By symian — Written on Aug 14, 2009
Before you start, this might ramble... a lot... and yes, I already know about therapy, thank you.
I can't understand myself sometimes. I have an awesome guy, and I like almost everything about him. I think what I donn't like the is his desire to know what goes on in my thinker. How I feel about things. What I think about this or that. How I might feel about something in the future. He wants to probe the inner machinations of my mind and that's not easy even for me to do.
Sure this is the same Symian who doles out advice like nobody's business, reminding people to know when to stand your ground and know when to walk away, but this is the largest issue I struggle with. I wasn't brought up to think that my opinion or feelings mattered, what mattered was right and wrong and what was best for other people. I didn't like when my parent's friends hit me, but it was best to keep my mouth shut or it would get worse. I didn't feel that I was important as a child, but I learned not to say anything or I'd find out (again) why I felt that way. I learned that showing feelings was a weakness that would instantly be attacked and growing up and into my early adulthood, I was proven right until I stopped feeling.
Not in the way that people might think Of course I still have feelings, but I'm no longer able to share them with people except my daughter (because I know that at least for now, she won't judge me, and I don't want her to be ice cold when she's older). I can't even cry for my dead brother. Inside, it's like a boiler at capacity. Every so often I'll be in the car alone and it will start to run over, I'll be overcome with emotion, but I can no longer physically cry not even when I'm alone, I feel like I'm being weak. Once I notice anything resembling a feeling, it's overtaken by an adreniline rush and then several hours of a tight chest and sometimes a headache.
Now, I've been to the doctor and the therapist and I've been on the medication, but it didn't change anything, so I stopped it all. Medicine can't change the way I percieve weakness and fragility. I need to be strong and this is how I do it. Maybe too strong though. So strong, that I feel like it's affecting my relationship.
The more he tries to dig out my feelings, the more stoic I become. God forbid he finds out that I'm human and not a robot. I've started to feel guilty because I can't put him through this. I really thought that I was ready to take these next few steps, but I'm physically stressed out because I can't emote. I wish I could cry right now, but my throat is closing up and there's a piercing pain behind my left eye, maybe my head would explode if I tried to force it out.
August always makes me realize how shut down I've become. After my brother died, I felt like I died. I felt guilty that my birthday was 2 days after his death. That my life was no longer worth the celebration, and it hasn't been celebrated since. Maybe I'm just reliving that now, it is that time of year. In 10 days I will be 28. In eight days it will have been 9 years. In 2 days it will be my guy's birthday. I wish I could skip to September.
I want to change. I feel like I'm no longer welcome in my own world of feelings since I haven't been there in so long. I wouldn't know how to express joyful if I had a manual and a tutor. I wouldn't know to show happiness if I had an instructional video. And showing love can only be done in the most round about ways (cards and such, mailed so I don't have to respond when it's opened), I can't say it to him unless I'm descibing my attatchment to my phone or family. He deserves better than that.
I've given myself until the end of the month, if I don't make enough progress, my status will be single. I can't keep him in this type of situation. He wants to share his life with someone, which I think means that someone will have to share back. I don't bother showing any consideration for my feelings or thoughts on my life, so I don't show them to anyone because I don't expecct them to care any more than I do. How I feel about dinner doesn't change the fact that we have to eat, even if I want something different I can deal with whatever it is. That's my kind of thinking. How I feel about his traveling doesn't change the fact that that's part of his job, so it's not important. OK, it's important to him, to me it's a non-issue (even though I should care). I feel like my purpose in life is to make other people's lives more comfortable and if I have to do it at the expense of myself, well, I might not like it, but it doesn't matter.
It is hard to take your own advice. Not because the action is hard, more because I know that I am doing this to myself. I know that I'm willing to deprive myself of something that I want so badly, something that I've been looking for. But in this condition, it's the best thing for him. I'm sure he must have been concerned when I sat with a blank look on my face after getting a really nice (I mean really nice for a broke girl like myself), I can't express happiness in front of others for I see it also as a weakness.
Deep down, I know I am weak. I think it takes strong people to put themselves out there and risk getting hurt, those are the people who feel alive and embrace life for all it has to offer. Those people can get back up after they get knocked down and they continue on in search of something better. I have spent my whole life just trying to make it to another day without rocking the boat, I don't guess it matters where it's going, as long as it doesn't sink.
Even facing this decision, I don't question how I actually feel about it. What matters is that he's free to be with someone who isn't an upside down, empty glass (potential, but not in that condition). I have wasted a year of his life and he has nothing to show for it. We've had fun together, but he deserves more than I have to offer. He deserves better.