constantly juggling corporate America, dating and parenting. Picking up the pieces of years of brokenness, trying to learn how to live Brave while teaching a future man and a teenage girl how to be Brave and not live broken. Not knowing what would be better:  the real unconditional love we all long for or a Laundry Fairy to ease the household chores.