Love Wins.

I've been dating for ten years. All of the ups and downs, in retrospect, mostly downs.

There's so many specifications, lists; has to be tall, a certain job, certain looks, certain upbringing, matching hobbies. It goes on.

Like most girls I was obsessed with the idea of dating since I was old enough to understand it. The idea of someone loving you because they were adoration of everything you were just completely captivated to me. I longed for someone to share that love with.

A few relationships in, some long, some not, I met a man.

A man who was nice.

We had a nice relationship.

A nice house.

A nice life.

No surprises, no uncertainty.

And it was well, nice.

But nice is different to happy, different to in love, different to committed. All of my friends were reaching the point of engagements, buying houses, having kids. The big milestones. And I in part followed.

I got a nice ring. I nearly said yes to a nice life.

But something was eating away at me and making me come completely undone. I couldn’t just do nice. Nice was a safe option, nice was empty, nice wasn't being loved the way that everyone dreams to be loved. Nice wasn’t true to myself. Nice was not fair to either of us.

So I walked away from everything. Started from scratch. It was petrifying. It was lonely. It was scary. In the middle of the night I would wake panicking, the isolation getting under my skin making me fearfully wonder if I'd made a huge mistake.

Who was I to go out so fearlessly in pursuit of love?

Who was I to think I deserved that love?

Did this love even exist?

When the dust settled and right when I least expected it. I met the love of my life.

And let me tell you, those moments in movies when they play the music and the heart stops. It's real. It exists.

I said yes to crazy, consuming, inconvenient, love.

I said yes to the kind of love you never dreamed you would have.

Love that has you so impassioned that you're screaming and yelling when you're fighting because they just completely get under your skin, love that even more often has your crying because you're so overwhelmed, that you didn't even know it was humanly possible to love another person so much.

Love that you would lay down your life for them, and give everything you have, your vulnerability, your heart, your future.

Love that forces you to grow up, put someone else before yourself, and makes you into the partner you always wanted to be.

The kind of love that makes you want to build a future, become a family of two, and then three and four and maybe more.

Love that you would stand in front of your family and friends and promise to love them for the red of your life.

All consuming, endless, love.

I finally found it.

Never settle for nice.

Never say okay to easy.

Because you could miss out on becoming the person you were meant to be.

So yes, either way, I win.