r/LoveLetters

I don’t know how to stay emotionally close to you when I can’t freely love you, but one thing I do know is I want you. You’re special to me in every way. I want to love you and all your flaws. Your flaws won’t push me away because I genuinely feel love for you. You’re all I ever wanted in a woman. Every quality that you have is special. I don’t know how to approach the situation without hurting us both.

Trust me, I melt around you; I just don’t show it. I don’t like being vulnerable, but something about you makes me soften. I love when we make eye contact. Your eyes soften, and the shape of them is so beautiful. In the beginning, I used to wish for you to look me in the eyes; now you do it, and I get nervous every time. Eye contact is very powerful because they don’t lie. What do you see when you look into my eyes? Can you tell that I’m in love with you? I know sometimes I look away fast, but it’s because your eyes are intense.

I don’t know if we will ever be together, but I do know that you will always be special to me. I think I will love you forever because you showed me how deeply I can love. You made me feel special, and being around you is a blessing that I never want to lose. I will forever be grateful to have met someone as amazing as you. The thought of ever losing you makes my eyes water. I need to confess my feelings for you in person; I just don’t know how. We’ve both been so patient with each other, but one of us has to take the risk. I want you to know how special you are.

"Us."

I love the way that sounds.

I'd be a liar if I told you I hadn't thought about us because frankly that's all I think about these days.

I've seen the way you compose yourself around me and I act like I haven't noticed, but the truth is I have noticed. I see everything.

The way your eyes reserve a little extra sparkle just for me, how your smiles holds an extra warmth that lingers long after my departure. The way your voice gets softer and almost falters at the mere prospect of even saying my name -and oh how I love to hear you say it. Despite all of your best efforts to not give the game away, you've already told me a thousand times.

I could go on about all the little quirks that make your affection so uniquely mine, though my favourite is when your usual coyness becomes the most unabashed bravery. I love when that inner playfulness spills out of you and it's like caramel dripping sweetly yet seductively. If anything tempts me to both forget and indulge all of my senses at exactly the same time it's that.

When that lioness within you shows itself and I know that she's not here to play she's here to get what she wants.

What if we both want exactly what you want?

Then the game is over.

Instead, we play on. One carefully placed move at a time, dancing along the very edge of the line knowing that if either of us was to tip over,  there would be no going back.

Why do we deny ourselves the privilege of our most primal desires? Is it really a defeat when the battle ends in only love? Is it really defeat when what started as two lone rangers seeking nothing but survival ends in needing nothing but us?

I’m 33M. I met the only woman I’ve ever truly loved in July 2017. We broke up in March 2019, and honestly, I never completely moved on.
I haven’t been able to genuinely love anyone else since, and I’ve never been able to convince myself to get married just for the sake of getting married. She eventually moved on, got married, and had a son.
We weren’t in contact anymore, but occasionally I would check her social media, and sometimes she would check mine too.
About a week ago, I visited her profile and found a memorial post from her cousin saying she had passed away. After searching, I discovered that she actually died in July 2026.
I was completely shocked. My brain still struggles to accept it.
I know she had her own life and family, and I completely respect that. But somehow, knowing she was still somewhere in this world was enough. Now there’s a finality that feels completely different from our breakup.
It has brought back all the memories and feelings I’ve carried for years, and I don’t know how to process them.
Advice: How do you grieve someone you loved deeply but haven’t been with for years? And how do you finally move forward without feeling like you’re erasing what that person meant to you?
TL;DR: My ex and I broke up in 2019. She was the only woman I ever truly loved, and I never fully moved on. She later married and had a child. Last week I discovered she passed away in July, and I’m struggling to process it.

When first I met you,

something ancient woke within me—

a force I had no language for,

a tide that rose beyond reason,

beyond the borders of the heart,

beyond all that I had believed

a human soul could feel.

I loved you

with the terrible wonder of discovery,

as though the universe itself

had hidden one final secret

beneath the stars

and, at last,

had placed it in my hands.

