Love thy self....

A tale for the "unloved".... That is what I have been letting myself feel like for the last 8 years. Unloved... This tale started around the time I graduated from high school. I had put on a little weight so my nice four-pack abs were no longer visible... and this really cool thing called a muffin top began to grow.. I began college in the fall and was soo excited because all I could think about was what one of my high school teachers had said... They talked about college being more than the education, it was about the experience. The growing up, the gaining of responsibility and independence, and FINDING THE ONE!!

I had had a couple cute innocent boyfriends in high school, and I was looking forward to dating, flirting, all the wonderful fun things you see on the movies!

Us girls would get all dolled up in the dorms rooms.. filling the tiny space with the smell of perfume, hairspray, and mushroom pepperoni pizza!! We would get the heels on and hit the town... Guys would come up to me.. but they would say, "Your friend is cute!" "Who's your friend?" This mixed with a slow gain in weight lead to a very low self image... I didn't know how to handle it... How are you supposed to feel when you are never getting hit on, and the only attention from guys you get is to ask you about your friends?? They don't cover this in Cosmo... So I began to feel like I was unworthy... It became a somewhat annoying joke with my roommates but I would often say, "Nobody loves a fat girl". I truely in my heart began to feel that!! I had days where I felt soo cute! I felt so good about myself!! I couldn't wait to go out, because I just KNEW guys were going to think I was as cute as I thought I was... And, nope.. didn't happen... This only made me question more.. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?!?!

I would talk about it, and I would hear a lot of you need to love yourself, you need to know how to flirt, you need to talk to guys first, you need to be aware of how you are coming across to guys, just be yourself.. hes out there... BLAH BLAH BLAH is really what I thought of all that!!

Couples... They follow me EVERYWHERE!!! It seems like no matter what, when I am around people.. they are dating someone... I began to think I had the curse of cupid.. Always shooting the arrows... never getting hit... It would get to the point where I would get soo sad that I would get mad at the site of a couple.. It didn't matter how happy I was for them, and how great I thought they were together I couldn't shake the anger/jealousy/sadness...

I just hated how I felt... low.. unwanted.. unloved... I felt like when people were in couples they always had someone who had their back... Someone who would be there for them no matter what!! Someone who thought the sun shined out their ass... Okay, now I know what you are thinking.. it isn't always that great. There are fights, guys just want one thing, blah blah... To me I was weighing my self worth on the attention I was receiving... I will never forget a roommate my senior year talking about this guy she had talked to in class and she was talking about how she felt sorry for him because he hadn't had a girlfriend since he had been in college..That made my stomach drop and it took everything not to let the tears stream in...

Then in my seventh consecutive year the curse was broken! I got a boyfriend!!! It was a semi-long distance relationship so we didn't see each other all the time.. This being my first boyfriend in what seemed like eternity it pretty much felt like the first.... We ended up breaking up after 4 months.. Most of the relationship was good and innocent. There was just one thing that continued to haunt me... He wasn't good about complimenting.. There were no, "you look good todays" No, "You are soo prettys".... For me this only fed into my already low self worth...

I finally began to realize that I need to look inside.. I began losing weight and feeling great... I began getting attention from guys... Was it because I looked different.. or because I was beginning to love myself and I was wearing it on my sleeve.. Idk! But I didn't know what to do with the attention and made a couple decisions I was regard to as poor... Like all things in life we have a choice... I had been choosing to embrace the sadness... I was choosing to give guys the power to make me feel like that!! I also had let my love for myself be decided by someone else... Not only was I choosing to feel "unloved" I was disregarding the love that is all around me everyday!! I am a LUCKY person! I am not smighted by God for not having guys hit on me and want me.. I am gifted to have some of the greatest people on earth as my friends!!!

This tale is one that needs no pity.. This is a tale that I think we all can relate to in some way.. We all have that something we want, but just can't have right now. Which is what makes it taste that much sweeter when we get it!!!

Where am I now? I am dating.......... myself. Getting to know who I really am... And you know what... I think I am starting to fall for me!!!

Peace and Love,

Green Teeney