When Love Burns Slow

Vie
May 13
12 min read

When the Scale Tips — Learning to Sit in the Unbearable In-Between

There may come a day when you find yourself in a chapter you never imagined writing, a moment in life you didn’t prepare for, didn’t want, and certainly didn’t expect to live through. Maybe that day is today. Maybe you’re standing at the edge of something sacred that suddenly feels foreign, unfamiliar, and painfully fragile. It’s not the end… but it doesn’t feel like the beginning either. It’s something else entirely. A pause. A reckoning. A breath that holds too much weight.

If you’re here, reading this with trembling hands or a heavy heart, know that you are not alone. You might be navigating the aching uncertainty of a breakup, or the quiet grief of something that used to feel whole now splitting at the seams. And if you are, then you already know, this space between what was and what might be… it cuts deep. It’s like trying to hold onto shards of glass, each piece slicing through the version of yourself that thought love would always be enough.

You probably remember the beginning, that magical moment when the world seemed to fall away, when their soul felt like home and the chaos of life paused, just for a moment. There was a pull. An unshakable knowing. A love that had nothing to do with money, titles, or polished perfection, and everything to do with soul-level recognition. Maybe you thought you had found your forever. Maybe you still believe in that version of love.

But now, here you are, staring at a scale that refuses to balance.

And you’re asking the questions we all do when love starts to hurt:

Was it me?
Did I ask for too much,
or not enough?
Was it them, slowly slipping away without ever saying goodbye?
Were we ever truly aligned in the ways that mattered most?
Or did unresolved trauma, silent expectations, and old coping mechanisms build walls between us when we thought we were building bridges?

These questions will haunt you if you let them. But here’s something you need to know: you don’t have to answer them all right now. You are not a therapist. You are not an expert observer of your own pain. You're living it, raw, real, and without the luxury of distance.

And that’s okay.

Because here’s the truth: marriages, relationships, connections, they’re supposed to be built on mutual respect, on equal footing, on both people standing eye to eye. But sometimes… one side gets heavy. One side feels burdened. One side feels like it's doing all the work to keep the scale from tipping, while the other feels weightless, detached, drifting.

And when that imbalance becomes the norm rather than the exception… what then?

Caught in a constant seesaw of uncertainty. Disoriented. Exhausted. Longing for a moment of stillness, a clear sign, something solid to stand on. And still, nothing comes. Just motion. Just questions. Just ache.

This space you’re in, it’s not failure. It’s not weakness. It’s the confrontation. The pause. The moment where you finally stop avoiding the truth and ask yourself: What do I really want? And what is this connection asking of me that I cannot give without breaking myself in the process?

You may not have the answers yet. That’s okay too. Sometimes, the most courageous thing you can do is allow yourself to not know, to sit in the unbearable present without rushing to fix it or flee from it.

Just feel it.

This isn’t just a breakup or relationship pause. It’s a mirror. It’s showing you who you’ve been, what you’ve carried, what you’ve ignored, and what you’ve sacrificed. It’s asking you: Are you still aligned? Are you still choosing each other, not just from habit or fear, but from truth?

And if you’re scared that this might be the beginning of the end, breathe.

Maybe it is. Maybe it’s not. But either way, the question remains:

Will you keep fighting for balance, or will you let the scale tip, and let gravity show you where you truly belong?

You don’t have to decide today. But promise yourself this: You’ll keep showing up to the scale with honesty. With grace. With a willingness to see the truth, even if it hurts. Because sometimes, the bravest thing we can do for love is pause. And sometimes… that pause becomes the doorway to something even deeper. Even freer. Even more real.

Sitting in the Discomfort — Where Growth Begins

There are moments in life that strip you bare, moments that shake you so deeply you’re forced to stop pretending everything’s fine. Maybe this is one of those moments for you. Maybe today, you’re standing at the edge of something you thought would never falter, a marriage, a relationship, a vision of love, and it’s suddenly unsteady. You’ve asked for space, for breath, for stillness… and now that it’s here, it’s heavier than you imagined. But discomfort is the soil where truth begins to bloom. Growth rarely feels graceful. It begins in the ache, in the silence, in the long stares into the mirror when you’re forced to ask yourself the hardest question of all:

Who am I in this now?

Maybe you asked for space too. Maybe you thought that with time apart, clarity would rise like steam, quick, easy, obvious. But now you’re realizing something deeper: clarity doesn’t come gently. It arrives like a storm. And in its wake, it asks you to examine not just the relationship, but yourself.

Did you fall out of love? Or are you mourning the version of love you believed would carry you through? Are you grieving the partner… or the potential? The connection… or the comfort?

