hi medium
ok, so i had the itch to write. and as i write, my brain imagines the vision of me going back and reading my previous writing. and the sense of dysregulation that comes with it. like oh god, i did this thing that makes me so vulnerable. deleting it will take so long. who’s gonna read it. how will it come back to bite.
and to be honest, i was going to do a very overwhelming, positive write. very i’m having a great day, had a great event happen today. despite not a great night, kind of write. but maybe, i can go a little deeper? instead of performance grief, performance happy, performance anything, i can do authentic?
authentic would be telling how you in my deepest darkest nights i reach my ex, who seems to want nothing to do with me. i remember when this same ex felt like someone that could enthusiastically like, nay lovewhelm me. like overwhelm with love. even as how i experienced that love was ANXIETY.
i remember when they fought to keep the relationship even as i pushed and pushed and pushed it. i was convinced they just wanted the benefits of being with me, not ME. i was convinced they would leave the minute i felt safe or the minute they got what they needed from me.
and the way they treat me, it’s quite easy to believe it. the negative side of things feels quite compelling as shit. i’m not the type of person who lives life out loud. honestly. i had been. or maybe i’d tried being. but the nervous system dysregulation that brought on, before i knew that nervous system dysregulation is what it’s called, i couldn’t handle it.
i worry about shame, disappointment, betrayal, anxiety. almost constantly. i don’t sleep well at night, often. and i feel bereft of that sense of belonging. masking and performing feel “easy” to me. insofar as i’ve conditioned myself/ been conditioned, and am practiced.
this deconditioning is almost draining to me. even as no part of me wishes to go back to that old way of masking. but the “new” way. the empty-ness, as a youtube video put it, for what happens after “shadow work”, it’s anxiety. i try to avoid it. the empty feeling.
and then it brings up that question. of is my ex someone who just met a need that i’m struggling to meet without him. or is he somebody that actually lit up the love in me. normally, the performance bit would go into providing data for the yay and nay side of it. confusing itself. offering up data so it can choose what is most convenient to believe. most agreeable to believe. least ruffling feathers to believe.
such questions trouble me. because if it isn’t love, hadn’t been love, how could i have been that deluded into believing it. if he says i didn’t love him. if he didn’t feel it. how can it be love. and how can you love someone with distance. even if they’re not in your life. how do love after grieving. not because they’re dead, though that can happen, and has happened (not romantic, but familial). but love where the person is no longer interested in a relationship of whatever sort. and the love you have doesn’t finish.
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all my life, you know, i believed in empathy and being compassionate. lately, that’s started to feel cringe. now it’s like i’d rather be a narcissist. and i know absolutely know someday this comment might come back to bite. come back in weapon form. i just believe that empaths get bit. narcissists are hurt but they get fed. empaths are also hurt but they get bit. i’m not making sense to myself in this minute. my brain is fogging, fingers, hurting, but i’m just going to try and finish.
my process is very long, and bloated. that’s how i perceive other people to perceive me when they’re doing it sans projections and authentically. that i’m taking forever to get to the point.
i’m hoping to ground myself back into where i was going with the empath comment. i guess what i’m saying is being so ungrounded by the feelings i was sensing from people, combined with the parts of my brain that lit up with those same feelings when i felt them, i think i lost sight of what it meant to be empathic. or i never knew. i had affective empathy. i would cry seeing someone else cry. but i had no cognitive empathy. i couldn’t grasp a reality different from mine. choices made that were different than mine.
when i first learned of cognitive empathy, it felt like a consolation kind of thing. for people who don’t have actual empathy. it felt like like faking. it felt like, why does anyone want this, if they could have the affective kind. of somebody holding it and being in it and feeling it. that’s what i always found healing, or have been finding healing. the tearful face of an aunt when she saw me going through a dark phase. it unburdened me in a way nothing else ever did.
but i also know there’s people, such as my ex, who i’m pretty sure prefer the cognitive kind. i think. idk. the cognitive kind to me is what exists in a world where shame is omnipotent, omnipresent. so people don’t want you to feel what they feel, because they don’t want to feel what they feel. so you feeling it can be dangerous as shit. the cognitive kind feels like performance.
but idk. the cognitive kind also allows me to take my own feelings and transmute them or project them into different situations and ask questions of another person and refine the answer. it takes me out of my perspective. so where i landed is maybe i have been empathic, but self-focused. unable to focus on others. idk. always wanting praise and validation. i thought admiration but wrote validation. because i worried admiration would fit too well with the term narcissist.
idk. i’m drained a bit from asking the question. i have to imagine part of it is my perfectionist part trying to answer so it doesn’t get abandoned. trying to predict, fit, fix. and maybe i have to let go of that bit. tell her i’m safe even if people abandon. which they will. did. have. yes i did like and love them. yes they did remove emotional, mental, digital access to them. yes i did and do have memories i visit and revisit often.
and yes i don’t have a consistent belief system that i will find people again or that i ever even had them.
i guess for now i seem to find solace in the fact that i loved them. i think about them. i may not always send good wishes to them, especially since they abandoned. and that’s gonna change. thanks for reading. probably this will be an abrupt way to end. my thoughts and writing and everything haven’t been well planned and things. very stream of consciousness, follow the thread that most compel. and i’m certain things will change. i will grow, mature even. i have growed. matured even. so if you hate me, or find me annoying, you are welcome. but if you don’t and you like me, i prefer you to be more welcome.
thanks for listening. kisses, hugs, prayers even.
