The world has changed pretty drastically the past month or so, funnily enough I was just trying to get out of the small funk I was in and trying to get out of the isolating cycle I was getting myself stuck in. Then this whole Corona virus hysteria appears and now everything’s closed and everyone’s staying home. While I am calling it hysteria, because people are going out basically stocking up on months worth of toilet paper I am in no way understating the seriousness of this virus. Isolating is essential right now. So my disappointment in having to isolate more is felt with all that still in mind. I had a few trips planned, one to Las Vegas was going to happen pretty soon but a majority of hotels are closing now and I can’t risk infecting anyone else in this household. Hopefully the plans I have set for later this year won’t have to be cancelled due to this virus. A get away is pretty damn needed at this point because being confined indoors is getting to me. Despite having people I do talk to online every day, I don’t believe that can replace any actual person to person to person interaction or just any general routine of just getting out of the damn house. My group therapy sessions which I hated having to drive an hour to get to was at least rewarding in that it gave me an hour or more’s time with people who are going through nearly the same shit I’m going through. Who get it. Who get me. That’s been cancelled the past few weeks and might be back on in a group call situation.. which isn’t ideal for catching up with Sid or anyone else. I think I really only have one person who I feel comfortable talking with about any of what’s going on in my head outside of that group. And still, I don’t like always going to her with my problems because I don’t want to make them my therapist. That’s what I have a therapist for and my mental process is a shit storm most of the time. That’s a result of having both a personality disorder that makes me feel intense emotions, not the greatest skillset to deal with those either, and a mental disorder that makes me feel periodical mood shifts that I will never have any control over. It takes me some time to sift through the confusion, through the almost always conflicting emotions. And I’ve become actually very decent at sorting out my own stuff by myself. When I need help I also have this site.

However in discussing what it is that I’ve wanted in the people I consider “my pack” it’s that I want people that I can be vulnerable with and to go with this stuff that for the most part has either ended going through the ears of my therapist or into text onto this blog. I’ll admit I’ve been almost working against my goals in that sense. Sure, I think I’ve been doing a way better job at allowing more people into my lives and allowing them as into my life as I feel comfortable with. The caveat obviously being that it was clear I wasn’t very comfortable with any real closeness since, well I can’t pin point any specific occurrence. Let’s just say my repeated mistake of letting the wrong people in, and definitely holding on for longer than I should have when I knew it was high time to book it. Each past relationship has added to the weariness to the point I had almost become entirely closed off. If not for thankfully a few people who I have in the past year have just welcomed into my life and into my “pack” and those who are returning into my life with a now much bigger significance and level of trust, I would be in a much worse state than I am. Considering where I was at last year and ignoring the very real yet entirely out of my control viral panic, I think I’m actually doing okay for once. Emotionally at least.

I don’t know how much I want to talk about it on here because the very same person might end up reading this later down the line, but I finally reached out to that reoccurring “old friend” and I don’t know what to say. If I’m being completely honest I felt a little disappointed. I have some idea of why that is, but none of it has anything to do with what actually happened or what either of us said. In fact I think it went about as well as it could have gone. In the past times of “making up” for lack of a better word, there was usually the first part where one of us spent a long time apologizing and then we’d both go into this cycle where we just made sure the other one felt better about the situation even sometimes despite our actual feelings towards it. We didn’t do that and that was nice. It was just a conversation, what I liked about how I made up with someone who’s now one of my best friends. However that’s also the crux of it all I suppose, it was after all just a conversation.

There’s obviously more to it than that but I’m trying to adopt my own personal rule of not subtweeting/writing about something that could easily be discussed. And I don’t believe this is something that needs to be. I have a thousand conflicting thoughts about everything and everybody in my life. Some might be cause for alarm, but none of these are. In this “process” I have become more sure of what it is I’m searching for in those closest to me in my pack though. The most surprising one to me was actually emotional intensity. Before this “finding my pack” philosophy came into mind and I was solely focused on just trying to stay emotionally healthy, I hung out with everyone who asked. Kept myself busy but for the most part emotionally distant. Gamer pals and not much more with the rare exceptions. That’s because in the past with friendships that I have a strong emotional bond with and thus feel more intense emotions when I am with them, the negative emotions often prospered and those times were incredibly and unbelievably painful. Yet with the bad, there was also a feeling of love, of feeling understood and cared for and I hated having to see those feelings go too. I had that with this friend and unfortunately we don’t anymore but I mean it has been a year since we’d stopped being friends, so that’s par for the course. I do know I want to try and implement those more positive aspects of past relationships more into my current ones and hopefully into whomever I meet and add into my life in the near future as well. It’s nice having someone out of the blue message you telling you they were thinking about you. Or even something with incredibly lower stakes/intensity like how just yesterday a friend of mine messaged me just asking me for a random word. When I tried asking her why she needed it, she just responded with no time to explain and next thing I know I’m being sent a doodle of a farting brain eating spaghetti (spaghetti was my contribution to the random word doodle.) It’s simply nice to be thought of.

The biggest problem with this goal is that in order for me to find more friendships like this, where I feel more connected with them, where they want to reach out more, where I can talk about what’s on my mind or they would go up to me to talk about what’s on theirs, I have to become more comfortable doing that as well. I have a past of feeling stupid for either reaching out too much when I wasn’t always wanted. And when this is coming from a significant other that feeling feels like shit. Just as much when it comes from a dear friend. I also have a past of feeling stupid for trusting the wrong people and for trusting way past it’s due date. Way after I’ve been given every reason to never trust them again. That’s a fear I got to work on and I have been slowly trying to with those I feel most comfortable with. A simple good morning text or a “how are you doing?” to simply learn how it is my friend is feeling today have been what I’ve been starting with. I also have been reaching out more to play games with people, mostly with Lilli but also others too I don’t want to get into the habit of solely relying on one person to get me over a surge of sadness. I know where that’s gotten me. It’s not just reaching out, initiating the conversation, or telling people that I’m thinking of them. While that all is important of course, in order to find friendships in which there is more of that emotional intensity I’m seeking, of more of that “I got your back” attitude between us, I will have to be more vulnerable, open, and in a way I have to be okay to look stupid. Some people are going to make me feel needy or dumb for wanting their attention or affection. Those people are not the people who belong in my pack anyway. We’re lying if we tell ourselves we’re not looking for just a little bit of that in every one of our friendships. It’s nice to know people care about us and I’m done letting other people make me feel bad for caring. I’ve come damn close to stopping caring entirely and believe me that is a dark and lonely existence so I have no desire going back.

Stir crazy but still full of love,

-T.