one long fucking day
Today I took myself off the radar... and I'm not yet committed to putting myself back on. We'll see.
Feeling overwhelmed -- synaptic overload on every level. School feels overwhelming. My prolonged homelessness feels overwhelming. Finding housing, packing up all my shit, moving, unpacking, settling in, buying a bed and other necessary home items, every fucking thing I have to do for the next month feels overwhelming. SK is overwhelming. SK is completely wonderful. My life is a tsunami and I am being swept along like debris.
I'd prefer a little more control. That's a problem. So my job is to figure out a way to be a boat instead of debris -- to have a rudder and natural buoyancy. To stay afloat and steer a little.
Today I had a wonderful appointment with my counselor. Thank god for counseling departments attached to colleges which provide "free" services to students. What a resource.
This counselor of mine -- she's surprisingly proficient. I tend to think I've already figured out all my own little psychopathologies -- patterns, coping skils, complexes, issues, whatever. I go into a counseling appointment hoping for a stamp of approval on the mental health assessment I've already created for myself and, perhaps, some kudos for being phenomenally self-aware. This counselor of mine -- she's smarter than me. Thank god.
After my last appointment she said "think about your patterns in relationships and how you feel you fuck them up" (paraphrasing, of course). My pattern -- to swing from relationship to relationship like tarzan swings vine to vine through the jungle. My pattern -- to meet my relational needs in a parasitic way by manipulating my partners and never really sharing myself. My pattern -- to leave, physically, sexually, emotionally. My pattern -- to be dishonest on some level, conscious or unconcscious.
My hugest, biggest, giantest, most enormous fear in all this? That this is my pattern, yet I can't identify it until after the fact and I am therefore precluded from breaking it. My biggest fear is that I can't ever trust myself because I do this awful, parasitic thing so unconsciously, I can convince myself that I'm not doing it even when I totally *am* doing it! That's my fear.
So this counselor of mine, who is very smart, helped me realize some things. She asked some questions I never thought to ask myself until now and suddenly, like some giant, jungle flower, this new understanding of myself exploded into bloom before me. It was dizzying. I left her office in a stupor and hardly made it through the next few hours.
It won't seem so stunning or miraculous to anyone who isn't me, but I can't leave you hanging, so here's what I realized. My big issue is that I'm not authentic in my relationships. What does that mean? It means that impression management wins out over authentic engagement at some point, ie: I become so invested in continuing to have my needs met (whatever they may be, generally the need to keep the partner around) that I give the partner whatever I think she needs, say whatever she needs to hear, etc. I manage her image of me rather than risking the loss of the relationship by really being myself.
In this way there is a split between my authentic self (who has her own needs) and this image-controlled version. This counselor of mine suggested that, perhaps from the very beginning of the relationship, the image-controlled version is managing the relationship while the authentic self is preparing the exit strategy. The partner, whoever the unlucky lady is, only sees what the image-controlled version is putting out and is ultimately surprised when I up and leave at some point. Hence the guilt, even with CB whose drinking problem would've made anyone want to leave. Drinking problem aside, I feel guilty because, on some level, I did not behave honestly. CB even called me on it, over and over, during and after our bender. She said "I just really feel that you're not being honest with me." And I swore I was being honest and I secretly thought she was nuts for even *thinking* I wasn't being honest... But she was right. She was totally right.
Next step -- why do I do this? Where does this come from? Goes back to the belonging thing I ranted about a few days ago. I don't belong. Why not? Because I never have. Why not? Because I don't want to. Why not? Because at a very early age (early = between 3-5) I recognized that I would have to take care of myself emotionally. My parents split and I had to defend myself emotionally against my dad's incessant guilt-tripping to coerce me into living with him. Then, mom rapidly remarried and had another kid. This was the key -- the thing I never considered until today. My counselor said "So they split, you lived with your mom, describe your attachment to her." ("Attachment" b/c we'd just been discussing attachment as a developmental phenomenon.) Completely unaware of what I was about to uncover, I started explaining that I was really close to my mom and that I had a great relationship with her then... but... then... I thought... yeah, but she remarried right after she divorced my dad... and then she got pregnant... I was thinking... yeah, what was my attachment to mom exactly?
