Love Letters

October 19, 2025

This is a reflection on how I learned to love myself.

It won’t be for everyone,

but if it is for you I hope you know you are worthy.

With endless love,

Katherine

Love Letters

We grow up believing love letters come from other people—

from the ones who see us, choose us, and write our names with care.

There’s a quiet thrill in that:

the flutter of being wanted, the feeling of mattering to someone else.

But what I’ve learned is that another person’s love—

no matter how good or true—

can’t always reach the deepest parts of us.

The ones shaped by neglect, abandonment, loss,

abuse,

or the kind of emptiness that teaches you to doubt your own worth,

or instills shame that turns mistakes from “I did something bad”

into “I am bad.”

When those wounds go unhealed,

we often don’t even choose people who can love us well.

We mistake intensity for intimacy,

familiar pain for connection,

and end up reinforcing the very stories we long to escape.

Even when healthy love does appear,

it can feel foreign—

so we flinch from it, question it,

or self-sabotage.

I didn’t understand that for most of my life.

I thought the answer was to never be alone,

love harder, try more, prove myself worthy.

I didn’t realize that what I was really searching for

was the love and acceptance I had never learned to give myself.

It wasn’t until I finally went to therapy—after years of resisting it—

that I started to see this truth.

I had always been afraid of what might happen

if I opened that door.

My mother’s lifelong struggles with the mental health industry

made me wary of the entire world of therapy and self-examination.

But pain has a way of insisting on honesty.

I reached a point where I couldn’t keep living in the split—

between who I showed the world

and what I felt inside.

So I took the risk.

I opened the Pandora’s box I had spent my life avoiding

and asked for help.

In those early sessions, I shared what I had never shown anyone:

my pain, my shadows, and the small, hurting child still living inside me.

Thankfully, I found a therapist who didn’t just listen—

she gave me tools. Books. Exercises.

And one of the first was something that sounded strange at the time:

Write love letters to yourself.

It felt awkward, almost embarrassing.

Who does that?

But I was desperate to do things differently, so I tried.

At first, my letters were short and unsure—

generic words I thought I was supposed to say.

But over time, I began to write what I truly needed to hear:

that I was lovable simply for being,

that I was proud of myself,

that what happened to me wasn’t my fault,

that I was beautiful, talented, funny, and capable,

and that I was already becoming emotionally healthy.

That was in 2014. I still write them today.

My letters have changed as I have.

I no longer write to “little Katherine.”

She’s integrated now, folded into the whole of who I am.

When I write, I speak to all of me—

the woman I’ve become and the one I’m still becoming.

I write about love, pride, boundaries, needs, dreams, pain, and faith in myself.

And I write with an unwavering belief

in the beauty of the life I’m creating.

Over the years, I’ve shared this practice with others.

Some look at me like I’m crazy.

Others say it feels too uncomfortable to speak to themselves with love.

But a few have tried it—and it’s changed them, too.

Writing love letters to myself transformed my life.

It taught me to nurture myself, to forgive myself,

love the shit out of my shame,

transform my behaviors,

and believe in my own goodness despite all of my imperfections.

While my self love, boundaries, and wholeness are still in process,

I’m sharing this practice with you now,

because we all have to start somewhere.

You can write them yourself—

the words you’ve been longing to hear.

And when you do,

they don’t just count.

They heal.

They rebuild.

They become proof that you already are

worthy.