Three Words More Important Than "I Love You"

"Love you," he says, keys in hand, eyes on his phone, halfway out the door.

"Love you too," you call back, mid-sentence to the dog.

Neither of you looked up.

Somewhere along the way, "I love you" slid in next to "pass the salt" and "I'm fine." You say it to be polite, on autopilot, so often you barely hear it.

The dictionary calls love affection, desire, intense admiration. In your kitchen, it might look more like resentment simmering under the counters you just wiped, a running tally of who did what, or a close eye on your partner's every move. And the whole time, you're both still saying "I love you."

Where we learned to love with conditions

Nobody showed most of us what unconditional love looks like. We grew up on fairy tales (thanks for nothing, Disney), "because I said so" parenting, and marriages that ran on duty more than connection. We watched the adults around us give themselves away until they turned bitter, and we called it devotion.

That left fingerprints. Many of our mothers carried too much, and people called them controlling for it. Many of our fathers lost track of where they fit and what they had to offer. We grew up inside that confusion, and a lot of us learned to stay guarded and independent, careful not to need anyone too much.

You learned what you know about love somewhere. For most of us, it started there.

The 50/50 myth

We say we want 50/50. There's no neat split, and who decided half was the goal anyway?

Imagine each of you showing up 100/100. You won't do it perfectly. You'll show up whole, own your part, and take responsibility for your words, your actions, and your growth.

Most of us didn't grow up learning how to say what we need. So we keep our expectations to ourselves until they come out sideways, as rage, resentment, or a slow, quiet withdrawal.

Love means sitting through the discomfort

Picture someone you love looking at you and saying, "This thing you did hurt me." Nobody taught most of us what to do with that moment.

The person saying it wants the relationship to grow. Underneath their words sits something like, "I want to be closer to you, and I'm trusting you to hear me because you love me too." They took a risk to say it, and that risk is love.

Plenty of us hear criticism instead. Part of you hears danger, your nervous system senses threat and your behaviour turns defensive and shuts the door before the love underneath has a chance to reach you.

My body knows the difference now

It took me a long time to learn what love feels like and what it doesn't. I had to explore my body’s sense of safety and danger and how it perceived threat. These days I feel the signal, pause, and reflect on whether this is an old story or if this threat is real. I have more capacity to tolerate and room for compassion over judgment and my guard. It doesn’t mean things don’t hurt - they do. I got here through years of personal work. It doesn’t feel like survival at every step anymore.

When love goes missing, I feel it deeply. Quite literally, my heart ached. Sometimes like a hot poker pressing into my stomach, too. Anxious, frustrated, disappointed. Uh-huh. Not subtle. Strange as it sounds, I'm grateful for that contrast, because it lets me give and receive love in a much more real, unfiltered way.

Stop falling for the cheap knock-offs

Once you know what love feels like, you start spotting the knock-offs. You stop accepting "I love you" as a substitute for action. You side-eye the grand gesture that doesn't match the everyday behaviour. You stop mistaking control, guilt trips, and emotional crumbs for connection.

And once that radar switches on, you can't switch it off, which turns out to be a gift. You sure as heck can't pretend you don't deserve better. You know you deserve better.

The strings we don't see In my own life and in the stories clients trust me with, I keep seeing the same thing: most of us love with strings attached, and we don't notice them. We call them expectations, standards, or "just wanting what's best." The unhealthy ones usually come down to control.

You might recognize:

• Parents who'd do anything for their kids, except let them figure things out and accept them for who they are.
• Adult children guilted into calls and visits because that's what a "good" son or daughter does.
• The "blood is thicker than water" crowd who turn on family the moment money or pride gets involved.
• Siblings who still need you in the role you played at twelve, the peacemaker or the screw-up, and get prickly the moment you outgrow it.
• Partners who say "I love you" but don't listen, don't know you, and stopped growing with you a long time ago.
• Friends who show up for you when you’re struggling, then go quiet when things start going well for you.

So how do you love?

If love is something you do, look at what you're doing.

How do you feel loved?

How do you receive it?

How do you give it?

Sit with those for a minute. Your answers will tell on you, a little.

Try "I choose you"

My challenge to you: set "I love you" down for a while and try "I choose you."

Choosing is something you do. It sounds like:

• I'm here for the messy conversations, not just the easy moments.
• I'll listen when you speak, even when it's uncomfortable.
• I'll grow alongside you instead of holding on to the version of you I first met.
• I’ll get to know who you are now, not the kid I shared a bedroom with.
• I'll respect your choices, even when I'd choose differently.
• I’ll cheer your good news as loudly as I showed up for your hard days.

You can say "I love you" in passing. "I choose you" asks your actions to match your words, today and tomorrow and the day after.

A word for parents, because this one matters. Your child's belonging was never up for a vote. With our kids, "I choose you" means I choose the child in front of me, the one I have rather than the one I pictured, again today, as you are. That's unconditional love with its shoes on.

And that, my friends, beats any fairy tale. It means far more to a child when it comes from their parent.

If one person came to mind while you read this, start there. Choose them today, out loud and in what you do. And if you keep hitting the same wall between what you know and how you show up, that gap is the work I do. Your free 30-minute consult is waiting at sabrinabelo.com.

You're worth it. The people you love are worth it.

Sabrina