Nothing lives here, nothing dies

We started this relationship on the foundation of a vow to build a strong bond and not as a result of one.
We placed the value of family above the quality of our life together moment by moment.
Perhaps we did it because marriage was an outside source of validation:
You are living a good life.
You are worthy of committment.
But that is too kind to say of us.
I think we did it mostly out of fear - the fear of love itself.
Love's potential to cause heartbreaking pain is what led us to choose to be free from its power.
We had seen the dependence,
the tears,
the irrational fights,
the despair
- and it was not how we wanted to live.
In each other we found the thing that was guaranteed not to destroy us if it ended.
Yet here we were, dying piece by piece and holding on.
We reasoned if we were not mad with love, there would be no thrilling highs, it's true, but we'd never have to experience the excruciating lows.
We would live in the in-between.
You were someone safe, who gave little but asked for little in return.
I was never in danger of being inspired to offer more than I could give.
I would not lose my Self here.
So insidiously I gave up the hope of ever being deliriously happy in exchange for disquieting comfort.
I did not anticipate how my insides would ache with longing for years, until I fell apart and allowed someone to hold me.
Someone sent by heaven and hell: everything I ever wanted, everything I was afraid to lose.
A life with no pain seemed so appealing, until it became a different kind of prison - where my soul existed but did not matter.
Who was to know that loneliness and disappointment were worse to bear than loss? That in trying to avoid having my heart broken by another, I broke my own.
We, in our foolish youth, underestimate our capacity for dealing with the difficult emotions and overestimate our ability to feel alive in the absence of love.