The counselor said "Oh, she started a whole new family..." And then I remembered this dream I had when I was about 6 and this dream explains it all. I dreamed I was on a boat with mom, my stepdad and my brother who was just a baby. We were on a beach, leaving the shore, into the ocean, then the boat started flying up into the air over the water. It was loud and windy and tumultuous and we were very high up. Then I started falling backwards out of the boat. I was suspended there, hanging off the edge of the boat, about to fall... and all around inside the boat sat my so called family. Watching. Nobody was concerned, nobody was trying to help. They were just watching me fall.
My attachment to my mom. To my mom's new family. I was falling out of the boat.
So, back to not belonging. I didn't belong in the boat. I grew my whole identity around not belonging in the boat. I grew my whole identity around taking care of myself, being the only person I could rely on, the only person, developmentally, I was attached to. So I behave parasitically b/c I still have social and emotional needs and part of taking care of myself involves getting those needs met by relating. But deep down, I am this solitary creature and have been since I was a small child.
My counselor said that behaving inauthentically in relationship is about fear. "What's the fear?" She asked. "What's the fear that makes you feel you need to control the relationship by being inauthentic? Fear of loss? Fear of rejection?"
The fear?
The fear is: who the fuck am I if I'm not the solitary creature who takes care of herself?
Who the fuck am I if I crack open that deepest shell and let some other person have a genuine stake?
Who the fuck am I if I let someone "scoop me up," in SK's words. I am not someone who has ever been scooped up. I am not scoopable. I don't know who I would be if I let myself be scooped up. The fear is that I would cease to be the person I think I am if I became scoopable.
Who am I if I'm not this hard little coconut that can't be opened??
This relationship with myself is ultimately all I've ever had since I was a small child.
How can I give that up?
Feeling overwhelmed -- synaptic overload on every level. School feels overwhelming. My prolonged homelessness feels overwhelming. Finding housing, packing up all my shit, moving, unpacking, settling in, buying a bed and other necessary home items, every fucking thing I have to do for the next month feels overwhelming. SK is overwhelming. SK is completely wonderful. My life is a tsunami and I am being swept along like debris.
I'd prefer a little more control. That's a problem. So my job is to figure out a way to be a boat instead of debris -- to have a rudder and natural buoyancy. To stay afloat and steer a little.
Today I had a wonderful appointment with my counselor. Thank god for counseling departments attached to colleges which provide "free" services to students. What a resource.
This counselor of mine -- she's surprisingly proficient. I tend to think I've already figured out all my own little psychopathologies -- patterns, coping skils, complexes, issues, whatever. I go into a counseling appointment hoping for a stamp of approval on the mental health assessment I've already created for myself and, perhaps, some kudos for being phenomenally self-aware. This counselor of mine -- she's smarter than me. Thank god.
After my last appointment she said "think about your patterns in relationships and how you feel you fuck them up" (paraphrasing, of course). My pattern -- to swing from relationship to relationship like tarzan swings vine to vine through the jungle. My pattern -- to meet my relational needs in a parasitic way by manipulating my partners and never really sharing myself. My pattern -- to leave, physically, sexually, emotionally. My pattern -- to be dishonest on some level, conscious or unconcscious.
My hugest, biggest, giantest, most enormous fear in all this? That this is my pattern, yet I can't identify it until after the fact and I am therefore precluded from breaking it. My biggest fear is that I can't ever trust myself because I do this awful, parasitic thing so unconsciously, I can convince myself that I'm not doing it even when I totally *am* doing it! That's my fear.
So this counselor of mine, who is very smart, helped me realize some things. She asked some questions I never thought to ask myself until now and suddenly, like some giant, jungle flower, this new understanding of myself exploded into bloom before me. It was dizzying. I left her office in a stupor and hardly made it through the next few hours.
