The Dear John Reader: Letters of Disclosure in Love and Emotional Emancipation

Nothing reveals the secrets of the heart like a letter to a lover, a friend, or a significant other. The heart stores the emotional investment of its relationships as if those emotions are heirlooms to be treasured, passed along or recycled for the next relationship.

Dear John, is a compilation of letters written to individuals at various levels of relationships. These letters express a range of emotions from affectionate love to disappointment, grief and loss from heartbreak, and downright disgust over the audacity of certain suitors whose expectations exceed reality. It is the journey of disengaging the heart from the emotional pain and regret of love; lost, found or attempted.

These letters were written to explore and express what these relationships contributed to the enrichment of love, or the unraveling of life. They expose complicated liaisons that often mask complicity and compromise for the sake of getting it on or getting along. Or to hide wounds inflicted in relationships that should've never existed at all, let alone in the form of romance. Thankfully, they are also penned as testaments to the enduring power of love.

For those who have already gone there in your thinking, The Dear John Reader is not a diary of physical relationships. It is not an odyssey of forbidden love and fantasy desires. It is neither the first nor last installment of love gone wrong. However, these letters are based on real-life situations that span a range of issues as far back as Junior high school and are included by permission to help understand intimate, interpersonal relationships whether romantic, physical, emotional, plutonic or otherwise. It is the value of these relationships that the Dear John Reader measures, taking into consideration the depth of the emotional investment involved to determine what lesson each engendered. These letters are mere guides and not intended for instructions as to whether to enter or how to exit a particular relationship. Therefore, if needed, seek wise counsel or therapy to help navigate your safe exit out of an abusive or unfulfilling relationship.