You’ll Get Love If You Get It Right

AWRYTE | Weekly Post Love didn’t feel like a given. It felt like a reward. I don’t remember being held just because. I remember being praised when I did something right, when I made things easier, when I didn’t mess up. And I chased that approval like it was oxygen. Because it kind of was. I was a smart kid. I picked up patterns quickly. I could read a room before I could read a book. And in my house, the rule was simple: Be helpful. Be quiet. Be impressive. And maybe, just maybe, you’d be seen as good.

It wasn’t about abuse. It was about absence. Emotional availability wasn’t in our vocabulary. Affection didn’t flow easily. It was rationed. And you learned fast that certain behaviors bought you time, bought you space, bought you… something close to love. I say “close to love” because I honestly didn’t know what real love looked like. Love, in our house, had conditions. Love came in the form of “That’s my girl” after a good report card. Love looked like a gift—but only if I’d earned it. Love sounded like silence when I stayed in line. I remember scanning her face the way some kids scan their phones—desperate for a notification. A flicker of approval. Anything.

And when I didn’t get it? I thought I did something wrong. It didn’t occur to me that maybe the system was rigged. That maybe no performance would’ve been enough. That maybe love was supposed to arrive without conditions. By middle school, I had perfected the art of the high-achieving ghost. There, but never needy. Bright, but never too bold. I said thank you before I even opened the gift. I apologized for emotions I hadn’t expressed yet. I earned gold stars while starving for real connection. I remember wrapping my own birthday presents one year. Not to be quirky. Not to be ironic. But because I didn’t want to feel disappointed when no one else remembered. If I could control the ritual, maybe it would hurt less. It didn’t.

This pattern followed me everywhere. Into friendships. Into romantic relationships. Into jobs. I’d try to “get it right” to feel wanted. I’d anticipate needs that weren’t mine. I’d smile on command, hold back tears, and call it maturity. And people loved it. Because I was easy. I made them feel good. But I was starving.

Nobody told me that love doesn’t have to be earned. Nobody told me that love isn’t a transaction. Nobody told me that if you’re constantly scanning for approval, you might never notice you’re actually invisible in the relationship.

It wasn’t until much later—much, much later—that I understood I’d built a mask out of perfection. I was praised for being “so put together.” I was told I was “strong.” What they meant was: You seem fine without needing anything from us. And what they didn’t see was the anxiety humming under my skin, the panic of disappointing someone I loved, the internal timer counting how long I had until I messed it all up.

AWRYTE is where that timer stops. It’s where I get to say: I don’t want love that only shows up when I’m impressive. I want love that shows up when I’m raw. When I’m confused. When I’m messy and not on my A-game. When I say the wrong thing. When I cry in public. When I get quiet and pull away—not to punish, but because that’s what my nervous system does when I’m hurt.

If you grew up learning that love had to be earned, I want to tell you something I wish I’d heard sooner: You were never hard to love. You were just around people who didn’t know how. You don’t have to impress anyone to belong. You don’t have to shrink or sparkle to be worthy. You don’t have to wrap your own gifts to avoid disappointment. Real love doesn’t punish. It holds. It stays. Even when you’re not performing. And if you’ve never had that before, you’re not broken. You’re just early in the chapter where you stop chasing and start choosing.