TRUE STORY

What I Couldn’t See at 17: A Reflection on First Love and Manipulation

The truth behind the “fairytale” I lived at 17

When I was 17, I thought I was living a love story. My first boyfriend, my first everything, was 22. At the time, the five-year age gap didn’t seem strange to me. I was naïve, enamored, and entirely unprepared to see the dynamics at play. Now, as I’ve grown older and work with teenagers who remind me so much of my younger self, the realization hits me harder each year: 17-year-olds are still so clueless. I was clueless. And he knew it.

We were together for three years, married for less than one. I had broken up with him at one point because the relationship was starting to feel “off.” I couldn’t articulate why at the time, but I knew I needed space. Instead of respecting my boundaries, he manipulated me into coming back. He said he’d been in a car accident. Then he told me he’d been to the doctor and might have skin cancer. Each story seemed like an urgent call for my care, for my love. I interpreted these tactics as romantic gestures — displays of how deeply he cared for me. I didn’t know anything else. I didn’t know how to separate manipulation from love.

I was part of his collection, a blank canvas for him to project his…