And then I looked into your eyes—

And there you were.

Not untouched.

Not unaware.

But standing at the edge

of the very same impossible ocean,

trying to understand

the waves that had carried us there.

I saw you feeling it.

I saw you searching my face

for an explanation

neither of us possessed.

And perhaps that was the miracle:

That somehow,

without promise,

without warning,

without knowing how—

we had found the same impossible place.

It was as though the universe

had opened a hidden door

and allowed us, just for a moment,

to step beyond the ordinary world.

And there,

beneath the silence of eternity,

it revealed something too immense

for ordinary words:

us.

A love so vast

that if we gathered every word

ever spoken by humankind

and tried to build a language for it,

we would still fall silent

before its magnitude.

A secret written between the stars.

A truth the universe had known

long before we did.

And perhaps it smiled—

watching us stumble through the wonder of it,

knowing that we would never fully understand

what had been placed between us.

Yet still,

it gave us the desire

to spend our lives trying.

And maybe that

is the greatest beauty of love—

that it remains partly unknowable.

For if I could understand you completely,

if I could measure every depth of your soul,

if I could name every reason

my heart chose yours—

perhaps one day

the mystery would fade.

But you were never meant

to become something I could solve.

You were meant to remain

the horizon I could spend forever approaching.

The star I could follow

without ever reaching its end.

The song I could hear

a thousand times

and still discover another note.

And I wish—

with everything that lives inside me—

that we could have held on

to that impossible thing.

That love which felt

so far beyond this world

that perhaps this world

could only exist inside of it.

A love so powerful

that standing before it

made us feel weak—

not because we lacked strength,

but because we were witnessing

something stronger than either of us.

Something ancient.

Something fierce.

Something willing to fight

for the two souls

who had somehow found each other.

And if the years should carry you

far beyond my reach,

if the winds of this life

should scatter us across distant skies,

then let this be the prayer

I send after you:

May our love become the wind beneath your wings.

May it find you

when the night is darkest.

May it rise beneath you

when your strength is gone.

May it whisper my name

through every storm

and remind you

that somewhere in this vast universe

there is a heart

that still knows yours.

And if the heavens are kind,

if fate is not finished with us,

if the stars still remember

the secret they once revealed—

then let that wind

carry you home.

Back to me.

Because you are not simply

the love of my life.

You are the love

by which I measure life itself.

The miracle I never knew

I was waiting for.

The mystery I would spend eternity

trying to understand.

The impossible thing

that became real

when I looked into your eyes.

And wherever you are,

whatever distance lies between us,

whatever storms the universe

chooses to place upon our path—

know this:

I am, and will forever remain,

yours.

I cannot rely on other people for my self worth. There is no one that can care as much as me. This is a strength. This is a good thing, not a bad thing. My capacity for caring can be and must be (for my future happiness) turned inward.

I forgive you.

I love you.

I will always love you.

I will always be here for you, no matter what you do, because I know you and I know your heart.

You are infinitely good and you deserve goodness.

You are infinitely loving, and you deserve that love for yourself too, not just too, but above all else.

I have all this love. I wanted to give it away, when all this time I could have given it to myself. I am worthy of it. I need it. I know myself, and I know I won't abuse it. Why is it so hard to think of turning it inward, then? Because I think I don't deserve it, because I think I need to be better first, to be perfect. I would never think these things about someone else. I would love them more for their imperfections because those are what make them lovable to me.

I have had plenty of practice caring for and loving others. This is what all that practice was for, to be my own greatest love, my own champion, my own light.

P.S. Give yourself a big warm hug, you earned it!