There’s a unique kind of exhaustion that can’t be cured with sleep. It’s the soul-level weariness that creeps in when you’ve been carrying too much, for too long. Maybe you feel it too, that hollow heaviness in your chest. Like a part of you has gone quiet. Like you're still here, but something essential has gone still inside you.

This isn’t about giving up. This isn’t about weakness. This is about naming what hurts so you can begin to heal it.

We often say we’re tired. But what we really mean is: I’m overwhelmed by the weight of pretending everything is okay. You’re not tired of love. You’re tired of the war love has become. Not the fighting, because fighting, in itself, isn’t the problem. It’s the aftermath. The way it leaves both people wounded when it should have ended in understanding.

Real love doesn’t keep score. It doesn’t bruise your spirit or make you feel like you’re losing, even when you’re trying your best. Healthy conflict should end in softness, in mutual surrender, not in silent resentment or emotional bruises. And if your fights have started to feel like battlegrounds, it might be time to ask: What are we really fighting? Each other? Or our own ghosts?

Because behind many arguments… is fear.

Fear of letting go.

Fear of staying.

Fear of making the wrong decision,

or worse, the right one.

Fear of what it means if they’ve stopped loving you.

Fear of what it means if you still do.

Fear can mask itself as logic. As anger. As control. But underneath, it’s just the softest, most human part of us, desperate not to be abandoned, desperate to feel safe.

Here’s what no one tells you: Love isn’t supposed to be comfortable. Not all the time. Because real love is confrontational, not with another person, but with yourself. It reveals your wounds. It reflects your shadows. It pulls out the parts of you you’d rather bury. And when love is unraveling, those shadows grow louder. They demand your attention.

You might be here now, sitting in the rawness, the fragmentation, the not-knowing.

You wanted answers. But discomfort showed up instead. And that might be the greatest teacher of all.

Because discomfort doesn’t lie to you. It holds up the mirror and says: Look.

So look. Not at them. Not at what was. But at you.

Who are you becoming through this?

This may not be the story you wanted to write. But it is the one you're living. And if you're brave enough to write it anyway, then you just might find something sacred in the ashes.

Maybe this is the end. Maybe it’s the beginning. Or maybe it’s both, the ending of who you were, and the beginning of who you’re meant to be.

Either way, don’t rush through it. Sit with the discomfort. Let it teach you. Let it strip you down so you can rebuild with truth.

Because love — like life — was never meant to be perfect. It was meant to be real.

The Space Between Us

Some kinds of brokenness don’t come with closure. They sit heavy on your chest, turning every breath into labor. This isn’t the kind of pain you cry through and move past, it’s the kind that stays. That roots itself in your ribcage, wrapping around your thoughts, making it hard to function.

You might be here now, drowning in worry. Not just for yourself, but for someone you love. Worrying about their mind, their heart, their silence. And the worst part? You’re not the one holding them anymore. You’re not the one wiping the tears or steadying the storm.

There’s a whisper in you that says, “Let go.” But how do you let go when your heart is still bleeding from how tightly it's holding on?

You tell yourself to be patient. To breathe. To trust time.

But patience isn’t peace, not when every hour stretches like a lifetime, not when clarity feels just out of reach. When you're in limbo, time moves differently. It hurts differently.

You want to be chosen. Not with words. But with action. With a love so present it breaks through silence and fear. You want to be met, hand-in-hand, heart-to-heart.

And maybe, you wish he/she would say: “We’ll face this fire together.”

But today, all you feel is the burn. And you’re left asking the question many are too afraid to speak out loud:

When this is over… will I still be standing?

Will we?

On Dying Hope and Emotional Boundaries

Sometimes, emotional pain doesn’t arrive as tears.

When we ask for space in a relationship, we often underestimate the cost. Space sounds noble. Respectful. Mature. But the reality is rarely so clean. The person who grants that space often does so while quietly bleeding.

There will be moments when your mind spins out with fear, fear that the person you love is unraveling and you're no longer allowed to hold them. That fear breeds questions:

Do I honor their boundaries or reach for them anyway?

Is it love to let go, or is it love to fight?

Here's my thought: when someone sets a boundary, even in coldness, it isn’t just about you. It’s about them trying to reclaim something lost, clarity, self-worth, a sense of peace. It’s hard, especially when that boundary feels like abandonment. But resisting it only causes more pain.

Still, the ache of being dismissed, of pouring your soul into a voicemail and receiving silence or cold logic in return, is real. And it hurts. Because love remembers every time it stayed up listening, every time it held space, every time it chose patience. So when love gets told it’s “too much,” that pain cuts deep.

You may be tempted to rationalize or lash out. But anger isn’t always the answer, not because it’s wrong, but because sometimes what we’re feeling isn’t anger at all. It’s heartbreak masquerading as fury. It’s fear in disguise.

