Held at Arm's Length

Damn it. I can't sleep. And I'm hormonal. Great combination...

As I was laying awake in bed, a thought crossed my mind... Why is it that many of the people I care about most in my life are so emotionally guarded/don't communicate about their feelings?

I feel the walls they put up. I feel myself being held at arm's length... and it hurts.

Maybe it's the hormones... Maybe it's the fact that I'm away from home and the loneliness is starting to sink in... Or maybe I just can't take it anymore... I keep trying to decide which it is.

Life is too damn short. "Be who you are and say what you feel, for those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind." I have to say this, I have to get this off my chest. I wish I could say it face to face but I don't know when I'll be home next. I could say it over the phone but I have to get it out now if I have any hope of sleeping at all tonight... I understand, things happen in life, it messes with our psychology and our hearts, it makes us create defense mechanisms... But if you hide behind those walls forever you will miss out on some pretty great stuff.

So much of my life has left me feeling lost. From the beginning my life was defined by loss... and not just loss, tragic loss; you don't want to know all the details of the ways these people died... I lost my brother, my mum, the babysitter whose house had a bed permanently set aside for me and my sister, my dad got re-married and it ended months later in an annulment. Three mother figures in and out of my life within the first FOUR YEARS, critical developmental years. To top it all off, my single parent was a pilot, gone all the time, different cities all the time, no consistency. I had a Disneyland dad, and a sister 6 years older and in a different developmental stage in life.

Consistency, why didn't I ever have it? High school... God, I don't want to go into what happened then... I'll just say that I felt abandoned by my own father and at the end of my junior year I moved in with my Godparents, my non-parent parents who helped to raise me. And though I was involved in family events and holidays (and still am) I was never really a member of that family... almost, but not really.

After college I felt lost again, detached from my ancestry, heritage, and roots. I felt incomplete, a half of a whole. I maxed out a credit card to try to discover my other half on the other side of the world. And now I feel the scared, confused child welling up inside me again and I DON'T LIKE IT! I'm stronger than this, but when you push away it makes me feel weak... I'm too weak to fight those walls. I don't want to fight those walls! I can't stand being shut out any more. I open myself to you and you shut me out. How much more can you push me away when I'm already gone?

.............. deep breath .....................

All anyone wants is to be loved. They say if you love yourself, that's enough. I love myself. I accept myself just as I am. I have more self confidence now than when I was 20 pounds lighter, a tiny insecure girl. Maybe loving myself should be enough but we're social creatures, we need community, family, support for the times we're too tired. Being alone and not being let in are two entirely different things.

I'm okay with being alone, but I am not okay with being shut out and held at arm's length. Please, please, let me in.