Being in love after abuse is really difficult and it is certainly not an easy task for your partner as well. For the survivor it is all about daring greatly. It is about deciding to trust while the butterflies are making you feel a bit unbalanced. It is re-finding yourself by standing in your power. It is deciding to trust in your future together, even if you are worried that he will leave.  It is about letting the one you love  see who you truly are; your beautiful soul and your strength, but also your flaws, your cope mechanisms and quirky ways. It is being your pure self despite the consequences. It is about letting love in, even if it is scaring the living daylights out of you.

Daring to trust that even without guarantees you are safe with this person and he won’t intentionally harm you, in fact, if he can help it he will go out of his way to prevent that very thing. It is discovering that he truly loves you for who you are. Feeling his embrace fill parts of you that you didn’t even know were empty.

It is trusting yourself and your own judgment and making the conscious decision to go for this relationship, to take a risk. Just because it is better to have tried and loved than to let yourself be guided by fear and never have loved at all.

It is being confronted by demons you thought were conquered years ago. It is deciding to trust even if you don’t understand everything he does, because most likely, it hasn’t got anything to do with you.  It is knowing that you are good enough to be loved and to accept that knowledge – whatever might happen-. It is about deciding that damn it! you are not letting fear standing in the way of your connection with him.

It is about accepting your emotions, knowing where they come from but refusing to be lead by them. It is about communicating openly because if you don’t, how could he ever understand what you feel? It is respecting your own boundaries and feeling comfort when he acknowledges them.

It is trying to let go of deciphering everything he says or does. Because one of the important reasons you will do that is just to find out if you are going to be harmed and if you should run for the hills.

It is falling in love when you two talk about your future together. It is loving him even more when he opens up his soul and shares his dreams, fears, wisdom and wishes. It is feeling the wonder, the happiness and the enormous gratitude that this man came into your life and the joy you feel because he decided to be a part of it. It is feeling the warmth in your heart while watching him sleep. It is laughing so hard that you believe your heart will burst if he is joking around. It is feeling the concern when he worries and feeling that you want to do anything to make him feel better again. The thrill of getting to know him better and better with every conversation you two have. But most of all it is finding comfort in the knowledge that this man, is yours and in his arms you are finally home.