It won't seem so stunning or miraculous to anyone who isn't me, but I can't leave you hanging, so here's what I realized. My big issue is that I'm not authentic in my relationships. What does that mean? It means that impression management wins out over authentic engagement at some point, ie: I become so invested in continuing to have my needs met (whatever they may be, generally the need to keep the partner around) that I give the partner whatever I think she needs, say whatever she needs to hear, etc. I manage her image of me rather than risking the loss of the relationship by really being myself.
In this way there is a split between my authentic self (who has her own needs) and this image-controlled version. This counselor of mine suggested that, perhaps from the very beginning of the relationship, the image-controlled version is managing the relationship while the authentic self is preparing the exit strategy. The partner, whoever the unlucky lady is, only sees what the image-controlled version is putting out and is ultimately surprised when I up and leave at some point. Hence the guilt, even with CB whose drinking problem would've made anyone want to leave. Drinking problem aside, I feel guilty because, on some level, I did not behave honestly. CB even called me on it, over and over, during and after our bender. She said "I just really feel that you're not being honest with me." And I swore I was being honest and I secretly thought she was nuts for even *thinking* I wasn't being honest... But she was right. She was totally right.
Next step -- why do I do this? Where does this come from? Goes back to the belonging thing I ranted about a few days ago. I don't belong. Why not? Because I never have. Why not? Because I don't want to. Why not? Because at a very early age (early = between 3-5) I recognized that I would have to take care of myself emotionally. My parents split and I had to defend myself emotionally against my dad's incessant guilt-tripping to coerce me into living with him. Then, mom rapidly remarried and had another kid. This was the key -- the thing I never considered until today. My counselor said "So they split, you lived with your mom, describe your attachment to her." ("Attachment" b/c we'd just been discussing attachment as a developmental phenomenon.) Completely unaware of what I was about to uncover, I started explaining that I was really close to my mom and that I had a great relationship with her then... but... then... I thought... yeah, but she remarried right after she divorced my dad... and then she got pregnant... I was thinking... yeah, what was my attachment to mom exactly?
The counselor said "Oh, she started a whole new family..." And then I remembered this dream I had when I was about 6 and this dream explains it all. I dreamed I was on a boat with mom, my stepdad and my brother who was just a baby. We were on a beach, leaving the shore, into the ocean, then the boat started flying up into the air over the water. It was loud and windy and tumultuous and we were very high up. Then I started falling backwards out of the boat. I was suspended there, hanging off the edge of the boat, about to fall... and all around inside the boat sat my so called family. Watching. Nobody was concerned, nobody was trying to help. They were just watching me fall.
My attachment to my mom. To my mom's new family. I was falling out of the boat.
So, back to not belonging. I didn't belong in the boat. I grew my whole identity around not belonging in the boat. I grew my whole identity around taking care of myself, being the only person I could rely on, the only person, developmentally, I was attached to. So I behave parasitically b/c I still have social and emotional needs and part of taking care of myself involves getting those needs met by relating. But deep down, I am this solitary creature and have been since I was a small child.
My counselor said that behaving inauthentically in relationship is about fear. "What's the fear?" She asked. "What's the fear that makes you feel you need to control the relationship by being inauthentic? Fear of loss? Fear of rejection?"
The fear?
The fear is: who the fuck am I if I'm not the solitary creature who takes care of herself?
Who the fuck am I if I crack open that deepest shell and let some other person have a genuine stake?
Who the fuck am I if I let someone "scoop me up," in SK's words. I am not someone who has ever been scooped up. I am not scoopable. I don't know who I would be if I let myself be scooped up. The fear is that I would cease to be the person I think I am if I became scoopable.
Who am I if I'm not this hard little coconut that can't be opened??
This relationship with myself is ultimately all I've ever had since I was a small child.
How can I give that up?
posted by reasonably prudent poet at 8:04 PM
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