Vulnerability isn’t my strong suit.
Honesty? Yup. Oversharing? Happy to, no problem.
When shit gets really scary though – when feelings get deep or when the world is in tormented chaos, I tend to show my good side. The side that I think is good. I can be maternal, friendly, cheerful. Meanwhile haunted by recycling that mocks me from the corner of the kitchen, texts to people I care about gone unanswered.
A migraine a week, like clockwork.
I’m used to being the strong girl. I’ve always been the strong girl, even in my weaker moments. It’s an identity and I roll with it because it’s easier to be the girl who has her shit together (or at least looks like it) than it is to give in and be vulnerable.
Because if I collapse, who will pick everyone else up? How will they continue on? Besides, as I tell myself every moment of every day – you have no right to be upset. You have privilege. A home. A job. Even if you don’t have that (which your nightmares seem to think is imminent), you’re still okay. You’ll be okay.
And yet you can’t breathe. Are you sick? No, you’re not. It’s cause you can’t stop looking at statistics and reading articles and discussing it and it’s starting to make you doubt your whole reality.
The only cures seem to be that one smile that he makes when he’s been looking at you for a long time, and playing that dot game that has also managed to invade your dreams, and maybe a bit more beer and a bit more food than you should probably be consuming.
We’re all in this together but we’re all so far apart?