In these moments, let this be the lesson:

Respecting space doesn’t mean your pain is invalid.

Crying out for connection doesn’t make you weak. But neither guarantees that the other person will be ready, or willing, to meet you where you are.

This is the truth most people avoid: sometimes, the hardest love to give is the love that steps back. Not out of indifference, but out of deep, aching care, the kind that hopes the other person finds their light, even if it’s not with you.

And so, you wait. Or you let go. Or you grieve. But through it all, you feel. Because that is human. And that is brave.

When Love Hurts and Silence Screams

There comes a point in love, especially in love strained by silence, where the ache turns time into torture. And when that silence lingers long enough, it transforms from space into abandonment, from respect into confusion, from patience into pain.

This is the moment when many people reach out. Not to control, not to beg, but because the weight of not knowing becomes heavier than the fear of rejection. This is not weakness. It’s a primal cry for connection, a desperate hope that the person you once shared your soul with might still be listening.

But the hardest truth of all? Sometimes they aren’t.

And when silence meets vulnerability with dismissal or absence, the impact runs deep. That’s when the pain starts to take physical form, a tight chest, a twisted stomach, a body that seems to rebel against the emotional burden it carries. This is heartbreak in its rawest form: the collision of love and loss before the goodbye is even spoken.

So what do we do when we realize we might be holding on to someone who has already let go?

We ask the questions that haunt the brave:

Am I too much?
Am I the problem?
Is my love a weight instead of a gift?

These questions echo through the hearts of people who feel deeply. And while the mind might attempt to rationalize, to find blame or clarity, the heart simply bleeds. It wonders if maybe, loving too deeply is a flaw.

But let’s be clear: Loving deeply is not the problem. Expecting communication is not the problem. Needing reassurance, clarity, presence, these are not shortcomings.

The problem arises when we begin to define our worth through someone else’s inability to meet us where we are. When we shape-shift, shrink, and self-blame just to keep something alive that may already be fading.

And here’s the hardest part: Sometimes, even when you love someone with every fiber of your being, the most loving thing you can do is let go.

Not because they don’t matter. But because you do.

Letting go doesn’t mean the love wasn’t real. It doesn’t mean you failed. It means you've reached the sacred threshold where self-preservation must come before self-sacrifice.

So if you're sitting in that ache right now, if your silence has been met with indifference, if your too-muchness has been used against you, please know this: You are not too much. You are simply loving someone who needs less than what you were born to give.

And if they cannot hold space for the fullness of who you are, that does not make you unworthy. It simply makes them… unready.

The Finish Line — Loving Without Apology

There comes a moment in every heart-heavy journey where the choice becomes clear, not easy, not painless, but undeniably necessary.

If we truly love someone, we must also love them enough to let them go when holding on breaks us.

It hurts, not in a poetic way, but in a visceral, soul-shaking way. It hurts to imagine the person you once built dreams with building new ones without you. It aches to think of their laughter echoing through rooms you’ll never enter again. But love, real love, cannot thrive in one-sided silence. And so, when love begins to wilt under the weight of unreciprocated effort, we are faced with a sacred act of courage:

Release.

Not because the love wasn’t worth it. Not because it wasn’t real. But because you cannot bloom where you are no longer watered.

There are people in this world whose love comes quietly, in small doses, in reserved, measured ways. And then, there are people whose love burns like wildfire, consuming, present, fierce. If you are one of the latter, you must understand:

Your intensity is not a flaw. Your passion is not a burden. Your depth is not “too much.”

The problem arises only when that fire is placed in the wrong hands, in hands afraid of the burn, in hearts unable to contain it.

So what do you do when your love overwhelms the one you long for?

You grieve.

You rage. You ache. You cry in the quiet corners of your life where no one sees. And then, you rise.

Because loving like that, with your entire soul exposed, is not weakness. It is truth. And truth doesn’t need to shrink itself to be worthy.

Maybe you wished for more years, more mornings, more memories. Maybe you wanted to go back to the beginning, to before it started unraveling. But love that only exists in nostalgia is not love that sustains.

You are not made for small love. You are not built for diluted affection, or shallow connection, or convenient silence. You are made for love that is loud, bold, messy, and transformative.

And yes, there are people who will run from that. But there will also be someone who sees it and says, “Yes. This is exactly what I’ve been waiting for.”

So let this be your finish line, not of the love, but of the self-blame. Of the belief that you must quiet your heart in order to be held. Of the habit of calling your deepest emotions “too much. ”Let this be the end of contorting yourself into shapes unrecognizable just to fit into someone else's limitations.

You will love again, and next time, it will be a love that matches yours in depth, in daring, in devotion.

Until then,