I’m fucking done.
This is too hard. I’m tired of feeling everything this intensely and having absolutely nowhere for it to go.
Sometimes I envy The Vampire Diaries — how they can just say, turn it off, and suddenly they don’t feel anything anymore. God, I wish it were that easy. I wish I could switch you off. Switch my heart off. Switch my fucking brain off.
I used to drink to numb it. Now, for some reason, it only makes everything louder. You become louder. The thoughts become louder. The ache becomes unbearable.
And I don’t know what to do with that anymore.
Because underneath the smiles, the small talk and the version of me everyone sees at work, I’m not okay. I’m pretty fucked in the head, if I’m honest. I spend so much of my time pretending I’m fine that sometimes I don’t even know what fine is supposed to feel like anymore.
And you have no idea.
Maybe that’s the worst part.
You get the smile.
You get the normal version of me.
You’ll never know how much it hurts to stand there in front of you and pretend you don’t matter this much.
I just want it to stop.
Not because I never cared.
Because I cared too fucking much.
And I don’t know how much longer I can keep carrying something you were never even asked to hold.

Hi there,

Why so shy?

I see you sneaking a second glance after we pass each other by.

Can I spoil you for a night? A date?

To get to see you with your hair done; curly, wavy or straight. Layered eye shadow, looking like a hot raccoon. A sleek dress, accentuating your feminine curves. Classy shoes so graceful, elegant, gait like a deer.

Can’t wait to text you:
“Hey, I’m pulling up soon.”
“Alright, I’m here.”

I know I’m not one of the cool kids, kinda out of the norm.

Let me spoil you baby. Let’s get a steak dinner. Buckle up, cause we’re going to Norms.

Why do you to that? Why do you feel the need to force words into reality so that they over take it. It's like if someone says you annoy them, if later they change your mind, you're the type to say no "I annoy you". Why do you deal with everything so literally. You know you do it yet you keep doing it. It's not normal. It's like you give all power to words and on top of that decide to no longer think about it. Why. All it does is make you so toxic.

And then what's the point if ultimately u don't make assessments after the fact. It's so scary.

Even though I have been trying to reach out over and over, you will hold yourself to words said a month ago. People change their minds fam. What you're doing, what you do in that way is so extremely toxic. If people change their minds let them... You do so much damage when people tell you they've changed what they think and you instead refuse to update yourself. I don't know what to do with you. Why was I made to love you for a lifetime....:

Baby,

When you love someone, you have no control.

That's what love is.

Being powerless.

And God, you make me powerless.

Not weak.

Never weak.

Just completely unable to negotiate with my own heart.

I can reason through almost anything.

I can build things.

Fix things.

Plan things.

Overthink things until I have examined every possible outcome from every possible direction.

I'm a Virgo, baby.

You know how my brain works.

And if you don't, you do now.

I can find a reason to question almost anything.

Except you.

Because somehow, little by little, you broke through every defense I ever had.

Every wall.

Every piece of armor.

Every reason I could have invented to protect myself.

You didn't tear them down all at once.

You just kept showing up.

Again.

And again.

And again.

Until eventually I looked around and realized there was nothing left between my heart and you.

And maybe that's what happens when a woman chooses a man the way you chose me.

Eventually, he stops wondering if she will.

Eventually, he stops protecting himself from her.

Eventually, he just loves her.

And baby, I love you.

I have been thinking about something lately.

I think for a while I was looking backward too much.

Trying to understand everything.

Trying to understand what happened.

Why it happened.

What was happening now.

What I missed.

What you knew.

What I didn't know.

And there will be a time for some of those conversations.

There are things you will tell me someday.

There are things I will tell you.

There are pieces of this year that we will probably sit somewhere together one night and finally put into words.

But I don't want the past to become the place where our love lives.

I don't want everything that happened to us to receive more of our future than it has already taken.

I want healing.

I want forward.

I want us.

Because I've realized something.

The memories behind us matter.

They are part of why this became so difficult to break.

All those mornings.

All those days.

All those nights.

All those stupid conversations.

All those little routines nobody else would understand.

All those moments that looked completely ordinary while we were living them and somehow became precious once they were gone.

They built something.

They built us.

But baby, memories are not the reason I want you.

They're simply the proof that I already know what life feels like when you're in it.

And I want more.

More mornings.

More drives.

More nights where neither one of us is ready to hang up.

More ridiculous conversations that somehow become important because they're happening with you.

