I was the girl who stayed through the no job, no money, no gifts, no dates and the times when he had nothing to offer but himself. I could have left. I could have chosen an easier kind of love, but I stayed because I believed in him, believed in us and believed that one day things would get better. I never needed him to have everything figured out. I just wanted to build something meaningful together. I wanted my loyalty to mean something, to know that when life finally got better for him, he would remember the girl who stood beside him when it didn’t. Maybe that’s what hurts the most. I wasn’t asking for a perfect man or a perfect life. I was willing to grow with him, struggle with him and love him through seasons when we had very little. I just never imagined that after giving so much of my heart, I would be the one left trying to put it back together. I didn’t leave when he had nothing. I stayed because I believed in what we could become. And it breaks my heart that the love I was willing to build from the ground up still ended up destroying me.