The Price of Vulnerability 2/7

The Inheritance Hidden in Love Letters

Maiken Ringkjøbing has always believed in and dreamed of love. She has simply struggled to dare to pursue it. In this personal story, Maiken Ringkjøbing explores why the fear of being hurt can outweigh the longing for love. What does it do to a person to protect themselves so much that no one is ever truly allowed to get close?

The Price of Vulnerability is her story about love, fear, and a constant escape from losing control. About growing up with the ideal of great love while simultaneously being terrified of it. Through conversations with psychologists, her parents’ love letters, and her own experiences, she has explored why some of us long for love yet still struggle to surrender to it. This is the second part of The Price of Vulnerability by Maiken Ringkjøbing.

I have seen that love is real, so why does it feel like something I cannot take part in?

November 9th, 1995, 00:11:

“I believe that you are the man of my life, and I only say believe because I am so afraid to say anything else — what if… Some of my friends think I should slow down when it comes to moving in with you, giving up my apartment, and so on, but I have decided to do what feels right and not what my friends and logic tell me. (...) I am madly, hopelessly in love with you (...)”

My parents’ love story began back in October 1995. They met through a mutual friend who thought they would make a good couple. There was just one small complication: my father was living in Felixstowe, England, and my mother in Copenhagen. Of course, physical distance is not necessarily a huge issue in today’s world, but back in the 90s there was neither FaceTime nor Messenger. So they spent a month talking on the phone and writing letters to each other before finally meeting in person.

And if we return to the quote above for a moment, it is an excerpt from one of the letters written just a few weeks after they had spent a few days together for the first time. Let me say that again: THE FIRST TIME!!!!

At the beginning of December 1995, my mother had quit her job and given up her apartment in Copenhagen to move in with my father in Felixstowe. What a beginning.

I have never really doubted that this kind of love was the very foundation of my existence, yet reading the letters still does something to me. On one hand, I am deeply moved by the fact that the love I believed I witnessed growing up was real — and has remained real for 30 years.

On the other hand, I immediately feel a heaviness in my stomach. A restlessness. A discomfort. Not because they are my parents. Not because I do not think it is beautiful. And not because I would not wish for a relationship like that myself. But because I could never bring myself to say words like that out loud — not even in writing.

It is such an intense unveiling of the chambers of the heart that it would crush me if it were not received with care. And how do you allow yourself to be so vulnerable that you risk being shattered?

November 22nd, 1995:

“Our occasionally telepathic abilities somehow confirm that we belong together. Believe me when I say that I have never felt anything like this before. Besides, I have never said all these words and things to anyone before — not even to my friends and family — so I must truly have been struck by Cupid’s arrow. For the first time in my life, I want to share my existence with someone.”

My father’s words to my mother. The corners of my mouth pull upward as I read them. It is impossible not to smile.

My mother had been in a couple of relationships before, but she was actually my father’s first real girlfriend. Before her, he had been known as “the picky one” who did not just fall for anyone. But when he met my mother, he simply knew. So certain that, after only a few weeks, he was already using grand declarations and opening his arms to the idea of spending the rest of their lives together.

When I look at them now, sitting beside each other across from me at the dinner table — teasing each other with fingers in armpits, on thighs, up noses, accompanied by a mix of hysterical laughter and frustrated sighs — I understand why.

I see what I have always seen, always sensed, and what gave me my belief in love in the first place:

Two people who have chosen each other every single day for nearly 30 years. They have been each other’s best friends and companions. They solved problems instead of postponing them. They worked on expressing their needs instead of hiding them away. They dared to be vulnerable and reveal what they struggled with.

But how?

As I continue reading the letters, I also find what I would call an actual love letter. The kind that — at least in my generation — used to be folded into paper airplanes and passed across the classroom with “Will you be my boyfriend/girlfriend? Yes, no, maybe.”

And it was dated only a few days after their first meeting.

So not only were they quick to be honest and vulnerable about their feelings, they were also ready to commit to what today would probably be seen as a huge obligation — a relationship WITH A TITLE!!!

I truly do not know why I react so strongly when I read it. Because, hello, here we are three decades later, fully aware of how it turned out. But it is as though the idea of fully surrendering yourself to one person — and therefore allowing yourself to be consumed by one person — intensifies the feeling of vulnerability even more.

The idea of saying, through a title, “I choose you and only you” almost feels even more vulnerable to me than opening up verbally — believe it or not.

Of course, I know it was a different time back then. If your lips had even brushed against each other, you were practically considered a couple, so the title may not have carried the same weight as opening up emotionally clearly did for them.

But as I continue reading, I once again feel tears pressing behind my eyes, my heart beating wildly, while the heaviness settles in my stomach.

Because on October 21st, 1995, in her very first letter to my father, my mother wrote something that hits the nail directly on the head for me:

“It does not work if you become afraid of trying to live in a relationship simply because it did not work out for others. Unfortunately, I believe we each have to make our own experiences.”

She is right.

I am just still unsure how the hell I am supposed to do it.

My parents’ love letters = the ideal.
My definition of love = my parents.

I would personally say that I have every good reason to want, believe in, and long for love. After all, I have seen what it can lead to. That people can fight through difficult times together. That you can love another person — and be loved in return — despite all the less polished sides we all carry within us.

So why does it feel like pressure?