Love

It is 11:23 AM, and I am currently sitting at work, listening to the phone ring as I stare at the computer. I work in the Financial Aid Office here at LMU, where I feel the most studious. I know everything about federal student loans, institutional loans, interest rates, scholarships, grants… you can name it. I’m listening to the ladies in the office gossip about what they did yesterday for their significant other. It’s February 15th, the day after Valentine’s Day and I’m thinking back to everything that I have been through in my life. This is where the feelings start.

I have been with a guy I thought I was in love with for four years. Four years of growing up together; sharing memories, families, laughter, and love. I never thought I would be “in love,” especially since I’m only 20-years-old. I have been with this guy since my junior year of high school and we did everything together. As of now, I don’t know anything else but my life with him. I feel like we became one person since he’s my best friend.

But in life, you hit speed bumps where change happens. It’s so shocking how things can change instantly, and you have to live with a certain type of pain. There’s no other pain compared to a breakup with someone you love. My boyfriend of four years cheated on me and risked everything just for one night. After reading his laptop with the messages between him and another girl, I shattered into a million pieces. I felt no pain at the moment, but the feeling of disgust and hate. Everything shut down inside of me and all I could feel was my heart racing for answers. I felt regret, hurt, and blame. I blamed myself and asked myself, “What did I do that made him do this to me?”

Now that the holiday has passed, I think about what it even means to be in love. Is love even real, when I loved someone for that long that did something so horrible to me? Millennials in our generation don’t really care about being in love or bother to be in a relationship, well a majority of them don’t. This generation likes sex, and doesn’t necessarily stick to one person. According to Rolling Stones, “Straight Millennials may not be having more sex, but they are certainly having it differently. A study found that today’s college students are significantly less likely to report having a regular sexual partner (77.1 percent versus 84.5 percent), while they’re more likely to report having sex casually with a friend or random partner.”

This may not be a bad thing, but being in “love” is so different for millennials. In an article written by Bolde, this generation has redefined love and romance to the point that they actually might be unrecognizable to the other generations. We recognize love as something that should be public. Millennials post on social media because that is how a relationship becomes official. It’s not official until you post about it. We turn to technology to feel love. In Bolde, they mentioned that, “There’s nothing like falling asleep over Skype of Facetime together… This makes long distance more fun.”

I’ve been doing long distance and trust me, it sucked, but I never really had a problem with it. I was always a firm believer in long distance, and if you loved someone then it will work itself out. One of my roommates, Helena, has been dating a guy for several months, but she’s nervous that he may be asking her to be his girlfriend soon. She came home from lunch with him one day and said, “Guys… I think he’s is going to pop the question. I don’t want a boyfriend. I like where I am in my life and how my life is. I don’t think I have time for anything more than just dating.”

In the generation we live in, we have grown up to be so independent and so “free,” that sometimes being in a relationship can stop you from doing the things you want, but sometimes it doesn’t. In my situation… this is something that I need to work on, and I’m still trying to find myself.