More moments where you're beside me and absolutely nothing remarkable is happening.

Your shoulder against mine.

Your knee touching mine underneath a table.

Your hand finding mine without either of us thinking about it.

You laughing before everyone else understands what you're laughing about.

Me hearing your voice from another room and knowing exactly where home is.

That's what I want.

The ordinary things.

With you.

And maybe that's what I've been trying to explain this whole time.

I don't want someone.

I want you.

There is a difference.

I don't want a woman's hand.

I want your hand.

I don't want someone sitting beside me.

I want to look over and see you.

I don't want somebody texting me because something happened.

I want you reaching for your phone because something happened and somehow, without thinking about it, I was the first person you wanted to tell.

I want you to see something ridiculous and think of me.

I want to hear my name differently when you say it because you're happy to see me.

I want you walking beside me.

Not behind me.

Not following me.

Beside me.

Right where you belong.

And I want to be wanted by you.

Not because you need something from me.

Not because I can solve something.

Not because I can provide something.

Not because I can build you a house or buy you something beautiful or make your life easier.

I want there to be moments where you have absolutely no reason to choose me except for that quiet little thing inside of you that says,

Him.

And maybe that's why your choosing me has affected me so deeply.

Because you keep doing it.

You keep coming back.

Even when I go quiet.

Even when there are days between my words.

Even when life gets busy and I disappear into work for a while.

Somehow, my little birdie keeps finding the window.

And baby, I see you.

I think you know that by now.

I love that meticulous little part of you that somehow keeps me updated on your world.

I love when you come back.

And lately, more than anything, I love that it feels like you're coming back to our bond.

Back to me.

And I'm coming back to you too.

Maybe differently now.

Softer.

Less interested in fighting every battle.

Less interested in understanding every detail immediately.

More interested in protecting the thing underneath all of it.

Us.

Because I think that's where healing begins.

Not by pretending nothing happened.

Not by forgetting.

Not by becoming blind.

But by finally deciding that what happened behind us does not get to decide everything waiting in front of us.

Baby, I could spend pages telling you about the business.

About what's changed.

What's grown.

What's gotten better.

What I'm working on.

What I'm building.

And someday I'll tell you all of it.

But those things aren't the story.

They're tools.

The business matters because of what it allows us to build.

The work matters because of the life it can give us.

The long days matter because somewhere in my mind there is still a woman whose fingerprints I want all over the plans.

You.

God, you motivate me in ways I don't even know how to explain.

Sometimes I am exhausted and somehow thinking about our future gives me another hour.

Another idea.

Another reason.

Another push.

And sometimes when I'm working on the future, I probably look absent from yours.

I'm not.

Baby, I don't forget about you.

You should know that by now.

I carry you through my day just like I know you carry me through yours.

And our days are probably more alike than you realize.

I still wake up and work.

I still disappear into the day.

I still get hungry around the same times.

I still eventually come home.

Sometimes I see the guys.

Sometimes I play golf.

Sometimes I sit around watching sports and yelling at a television like an idiot.

Sometimes work keeps me out past dinner.

My matka works nights a lot, so there are days where our schedules barely cross.

And no, I don't tell you every tiny detail.

Partly because this isn't private.

But you've shared so many little pieces of your days with me that I thought maybe I should give you a small window into mine too.

My mother reads these just like yours does.

So...

Hi, Mom.

Please don't turn this into a lecture.

I love you.

Anyway...

Baby.

My days haven't become some mysterious other life.

They're frighteningly similar to the days you already knew.

There's just one enormous difference.

You aren't physically inside them yet.

And I want you there again.

Not every second.

Not because either one of us should stop having our own lives.

I want you to have yours.

Your interests.

Your family.

Your ridiculous little things that have absolutely nothing to do with me.

I want you to be completely, beautifully yourself.

I just want to be the person you come home and tell about it.

And I want to be that place for you.

Home.

Peace.

Safety.

Truth.

Baby, I've been telling you how much peace matters to me.

