In a conversation with one of my guy friends, the subject came up about people's natures and whether or not they should try to be different from their natures, try to "rise above them" and such. One could talk about wanting to be a better person, wanting to be kinder to others, things like that. However, my thoughts took me down a different path, thinking about how people often try to be things that they're not, and when they try to do that...it's painful.
I was kinda speaking from experience there. To just take a small example, I've basically for the past many years have tried to act and be like a man and not like a woman. Most of my role models were male, and because I admired them so much, I wanted to be like them. So I tried to adopt characteristics that I thought were part of what it was to be male (or at least what culture has said). I tried to be strong, not just for myself but to be strong for the people around me, to be independent, completely so that I wouldn't have to lean on anyone, invulnerable so that no one would have to carry me. Oh, and never ever cry. If I had to, I'd go cry silently into my pillow in my room with the door locked so that no one knew about it.
My thought was that I could be there to support others without them having to carry my problems as well. I think the origin of this thought was from when I was in 3rd grade and we discovered my brother had autism. Suddenly my parents couldn't be there for me as much as before because much of their time was spent trying to help him through therapies and the like. So I was often alone. For my sports games my parents couldn't be there in the stands, we eventually stopped going to movies, rarely did we go out to dinner...basically our lives revolved around my little brother. Of course, my parents tried to make sure I didn't stay home and do nothing, so they encouraged (or forced) me into dance lessons, sports teams, things like that. Since Mom and Dad often couldn't be there at the games or stay for the lessons, more often than not I was just dropped off and was left pretty much to myself.
As a response, I withdrew into myself, trying to not draw a lot of attention because my parents had to spend time watching my brother. Thus began the striving towards strength, independence, invulnerability, and dry tear ducts.
At first, I thought this was working. For a little while I was taking care of my little sister, even once in a while watching my brother when my parents went out, and sometimes took care of Mom when her back went out, so my philosophy was working.
Then things started happening in my life. I lost several classmates to car accidents, brain tumors, and suicide, I was often alone, had a very hard time making close friends, just felt lonely. For a while, whenever I felt sad or depressed, I just told myself I was being silly and to just ignore it. But eventually the periods of sadness grew longer and deeper in intensity. Over the past year things have just been breaking apart, and the weight of trying to be what I'm not has been crushing me.
I'm strong, but not so strong that I can suppport my problems by myself. I'm independent enough, but not so that I can't get through life without leaning on the people around me. I'm not invulnerable. In fact I'm quite vulnerable. And I cry.
My friend asked me why I've tried to be so invulnerable if there's people around me who will protect me. I guess I've always felt like I didn't have such people in my life. How do I trust the people closest to me?
By not being ashamed of your weaknesses, and not being too embarrassed to ask for help, I guess.
ReplyDeleteIt's ok to need help. Listen to the Beatles: Help! It's pretty uplifting, and sees asking for help as a mature thing to do.
ReplyDeleteYou're supposed to need people. Evolutionary psychology. Your weapons and defenses aren't strong enough for you to be solitary, like bears or tigers are. That means emotionally, too.
Having a brother with extraordinary needs can be a very powerful enlightenment, but it can also ruin a childhood. My middle brother has Asperger's, along with some behavioural problems. My younger brother used to be the sweetheart of the family. He was well-behaved and did well in school. Now that the middle brother needs so much attention, though, the youngest doesn't get the attention he needs, and rather than making him self-sufficient (and depressed) like you or me, it's made him a sneaky brat with an overt ego the size of Alaska but with about as much substance behind it as Alaska has population.
As for trust, you just have to believe that people are going to follow through. Trust isn't supposed to need to be tested. It just has to be given, I suppose, to the degree that you trust them instinctively, not to the degree you reason that they have earned your trust. (Unless they've broken your trust, but then your instincts will go with your reason.)
That's about all I have to say, except for this:
Let it out. Don't keep things trapped inside you, because they grow. A problem shared is a problem halved, and all that. So don't be ashamed to ask for help, to cry, to break down. It's scary, but you're allowed to. You need to sometimes.