Sand & Love’s Hourglass

I cannot believe it is the last Sunday in February and the last blog for this “love and culture series.” It has been amazing to look at different aspects of love, cultural wisdom, proverbs, and lessons. This month, I have talked about love’s hopefulness, desire, being grounded while wanting and waiting for your person to show up. Today, I discuss how do we leave relationships and detaching from love.

Previous blogs in this series:

Orange Peels and Mirrors (click to read)

Old Flames Catch Fast (click to read)

Undoing Toxic: The Desire to Be Kept (click to read)

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We talk a lot about how we fall in love.

Fall hard.
Fall fast.
Un coup de foudre- “Love at first sight”
We were swept away and the rest is history.

Falling implies gravity. Effortless descent. Something pulling us toward someone. But we do not talk enough about the other side. How do we untangle and disconnect from love?

How do we disconnect when the connection once felt sacred? When the chemistry was undeniable? When the attachment was real?

Because love does not only begin; sometimes it expires. Contracts expire. And that expiration, realization, and finally recognizing “this ain’t for me” can throw you into the process of grief. As my friend always reminds me, “being done is a process.”

Imagine holding sand in your hands.

If you grip it tightly forming your hands into fists, it slips through your fingers and the sand falls to the ground. The harder you squeeze, the faster it falls.

But if you hold your palms open, gently cupped, you can hold more. Love is like sand in an hourglass.

At the beginning, the top is full. Time feels abundant. Everything feels possible. We talk about how we fall and what we want with this person, what we could build, what might be. Falling feels effortless, almost gravitational. Something pulls us toward someone and we surrender.

But sand moves in our hands and even in an hourglass. It is always moving, even when we cannot see it. And sometimes, without realizing it, we shift from holding love openly to gripping it tightly.

Have you found yourself ever trying to preserve what once felt expansive? Trying to slow what feels like physical and emotional distance? You are trying to outlast the fate of the hourglass. I have learned that holding on tightly rarely saves love. More often, it accelerates its loss. The healed version of the relationship requires both people. Both have to want it, or the efforts to save it may be in vain.

How Do We Fall in Love?

Before we talk about detachment, we have to look at attachment. We do not just fall because someone is attractive. We fall because we feel seen. Love deepens through something deceptively simple: shared stories.

New stories. Old stories. Childhood memories. Embarrassing moments. Former heartbreaks. Private fears. Future dreams.

This practice is called mutual self-disclosure. One person reveals something vulnerable, and the other reciprocates. That exchange builds intimacy. There is also what research describe as the reciprocity norm; when someone shares, we feel invited to share in return.

That back-and-forth exchange creates depth.

“I’ll tell you something about me.”
“Okay, now I’ll tell you something about me.”

Over time, disclosure becomes bonding.

We can never talk enough when we’re falling in love because we are constructing a shared emotional archive. We are building attachment through storytelling. We are weaving our histories together to build something with another. This is why early connection can feel intoxicating. Not just because of chemistry; but because someone is listening closely. Responding. Mirroring. Engaging.

Late night phone calls until morning? It is not something only teenagers do. It feels safe and safety can feel magnetic because we tell ourselves “this must be different because I never do this.” Never? Okay.

Attachment: The Blueprint Beneath the Bond

Attachment styles are the relational patterns we develop early in life based on how safety, closeness, and consistency were experienced. They are not diagnoses.

Secure attachment- Feels comfortable with intimacy and autonomy. A securely attached person can say, “I care about you,” without losing themselves. Conflict doesn’t automatically threaten the bond. There is an underlying belief that love can be stable.

Anxious attachment- Craves closeness but fears abandonment. There may be heightened sensitivity to distance or shifts in tone. When connection feels threatened, anxiety increases and reassurance is sought quickly. The grip tightens.

Avoidant attachment- Values independence and self-reliance, often feeling overwhelmed by too much closeness. When emotions intensify, distance can feel safer than vulnerability. The instinct is to pull back rather than lean in.

Disorganized attachment- Holds both longing and fear simultaneously. There can be a push-pull dynamic — wanting intimacy deeply but distrusting it once it arrives.

Most of us are not purely one style. Our attachment styles can also change over time. Understanding your attachment style does not eliminate heartbreak. Attachment styles are a framework to understand safety, security, and attending to the need for closeness and reassurance in relationships.

The way we attach is shaped long before this person arrived. Some of us lean in quickly because closeness feels like home. Some of us move cautiously because closeness once felt unpredictable. Some of us want intimacy deeply but fear being smothered by it. Attachment styles are not personality flaws. They influence how we fall and how we respond when the sand in the hourglass begins to shift.

When connection feels threatened, an anxious attachment may tighten its grip. An avoidant attachment may create distance to regain control. A disorganized attachment may swing between pulling close and pushing away.

None of these responses make someone “bad.” But they do affect how love evolves or deteriorates.

When Holding On Becomes Harmful

Trying to hold on can quietly distort you. You may begin arguing and responding in ways you never did before: using sharper language, circling back to the same unresolved topics, and replaying conversations without any movement toward resolution. You might find yourself focusing more on your intention than on the actual impact of your words, defending rather than listening. We can hurt each other deeply while desperately trying not to lose one another. Inside and outside of the therapy room, people are often fighting to preserve the history and legacy of their relationship and love story.

Conflict itself is not the problem. In healthy relationships people argue, they have misunderstandings, and they repair. But when repair doesn’t happen, when post-conflict conversations routinely lead to defensiveness instead of understanding, something important shifts. It becomes unsafe to be vulnerable, to disagree, to use your voice to name dissatisfaction. Love does not usually implode overnight; it erodes slowly, in the small missed repairs and the accumulation of distance and avoidance. Often thought of engaging in silence to “keep the peace,” or semblance that things are fine is another form of avoidance.

