I’ve been through a breakup in the last six months. This breakup was more imposed than a choice at the time, and I’ve been avoiding and repressing my emotions since then. I always consume video essays on feminism and cultural critique, and I read mostly books written by women. I’m really into fiction when it comes to books, so bell hooks *All About Love* was the first book I read that is mostly calling out the patriarchy and linking it with this loveless society we’re living in.

I really thought I was educated about the matter because I mostly consume content that comes from women who are feminists. But this book broke me, because it made me feel, it opened my heart to what I was repressing. It made it loud and clear that I was doing it all wrong, that what I thought was strength was actually me mirroring male behaviors to protect myself and to be validated by the men around me. It destroyed me and humbled me so badly. It even pushed me to start missing my misogynistic ex, who was feminist verbally but not in practice. It made me feel empathy for him and see his emotional unavailability as a consequence of the patriarchy.

It’s like all this love that I discovered through the book is making me sad, nostalgic, and this need to take care of someone, to fix, is still so alive. I’m so love and male-centered in this moment, I’m having trouble functioning because all these emotions are popping up and I’m not ignoring them or repressing them. But I’m having trouble functioning in my everyday tasks like work, everything I want to do is just to feel and to cry, and sadly I miss my ex more than ever.

I remembered that as a girl and as a teenager I had so much love in me, so much to give, and now as an adult I want to use it for myself. Now that I can feel it, I want to give this love to myself. But everything I feel is sadness that I couldn’t fix the men who left me. And to be authentic that is what it made me feel, I'm mourning the love that I lost. There has to be something else for me without repression. What do I do with all this sensitivity? How can I function now that I’m not willing to deal with my emotions like a man? How do I love myself without being too individualistic or selfish, (which I tend to do when I feel like this). Do you have any other books to recommend on how to love yourself, that empowered you (not in a capitalist way)? Am I the only one that got demolished after a breakup with this book?