It's just me...

So, what to do with me. The real me?

These thoughts have been spinning in my head since last Summer. After writing a book about how to accept yourself as you are... I couldn’t move on from such a small event. It was frustrating at first, surely if I could write a book about it I could remember to live it.

There are a lot of things about me that I’d like to change, but I’m reaching an age where I am going to have to accept that some of them are here to stay. At forty, I don’t have a lot of growing up left to do. I’m probably stuck with a lot of my personality, like it or not.

I talk a lot. At this point, it’s just me.

I think way too much. That’s probably just me too.

I am way too cautious, yep. You got it.

I have a deep need to feel safe.

I have a deep need to love and be loved.

I’ve had to accept that I have PTSD, there is nothing else I can do. In doing so, I’ve realized that I have to stop fighting it and start learning to live with it. Loud noises will always startle me. I will never be comfortable in public places. It will always be hard for me to sit with my back exposed.

As I wondered how I was going to live with these things... I realized that I was already have. My odd life is my coping mechanism. It’s how I have learned to survive. It might not work for someone else, it might not make sense to anybody else but it works for me. As odd as it may be, it really does work for me.

So, if I have to live a bit differently than the rest of the world, I’m okay with that.

I am a strong person.

At least that’s what other people think.

What would they think if they knew that what they see in public, and who I am in private are two different things.

What if they knew that a conversation I overheard a year ago has made me question everything about who I am and what I am doing. It has made me tear myself apart every single facet of my existence, everything I am, everything I do. Am I really the person that other people see?

They didn’t really like being around me they said, because I talk too much and always focus the attention on myself. They dislike being around me so much, that they don’t visit people we know.

The strong girl that everybody else sees reacted by saying “Oh, well.”

The girl I really am was crushed beyond belief. It hurt more than the people who said it would ever know, because at this point, even a year later, the thought of letting them close to me again is still terrifying. I am honestly not sure if I will ever be able to see them again.

There was more to the conversation than that of course, and none of it was meant to be hurtful. It wouldn’t have hurt anybody else. But I am the girl with a heart of glass. I wanted their love so badly, that whenever I was around them I did my best to show them what a Big Girl I’ve become. I’m not the child they once knew. The irresponsible mess of a girl. When I get nervous I talk too much, and yes... I dominate a conversation. I don’t mean to, it has always embarrassed me deeply, but I’d finally come to a point where I was comfortable with that person. I’d learned to keep it under control.

They didn’t even see it. They didn’t even see me.

My heart... is a gift. I give it to people warily. Once they break it, I am not likely to give it back again. This is the strong person that everybody else sees. It is only my shell that is strong, inside I question everything everybody says about me. My mind hears them, and just accepts that they must be true. If someone hurts me, I still to this day assume it is because I asked for it somehow.

But... lately, I’ve been wondering... what has all of this living for other people done for my life?

That I allowed a handful of people to bring me to my knees isn’t something I am proud of. That it affected my writing, my self-image, my-self worth... yeah. That’s pretty pathetic.

But something new came out of that.

Perhaps is was my friend Robert’s Facebook lectures on selfishness that got to me.

All of my life I have been taught that selfishness was bad and should be avoided at all costs. That’s why those comments got to me, that thinking of ourselves is wrong. I’ve put myself aside for others to the point of sacrificing my health, I’ve tried to be there for anybody and everybody whenever they needed me. My door is open anytime day and night for friends in crisis, my home is always open to those who need a safe place, my ear is always available... In order to make sure that everybody else's needs are met, but in order to do it I neglect my own needs.

I’m still not really clear on what my own needs really are.

Robert comes along and says that selfishness isn’t real.

So, I started thinking about my own needs more. Then I felt selfish. I started trying to live for myself... and everyone wanted to know why I wasn’t there for them anymore. The funny thing... I don’t think they realized what I was doing for them until I stopped.

I started setting more boundaries with others, and I got called a bitch. That kinda hurt... at first... but now I’m wondering if bitch really means a non-doormat-female.

The people who broke my heart? At this point as far as I know they are oblivious. They probably don’t even remember the conversation. But it changed my life. It took awhile to get there... but I was living a life on stage just for them, and they weren’t even in the audience. They already knew all they needed to know about me and that was that.

I am a survivor, reinventing myself is a specialty of mine. So what to do with the real me then?

We’ll get to that next time.

Really a struggle...

It has become difficult for me to leave the house again. The doctors are convinced that it is depression. I will concede that it is escapism, but Depression and I know one another well... and this is not it. I am frustrated. Plainly and simply frustrated.

I have a brain the wants to live the life of two people, and a body that can barely live half of a life. I hide it as much as I can, but sometimes when someone criticizes me about still being in bed at 3 PM... I want to scream. You have no freaking clue how hard it is for me to just get through a normal day. For most people, their morning routine is something that they just float through without even thinking. For me, it sometimes takes all day if I get there at all.

I have an engine that is always revving, but my parking brake is stuck. But I do my best to pretend I’m just like everybody else.

Then, I hear a rumor that I am on meth. At first I laughed. I knew who had started it, and considering the source I’ve heard worse. The rumor wasn’t what bothered me, it was the fact that I have worked so damned hard to overcome a disability the state rated as the highest level... and I’ve very proudly did it as pharmaceutical free as possible. I never went on SSI. I had to give in and get some assistance, but I got by with as little as possible. Food and medical. A lot of help from friends and family. But we’ve stood on our own two feet as much as possible. We have fought our way through hell and back.

And the rumor around town was that my weight loss was meth.

That people I considered friends were unaware of a five year illness changed my perspective on friendship. I spent the last few years of my life losing my lunch. My diet has been liquids and crackers. Sometimes I could eat a normal meal, but most of the time it was I went from 185 to 125 and then I got better. I had every right to feel good about myself. I want to feel good about myself. But there is this nagging thought in the back of my head... I know it shouldn’t break my heart. But it does...