I haven’t gotten out of bed today. The dog would be making picket signs if she could.
I have zero desire to do anything. I used to walk several miles every single day. I was always motivated to work on my business. Being creative was in my blood.
And now? I don’t see a point. I don’t see a point to working hard or doing anything.
What used to be little gold stars from the universe in the form of making people happy, accomplishing goals, feeling productive… doesn’t mean anything to me at all now.
I used to chase acceptance, being liked, loved, being seen as creative, helpful, passionate. The person who loved life.
Now I don’t care what they think. I don’t care if I’m making people happy. I honestly don’t care.
Also, I don’t believe men can love women, my parents don’t know me or care about me and my friends have their own lives so they can’t show up or care about me, either.
So, sitting here alone… in silence… even if some of it is by choice, it hurts knowing that the key people in my life ditched out on me.
But the biggest kicker in all of this… I’m mourning the fact that I gave 23 years of my life to my mother, serving her and making sure she was okay and then another 23 years doing the same for my husband. The difference with him is that I was giving him my body, too. Intimately. And the shame I feel about this. I almost feel like I was r*ped for 2 decades. But I allowed it. I know that sounds dramatic, but that’s how it felt. Duty sex, coerced via guilt (and pointing to a fucking calendar) for decades isn’t like… fun. And it starts to dip into the realm of trauma. (And for the record, he showed me that sex is all he cared about in the end, so feeling like it was traumatic is SPOT on and I should have listened to my body eons ago.)
I cared deeply about their happiness, their mental state. I went above and beyond to make them feel good, to pump them up, to point out their strengths. Making them feel good was my job.
I’m not saying this to be a martyr, gain sympathy or attention. I’m saying this because as twisted as it was, I have no purpose now. My identity was wrapped up in how they were doing. Their happiness, their success, their achievements were a barometer of my success as a human being. I felt like a failure if they weren’t thriving. Sick, I know. Disturbing, absolutely. That’s what chronic, toxic, people pleasing is all about!
And I didn’t get any closure in my divorce. He just threw me away. We didn’t talk about it. 23 years together and he just asked me to leave one night because he wasn’t getting laid. I even reached out to him when I went to the ER for a major panic attack. We were long separated, but I still reached out to him. They were going to hold me so I needed him to get the dog from my place. I let him know what was going on, as well as my Mom and Jim. None of them checked in on me. None of them cared enough to emotionally show up for me. And that honestly crushes my soul. What this shows me, again, is that if I’m not giving, performing or sacrificing, these people don’t care about me. And I cared deeply about all three of those people. Two of them got decades of my life, of my servitude. Of my fucking soul.
I’m not sure how to grieve this and move on.
This is the fallout of emotional trauma, CPTSD, a nervous system collapse, grief and identity restructuring. Decades of being in survival mode. Decades of lying to myself “they care, they just don’t know how to show it”. And those years I was possibly running on adrenaline, hyper vigilance and duty under the guise of living in a fantasy where everyone just adored me and I was living a good life.
But I wasn’t. I wasn’t safe. I wasn’t loved. I wasn’t seen as a full human. And I told myself over and over again that it was ok. I was ok.
It was all fake. All of it. The people were fake, including me… it was all done because I made myself some animatronic character on a stage that didn’t exist. That productive, high energy version of me was a habit, a persona, a mode of survival. I’m mourning her. I also sort of hate her. Why didn’t she see that I wasn’t loved?? Why didn’t I run away a long, long time ago.
Pure fatigue. Pure grief. Burnout. Nervous system repair. Starting over. Birthing myself. The truest version of myself who wants to live a life for me and not for anyone else. Authenticity. Being liked for who I truly am, not my performance.
I’m not saying everyone wanted me to perform for them. I do know my mom and my ex husband wanted that, though. So I performed. And I seemed to get acceptance more freely when I was performing.
I had no other purpose than to make sure everyone else was happy. Now I have no idea what to do with myself.
This is the premise of SO MANY MOVIES. The protagonist is floating through life, selfish, uncaring and then something happens, they usually meet someone who is dying or who sees life with wonder and suddenly, they have empathy! They care about other humans! They care about life and they will now dedicate the rest of it to serve others. Love wins!
But I’m sort of doing the opposite, here. Same concept, though.
Deep down, I want to delete my cell phone number, liquidate all assets and move somewhere nobody will ever find me. Never see a doctor again and just let the world devour me. I don’t feel like I belong here anymore. I only see selfishness and survival, being beautiful, getting attention, dropping names and being desperate for love. I don’t want to be a slave to my desperate, pathetic, yet human… desires.
Anyway… today sucks. I’m going to give my brain grace and let it sleep.
What I wouldn’t give to have a new hobby I was obsessed with. A cookie to obsess with. Anything (but a man).
I put on a movie for the dog. She is happy now. “You’ve Got Mail”. OMG Dave Chapelle is in it. Also, a golden retriever.
