I’m still doing all those things I’m supposed to be doing, waiting for this sense of OKness to rise up from inside and make me whole.
Diet! Exercise! Oil Cleansing Method! They are all prophetic of late. I’ve traded in my dry skin for break-outs, and my weight stays exactly the same. The story of my life right now, written in all caps, everywhere, is: GO AS HARD AS YOU CAN, AND STAY IN THE SAME PLACE. It’s exhausting and disheartening. Additionally, The Cool Thing has some stuff going on, and the pressure to look like a superstar (or failing that, at least normal) human being is greater than usual. (I’m going to be on a panel. Wheeee!)
I realized last night (as I was hugging the toilet, shivering with food poisoning*) that it took me almost 40 years to get to this place of crippling dependency on the approval of others. By break-up logic (Ye shall mourn half the time of the total relationship) that puts me at about 60-years-old before I feel OK again. It occurred to me that perhaps I am better going back to the way things were.
When I made this change, I had delusions of being some healthy person escaping the wreckage of bad family dynamics. Today, it feels like I’m just as damaged as my family, except now I’m alone. It feels very lonely, and as though the way they loved me was so enmeshed and weird that I will never feel loved again simply because no one else expresses themselves in the same way as my family of origin.
PS: My dad emailed me a few days ago. I think he was lonely for me, or possibly my mom is lonely for me and he’s her half-demented henchman. Twice, he identified himself by his given name, instead of ‘Dad’. I don’t think it was on purpose, but it’s possible he forgot how we are related.
*I’m writing this whole thing with what is probably a black bean stuck in my sinus cavity.
I don’t know how much this helps (probably not at all), but for what it’s worth, this sounds incredibly, completely, unbelievably normal. Your fears? Normal. Loneliness? Normal. Feeling of dread that you’ve fucked it all up and now you have live with the wreckage you’ve created? Normal. And it will get better, more slowly than you’d like but faster than you fear. Promise.
Big changes always feel catastrophic (births, deaths, moving, changing jobs, etc). If it helps, think of the big change you made with your family like giving birth to your first child: you’ve done a big, terrifying thing, and now it’s easy to start thinking that every problem or bump is The Way It Will Be Forever – but of course it’s not true, and it will get easier. Slowly, but really truly.
Breathe, be kind to yourself, do things that remind yourself that you are capable/worthwhile/loved.
:::hands parodie, above, a “speaks for me” card:::
Many days we are the Red Queen through the looking glass, running to stay in the same place. It takes a long, long time, and lots of backwards glances, to see even the incremental progress. It is there, though. I have faith that you will see.
I hope that the Cool Thing-associated stuff goes swimmingly well. And I wish for you, that you will be able to feel all the different molecules of love, in all their strange and tender permutations, reaching towards you not only across the internet, but also through the very air you breathe.
I think Parodie said better any of the things I was clicking through to tell you.
I second (third? fourth?) Parodie.
It’s cliched to say that things get worse before they get better but I always feel like I’m going to crash and burn right up to the point where things suddenly get better and I can breathe again.
This is hard. You can do it.
Break-up logic= Horseapples
Since you brought up the 12 step aphorism of “fake it till ya make it,” then let’s slap on a few more for good measure.
Like…
“One day at a time.”
“Babysteps”
“Practice progress, rather than perfection.”