Was It Love, or Just Comfort?

Childhood Without Affection

Sometimes I ask myself: was I really in love, or was I just searching for a place to belong?

Growing up, love wasn’t something I saw or felt in my home. My mother raised me as a single parent, but affection was never her language. Hugs, “I love you’s,” or even a soft smile weren’t part of our daily life. I used to wonder if she even knew how to show it but maybe she didn’t. She lost her own mother at a young age, her father wasn’t around, and she was raised by her grandmother, who later became the great-grandmother I spent most of my childhood with.

Life in that house was stable in some ways, but it was missing a heartbeat. Missing tenderness. Missing God. No one prayed out loud, no one talked about faith. The only trace of it was a wooden plaque hanging on the wall that read: “Prayer Changes.” I saw it every day, but I never knew what those words really meant. If I had, maybe I would’ve made different choices.

Searching for Belonging

As a teenager, I was hungry not for food, but for validation. For warmth. For someone to tell me I was enough.

I found myself chasing it in boys who whispered sweet nothings and in friends who only stuck around when it benefited them. Deep down, I wasn’t looking for romance I was looking for belonging. For the feeling of being wanted, because I had never really known what it felt like to be loved.

I remember nights lying awake, staring at the ceiling, wondering why I wasn’t enough for my father to stay… or for my mother to soften. Those silent questions weighed heavy, and the only escape I knew was to pour myself into the wrong people. Did it hurt? Absolutely. But at the time, even pain felt better than emptiness.

Lessons in Love

Now that I’m older, I can see it clearly. I wasn’t “fast.” I wasn’t “rebellious.”

I was a girl trying to fill a void. A girl who had never been shown what love truly looked like so she mistook comfort, attention, and companionship for the real thing.

And maybe you’ve been there too searching in all the wrong places for something that should’ve been given to you freely at home.

But here’s what I’ve learned:

“Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me.” (Psalm 27:10)

Even when love felt absent in the people around me, God was still there waiting to show me what true, unconditional love really looks like.

If This Is Your Story Too

If that’s your story, know this: you are not broken. You were simply surviving. And survival, even in its messiest form, is proof of your strength.

You are not defined by who didn’t love you right. You are defined by the God who has always loved you, even in the moments you didn’t know His love was there.

A Glimpse of What’s Next

In the next chapter, I’ll share how I began to rebuild my understanding of love and what God revealed to me about finding peace and purpose beyond the pain.

Let’s Talk

Have you ever mistaken comfort for love? How did you learn the difference? I’d love to hear your reflections in the comments.