The Shelter and the Man Who Said “Love” Too Fast
The Shelter and the Man Who Said “Love” Too Fast
I met him at my lowest. I was in a shelter. 2025. He was there too. In the beginning, red flags were everywhere. Little ones. The way he talked over me. The way his story changed. The way he said God told him to do things right after a crisis. I saw them. I ignored them.
When you’re at the bottom, attention feels like oxygen. He gave me attention. So I called it love and didn’t look closer.
I moved. Started getting my life back on track. We’d get together. Take photos. Spend time. He said “I love you” quickly. Too quickly. I didn’t love him. I see that now. I think I let men say the word first because I was scared to be the one who felt it. But the truth is, the word would sink in only after I started to know them. And that’s when the red flags turned into roadblocks.
This always happens. Especially in the past. A man shows up when I’m vulnerable. He’s intense. Spiritual. He names God a lot. He says “love” before he knows my middle name. Then I start seeing the pattern: history of not being stable, leaving places, starting over, calling it a calling.
He left for Idaho. Said Jesus told him to go. Maybe Jesus did. Maybe he didn’t. What I know is that he leaves. That’s his cycle. And I almost made it mine again.
I don’t date online because I don’t want sex. I’m celibate. I want to take time getting to know people. I want to watch how they handle boredom, how they treat the clerk at Walgreens, how they act when no one’s watching. I want to see if they can stay. Not just pray. Stay.
The shelter taught me how to survive. Getting out taught me how to discern. Love isn’t a word you say to keep someone from leaving. Love isn’t a prophecy you use to explain why you’re gone by Tuesday. Love is boring some days. It’s meds on time. It’s showing up for shift. It’s not leaving when things get hard, or when you get a “word.”
I don’t blame him. He was at his lowest too. But I’m not at my lowest anymore. I’m 51, starting a Ph.D. I can’t afford to ignore red flags. I’ve seen what happens when I do. Jail. Hospital. Back to zero.
So I let him go to Idaho. I stayed in Oregon. I stayed with me.
The next time someone says “I love you” fast, I’ll say, “Thank you. I’ll wait.” If it’s real, it can wait. If it can’t wait, it wasn’t real.
My life doesn’t flash before my eyes anymore. I’m living it, day by day, no longer looking for rescue in a man. I rescued myself.
And that’s a love story I can believe in.
