I’m not sure how to accurately qualify how things have been going since my last post. I feel quite numb most of the time. I bounce between attempts to get bursts of dopamine, and if my attempt succeeds then it only means happiness for a brief spell before I return to my apathetic starting point. The attempts are pretty destructive too, so that’s definitely not helping me in the long run. There’s a lot more anger in me than usual, and I have a much shorter fuse too. I’m obviously frustrated but even that is short-lived as the majority of my time is spent in a state of mild disassociation. When I do go out, whether on a date or even something mundane like a trip to the supermarket, I’m not really present from the moment I walk out the door to the second I return. It’s like a blur when I look back, and at the time I may as well be watching myself from a different realm because it isn’t me behind the wheel. I’m not sure who it is.
Things have become stale. It hasn’t receded from technicolour to black & white, it’s just a bit dulled. I’ve lost my appetite for food, even cooking has become a chore to me. I get more excited at the thought of food being delivered to my door than cooking some of my favourite dishes. My heart isn’t in my work, which is quite essential in my industry. I struggle to pay attention to movies or shows; when I tried watching Lord of the Rings, a film that soothes me at the worst of times, I mostly stared at the wall beside my screen. Music has very little impact on me, save for my newly rediscovered Delta Blues and Country. Lots of Son house and Townes Van Zandt currently. Songs with emotional depth, raw expressions of intense feelings, unique blends of folky melancholic Americana sounds. Songs that make me feel sad, but not in the kind of way that makes me want to stop listening, the kind of sad that makes me feel less alone.
On the other hand, I’m also proud of my current situation. It means I am finally learning to overcome something; learning to take the difficult route in actually evolving into the real me. I understand that these challenging emotions are the result of me directly confronting a problem that I’ve always had, and I just hope that when I come out the other end, it won’t leave me too scarred. I feel crap because I have finally allowed myself to accept things haven’t gone the way I wanted them to.
For the first time in a long time, I have had to accept that I am alone. Not because I haven’t got friends or family or relationships (I have all three of them) but because I am quite literally my own person – I am alone, tied to no one else but me. As far back as I can remember, my self-worth has been linked to other people and their opinions of me. Now, thanks to a major shift in my life, I am actually confronting myself. Not just in words like I do on this blog, but in reality. I have been questioning who I am and what I want, what I stand for. My desires, aims, my fears. This is making me uncomfortable, hence the first two paragraphs of this post, but this is where I am finally learning. I want to invite someone to share in my already complete life, rather than to complete it for me as I have done so since I first learned what a girl was. Something built with two individuals, rather than two halves desperately trying to fit.
I want to maintain the things that are me, and develop them further too. A tattoo I’ve been too scared to get, now on my arm. A Rolex I’ve felt unworthy of wearing, soon to be on my wrist. Clothes that make me feel myself, that allow me to present in the way I envision myself. It means writing more honestly about emotions, and not deceptively to paint a certain picture. Better communication, without fear of reprisal when nothing definitively inflammatory has been said. Openness to express what is going on inside my head. I would like this most difficult chapter to mean something by the end.