I have found myself on this slide a lot lately. It's been a busy, up and down few months. The universe, it seems, decided we were due for some ups and downs again, and as much as we should feel well-trained for just about anything, sometimes, you just get caught off guard. Sometimes, you have to choose where to place your strength, and it doesn't get to be with coping or self-care.
Is it with your professional hopes and dreams, because you have a family to support? Is it with your child, because she is going through some big challenges, and needs heavy guidance? Is it with your spouse, because at the end of the day, they are the relationship you will be left with when everyone else leaves? Is it with your friendships that always feel somewhat fragile, and irreplaceable?
The pressure of making the right choices about your strength, often leaves you struggling. It leaves you questioning and doubting yourself. You second-guess the simplest of ideas and thoughts.
While the summer has been filled with a lot to process, it has also brought new friendship, and reignited fiercely important long-term friendships as well. I have worked to push myself out of my comfortable, introverted box, and I have tried to let people know that they matter in my life, at least in part, because I am so anxious that I might mess everything up.
Stress, old trauma, old mistakes, and anxiety squeeze me like a vice at times.
A friend once told me that she and her husband had considered my husband and I as potential guardians for their child because of my extreme nature. She knew that if I were to be a guardian for her child, I would always go over the top, and to the extreme. I have never forgotten that conversation, and while I know that she couldn't possibly feel the same way about me being the guardian of her child today, I wouldn't doubt that she still views me as extreme. I think about it. Sometimes, it embarrasses me, because maybe it reflects a lack of self-control. Other times, I am able just to shrug it off, and think 'why not?'
Under pressure and under stress, I tend to default to that state of scarlet embarrassment. With new friendships, I worry that I might come across as needy, pushy, and desperate--scaring off people I am getting to know. With long-term friendships, I worry that my "extreme" side will lead me down the road of old mistakes, and acting without expressing intent.
Having gone through a season of losing almost every important friendship I had, I am now at times so afraid of my "extreme" pushing people away again. And when you have lost almost everyone at once, the fear of losing people again can be crushing, and almost paralyzing.
 |
| My daughter's drawing of herself and her best friend. |
There are many terrible things about such fear. The paralysis prevents you from truly embracing others, and even embracing the person you are happy to be when you are with them. It colors every move you make. It stops you from making mistakes, but it stops you from experiencing life, and being completely vulnerable.
I watch my daughter play with other kids. She's going through a hitting, screaming, grabbing things away stage. So are other kids near her age. It's awful to watch. At the same time, I see her desperate for social interaction, and every new person she plays with becomes an instant friend. I took her to a local farm that runs a corn maze and other fall activities yesterday. She met a little girl, and they played together while we were there. As we walked to catch the wagon ride, my daughter sweetly and fearlessly grabbed the girl's hand. They happily walked together, leaving her mother and I walking behind.
 |
| One of the rare times I grabbed a hand. |
It would rarely occur to me to allow myself that kind of vulnerability--the open comfort of a friend's hand. And yet, this has been a summer in which I probably should have grabbed for a hand many times over. There were at least two times this week alone when something bothered me so much, I wanted to reach out and grab for a hand, but I couldn't do it. I couldn't weigh someone else down with my feelings, because I didn't feel like they were worthy.
I have even been so worried about my "extreme" that I allowed it to stop me simply from asking to share time with my friends--both new and old. Like a vampire, I waited to be "invited," because stress, anxiety and self-doubt have allowed me to seem strange to myself. And if I am strange to myself, how can I not be strange to others?
How can I even share this strangeness here? I suppose it's because a blank page holds no possible judgment . It allows and asks for as much or as little as I am in a moment, and that makes it a safe place to be as strange as I am.
I have been lucky. Despite my own worries, my friends have been willing to "invite" me in these last few months. They probably haven't known that I sat thinking about reaching for their hands, but was afraid I might squeeze too tightly. They haven't realized that I wanted to share time, but was worried I might take too much. They haven't been a party to the self-analysis, and the times I have chastised myself for overthinking things that should be easy. They don't know that I have had to remind myself that oftentimes, we find ourselves falling into friendships with people because something about them reflects back to us, and validates the very crazy that we are trying to control in ourselves.
I will never be able to shake the label of "extreme." And I will probably always live up to it in ways that both embarrass me, and drive me to go after things and experiences with passion. As I look at friendships, and as I worry about who I am--more than I probably should--I hope that somehow, I may continue to be invited when I am too scared of myself to ask, and that I might start to learn how to grab for hands again.
No comments:
Post a Comment