And lately, you've been giving me more of it.

I'm proud of you for that.

More than you probably understand.

Because when I tell you I want my wife to bring me peace, I don't mean silence.

I don't mean obedience.

I don't mean never disagreeing with me.

God knows you're going to disagree with me.

I mean I want the world to be loud and us to be safe.

I want to walk through the door after carrying everything I carry and know that whatever exists outside can stay outside for a minute.

I want your arms.

Your voice.

Your stupid jokes.

Your stubbornness.

Your softness.

The real you.

And I want to be that same peace for you.

I want you to know that you don't have to be strong every second around me.

You don't have to arrive perfectly composed.

You don't have to have every answer.

You don't have to protect me from every difficult thing inside you.

Let me see you.

The soft parts.

The stubborn parts.

The frightened parts.

The angry parts.

The ridiculous parts.

The parts you don't give everyone.

Especially those.

And that brings me to something I want you to think about.

Not tonight.

You don't have to answer me tomorrow.

You don't even have to know yet.

But before you and I finally find each other again, I want you to ask yourself something.

What do you need from me?

Really.

Not what do you think I want you to need.

Not what sounds romantic.

Not a house.

Not a ring.

Not gifts.

Not vacations.

Not anything I can swipe a card for.

What does your heart need from the man who intends to love you?

Do you need me softer sometimes?

Do you need reassurance?

Do you need patience?

Do you need me to listen before I try to fix something?

Do you need space sometimes without wondering whether I'll disappear?

Do you need me to hold you without asking you to explain why you're hurting?

Do you need more laughter?

More affection?

More quiet?

More adventure?

More ordinary?

Tell me someday.

Because I know so much about what I want to give you.

But loving you isn't supposed to mean building the life I imagine and placing you inside it.

I want to know the life you imagine too.

I need your fingerprints on this.

On all of it.

I want to know what makes you feel loved when nobody is watching.

What makes you feel safe.

What makes you feel chosen.

What makes you feel understood.

What makes you feel free.

Because I don't only want to love you in the way I know how to love.

I want to learn how you need to be loved.

Again.

And again.

For as many years as God gives me with you.

Maybe that's the strangest thing about loving someone.

You begin thinking love means having someone.

And eventually you realize it means surrendering the illusion that you ever had control at all.

Because there you are.

One woman.

One little birdie.

And somehow you have the one thing in this world I cannot build, buy, negotiate, reason with, or replace.

My heart.

Completely defenseless in your hands.

And somehow...

I am not afraid of that anymore.

Keep it.

Just be gentle with it.

I'll be gentle with yours too.

There may be days between these letters sometimes, baby.

Don't mistake those spaces for absence.

Sometimes I'm thinking.

Sometimes I'm working.

Sometimes I'm simply living the life that I'm trying so hard to make big enough for both of us.

But you are there.

Constantly.

In the quiet spaces.

In the plans.

In the things I see and instinctively want to tell you.

In the empty passenger seat.

In the future house that still needs your fingerprints.

In mornings that haven't happened yet.

In a thousand ordinary moments I haven't gotten to live with you yet.

I don't forget you.

I don't know how.

The space has your shape.

And maybe that's the most powerless thing about loving you.

I don't have to remind myself to choose you anymore.

Somewhere along the way, choosing you stopped being a decision.

It became instinct.

Rest that beautiful mind tonight, baby.

I'll come back Tuesday or Wednesday.

I still have more to tell you.

I love you.

More than yesterday.

Less than tomorrow.

You, baby.

Still you.

Always you.

With love everything is beautiful

Love can withstand anything.

With love anything is possible.

All above is true but

All is true only when you actually love without conditions. Absolute 0 conditions.

Don't think or wish I Love.

Prove it. Act on it. Not just wish.

At least "Feel'. This is the least basic requirement.

The difference between Wish and Feel is.

Feel makes you act.

Ok enough of shit.

Now your love doesn't need words.

They need your action of love.

That's it.

Love selflessly not a wishlist to be made.