When I was a young adult, I looked for boyfriends to tell me who I am. I would find a boyfriend, try to mould myself into who I thought they wanted me to be, and when I burned myself out pretending, I’d move on to a new one. I’ve had a lot of boyfriends in the past. I was looking for someone to tell me who I was.
I’ve had boyfriends who have been amazing people. Treated me with nothing but respect and care. I didn’t feel like I deserved it. The care, the love. I’ve had awful boyfriends. Violent and abusive even. What’s common in all my past relationships is that I burned myself out trying to be someone I thought the boyfriends wanted me to be. I wanted someone who could tell me who I am. Preferably in one or two words.
Of course this wasn’t conscious. Of course I didn’t plan this or even realise this at the time. But a big reason why it was hard for me to be in a long-term relationship as a young adult was that I didn’t know who I was and it was absolutely exhausting to be someone I wasn’t. Being loved required a performance and I was a bad actress. Didn’t have the energy to keep up the charade, and eventually I burned out trying to be who I thought they wanted me to be. No one ever specifically asked me to be anything else and I read things between the lines that weren’t even there. Someone mentioned a character they liked in a show, I’d dye my hair to be as close to that as possible. I’d try hobbies and drugs to fit the role I built trying to read their expectations.
When I started therapy just over three years ago, I looked into the mirror, I didn’t see me. I saw a collection of what my ex-boyfriends had left and someone I had tried to become thinking that’s what they wanted. The role I was playing, the mask I was carrying, it was exhausting. It explains the continuous burnouts and short relationships. At every step of the way, I was carrying a heavy mask and trying to be someone I didn’t know how to be.
I have never really been good at reading people’s expectations. I have no idea about unspoken social conventions especially when they are ever-changing and very much tied to a culture that does not interest me. I do not get hints and if there is something “I should do”, that’s a surefire way to get me to resent the whole idea of that thing. I don’t see the point of keeping people I do not like and who do not like me in my life. Blood or not, relative or not, long-term friend or not, I value my own peace and mental health too much to try to jump through ever-changing fiery hoops just to make someone like me. I refuse to try to guess what someone wants of me or wants me to be.
It’s like trying to act in a play someone else has written, but you have to guess the lines without script, cues, rehearsal or any idea what the play is about. I find this especially exhausting and I have decided to not participate in the play anymore.
(To any of you reading between the lines whether this is about you, no, I am not talking about any one person specifically, so fuck off you self-involved twat.)
This all exhausts me so much that I just do not want to be in any contact with any human ever again. Of course, this isn’t good either because unfortunately humans are social beings and turns out I, too, need a social life. I luckily have a very wonderful husband who doesn’t take it personally when I hide in my den for two days without talking to anyone. To solve this, I have informed my family that I do not even try to read hints. If you want to see me, tell me that. If you expect something from me, tell me that.
In the past I have tried to find sense of self in diagnoses, relationships, education and work titles. One of my old workmates from my first serious job told me that I shouldn’t build my identity through that job, because that job wasn’t stable. He was right, of course, but I was in my early 20s and up to that point I had been a chronic failure and someone who would never become anything. I had been someone locked in a mental hospital multiple times. A temporary identity through a job was better than any of the old ones I had. It didn’t last long, but it helped me move on from building my identity around being mentally ill.
Naturally, identity doesn’t work like that. No one has a one solid identity they can be classified as. There is no one box anyone can be put into. Everyone has different roles they play in different scenarios. But somehow it seems not everyone is as distressed with the lack of identity as I have been.
A lot of people find an identity when they become a parent. Becoming a mother or father gives them one word to describe themselves. Some people also lose themselves behind the role of being a parent and forget their own needs. Some people live vicariously through their children, others try to live double lives, and burn themselves out trying to give more than they have. Some people find identity in being child-free. I don’t really identify with that either, because it centers children again. My life, choices and identity have nothing to do with children, so I’m not able to relate to the child-free terminology either.
The biggest thing therapy has given me is me. Through therapy I gained a sense of who I am and I am learning to listen to my own needs and take care of me. I know who I am, I know what I like and what I need. I take a break when I need a break and say no when I don’t want something. I build distance to things that hurt me and keep things close that make me feel safe. My sense of self is not tied to anyone else or anything else. Through therapy I learned who I am even if I still don’t have one word to describe myself. Through therapy I learned that I don’t have to be able to contain myself in one word. Or one sentence. I am not a coder, a handcrafter, a Green, a wife, a dog’s human or a leftist. I’m all of those things. And much more.