And sometimes, in the effort to keep someone, you become a version of yourself that would have been unrecognizable at the beginning: more reactive, more anxious, more guarded, more exhausted. Trying to hold sand and your person too tightly changes your attachment and the way you love.

When the Sand Runs Out

There is a quote many of us know: “It is better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.” There is truth in that, and also nuance. Love reveals attachment wounds and invites honest reflection. It exposes our growth edges and shows us where we still need repair. It teaches us how we give and how we cling. It shows us where we are secure and where we are still healing, learning, and expanding.

But sometimes the sand reaches the bottom of the hourglass. Not because the love was fake, and not because it was not deeply meaningful, but because it was seasonal in its time and purpose. Seasonal love still counts; it still matters and shapes us.

In Jamaica, there is a proverb/saying: “Everyday di bucket a go a well, one day di bucket bottom a go drop out.” What does this mean? There are real limits to patience, endurance, and giving. Life and effort continue, but even the strongest heart or the most loyal person has a breaking point. It reminds us that love and relationships are not infinite in their capacity to hold repeated harm, neglect, or disregard. People get tired. Even the most resilient hearts have limits. Don’t take people for granted or kindness for weakness.

Letting go is not indifference; it is acceptance. It is recognizing that no amount of gripping will flip the hourglass back over, and that holding on can cost more than releasing. There can be grief in that realization, tender and necessary. But there can also be relief: relief in no longer performing for reassurance, relief in no longer arguing for alignment, relief in no longer feeling yourself harden in the name of holding on.

Sometimes being released is as healing as choosing to release.

When Mistakes Become Choices

At some point, we have to stop calling everything a mistake. A mistake happens once. Maybe twice. It is followed by accountability, repair, and genuinely changed behavior. A pattern is different. Repeated dishonesty. Repeated betrayal. Repeated disrespect. Repeated dismissal of your feelings. Repeated promises with no follow-through. At some point, it is no longer confusion. It is choice.

And yes, the person may have been amazing: attentive, loving, consistent. But you cannot keep excusing who they are now based on who they were. Love is lived in the present tense. Chemistry does not override character. Attachment does not excuse harm. History does not justify staying where you are shrinking.

If you cannot forgive the repeated harm without lingering resentment, or if you recognize the pattern is steadily hurting you, leave. Stop normalizing struggle. Stop tolerating unloving behavior. Stop hoping love will magically fix what consistently breaks.

When mistakes become patterns, patterns reveal values. And clarity, however painful, is often the most compassionate and loving thing you can give yourself.

Sometimes a Hard Conversation Is Hard

Can we talk?

I need to talk to you.

Two of the most dreaded, anxiety-provoking sentences anyone can hear. Yet, they also serve as the gentle intro and clear invitation to a difficult but necessary conversation.

Being brave enough to speak what needs to be said, to put a definitive end to something that no longer fits, is itself a form of love. Love for yourself, for your boundaries, and for the relationship you once had. We can rehearse the words a million times in our heads, jot them down, tuck them into a draft folder, or even run them by a friend or an AI for feedback. And still, we often hesitate to voice them aloud.

Saying, “I am really done,” does not make you cruel. It does not mean you are bitter or ungrateful. It does not erase what was meaningful or the care that once existed.

Sometimes the most compassionate act is to close a chapter. It is an honoring of the time, energy, and attachment you invested, and a refusal to keep sacrificing your well-being by clinging to something that no longer serves either person.

Even when it feels unbearably hard, even when your voice trembles and your heart pushes back, speaking your truth is an act of respect. Respect for your own growth, for the lessons learned, and for the honest ending that allows both people to move forward.

Open Your Hands…Just A Little

Undoing toxic is not just about who you choose. It is also about how you hold them, like sand; open palms, not tightly formed fists. The goal is not simply to fall in love; the deeper aim is to love in a way that allows you to remain recognizable to yourself. To share stories without losing your voice. To attach without gripping. To repair when possible, and to release when necessary. When the sand runs out, it does not mean love was wasted, it means time moved.

As I close out this Love and Culture series, I keep coming back to something simple: love is not just about who stays. It is about who we become.

This month, I talked about desire. About wanting to be kept. About hope and mirrors and old flames. I reflected on culture and the messages we inherit about partnership. I integrated lessons on recognizing and undoing toxic patterns. And today, I talked about detaching with dignity.

Love is sacred. Even when it ends.

The truth is, “we do not heal in isolation; we heal in relationships.” As Esther Perel reminds us, we are shaped in connection, and many of our wounds are only revealed in connection. Some of our triggers would never surface if we lived alone on an island. There are parts of us that only emerge when we risk closeness.

And so, this series was never just about romance.

It is about learning to hold love with open hands.
It is about recognizing when our attachment is rooted in fear.
It is about noticing when we are gripping instead of grounding.
It is about honoring what was, without forcing what is no longer aligned.

There is maturity in saying, “This was meaningful.” There is wisdom in saying, “And it is complete.”

To love and lose is still to love. To release is not to fail. Sometimes the most secure thing you can do is loosen your grip and trust that what is meant for you will not require you to abandon yourself.

As February closes, I hope you leave this series with softer hands. Hands open enough to receive love. Hands strong enough to let it go. And a heart wise and discerning enough to know the difference.

Let’s connect. Email me: moniqueevanstherapy@gmail.com

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