Love: An Adventure

I used to rarely tell people I loved them. I mean, I told my parents and my siblings "I love you" before I left the house or went to sleep, but I never felt like I could tell people outside of that elite circle until I deemed them worthy of that honor.
That all changed when I turned 12 or 13.
It all changed when I met him. 
He was not my first kiss or first love or first anything really. He was my first infatuation, I suppose. But he made me want to constantly talk and think about love even though I had no earthly idea what romantic love was or even looked like. The only ideas of love that I had were how my parents loved each other, what I had learned from romantic comedies and Disney films, and Jesus's love for me (which at this point in time I had a very shallow understanding of).
So essentially I was completely lost with no sign of finding my way to the grip of reality. I liked him and I had no clue if he liked me, but that didn't matter because I was in love.
I had an infatuation with that boy for 5 long and debilitating years.
He never liked me.
I stopped liking me at points because he didn't feel the same way I felt.
I sat for many hours contemplating how to be more like the girls he liked, which drove me to such a place of darkness and self-hatred that I can't really bring myself to think of it anymore.
But one day I felt the feeling that I always wanted to feel. You probably know the one. The *sparks flying because I've met the person I want to spend the rest of my life with because they love me more than words can say and I love them like oxygen so now life is bliss* feeling. However, this was nothing like my parents' love story, or romantic movies. This was not from another person proclaiming their love for me in some crazy, lavish gesture. This was me sitting on my floor holding a bottle of pills crying because I had nowhere else to go. This was me opening my bible for the first time in years and hearing the words you are beautiful, I love you. They were not spoken by him. They were spoken by Him, the creator of the universe and redeemer of my soul.

From that moment, I realized how important love is. Not the false love that the media throws at us, but the love demonstrated by a God who sent His perfect son to die for the sins of everyone. Love that is accepting and affirming. Love that is kind and passionate. Love that is real and that means something. That love can conquer all. So now, unlike my younger self; I say I love you.
Maybe I've never met you, maybe you think you are too far gone, maybe you don't love you, but I love you, because you are worthy of love.