Stasis

That's really the only word that describes my life over the last four years. Back when I moved to North Carolina, I was determined not to put down roots when I planned on coming back to Chicago as soon as I finished my program. I tried to distance myself from people, refused to step anywhere near romantic entanglements, and avoided getting involved in anything I could get too attached to. It didn't last. My classmates were too interesting and lovable, there were so many affordable things to do and try, I was tired of waiting to have a life. I still miss my friends, my gym, my lack of allergies, never being overly cold. 

I really miss the confident and active person I became. I really intended to keep being her when I returned to Chicago. I lost a lot of myself that year and I was miserable. I was in an abusive work environment that didn't pay enough to live in Chicago, let alone have any kind of life outside of work. And I was too emotionally burned out to get my head above water. I found myself getting swallowed up by my friends with stronger personalities. Everyone kept telling me who I should be, how I should be handling my life, which people I should spend my time with. And I disappeared. I stopped making plans, stopped returning text messages, and spent more and more nights shut away in my bedroom with my dogs. And at the end of a year, I left. I had big plans for deep academia, home ownership, regaining some of my lost confidence and rejoining the people who don't hide in their houses every weekend. I tried to make a clean break with my Chicago life. Cut off dating relationships. Put up stronger boundaries where they were needed. I didn't want anything to keep me anchored to a place that just wasn't working for me anymore.

The week before I moved, I tripped into a new relationship and lost the ability to close the door on that chapter of my life. At first, I really tried to set up a life back in Champaign. I got jobs. Eventually, I got an apartment. I made local friends and professional connections. But I spent the next three years living in two worlds and never having a foot firmly in either of them. I got a good job, the pandemic began, I got an apartment, I left my job and started my PhD program, I left my PhD program and found an even better job. And then everything went to hell. In a matter of just a few weeks, I had to put down my dog, my dad had a debilitating stroke, and I made the decision to stop trying to have a relationship with someone who wasn't putting in the effort. In a matter of a few days I found myself walled in by becoming my father's full-time caregiver when I should be exploring life outside the boundaries of intimate relationships. 

It's been difficult to find balance with all of the changes. Most of my closest friends live a significant drive time away and several other relationships that I had previously thought were solid have been on shaky ground. I have difficulty trusting that people actually want to spend time with me and my rejection anxiety keeps me from reaching out to initiate plans. It's a terrible cycle of loneliness. And it's become more obvious that because I've spent so much of my life building my home in other people that it has become impossible for me to feel at home in any place. I moved into this apartment nearly four years ago and I have yet to hang most of my art on the walls. I left Chicago almost five years ago and I have yet to fully participate in a life where I am. 

I'm trying. Trying to cook more at home and to get involved in my baking again. I'm finding ways to make my home feel more permanent than transitory. I'm looking for the right career goals that will help me move forward professionally. Clearly I've opened the door back up to writing again. And I've begun to explore my options to get back into hobbies that I care about: gymming, archery, judo, horseback riding, etc. I started by signing up for ballroom dance lessons. Some of them are a bit below my paygrade (I could really teach the beginning Swing lessons) but it's good to just move to music again and to new people. One rock step at a time.

adaptation

Why do we change ourselves for others?

I've never been one to care much about what people thought about me. I refuse to hide my tattoos or my undercut. I enjoy dying my hair unnatural colors whenever the mood strikes me. I don't think that wearing makeup or less comfortable shoes makes me any more professional or better at my job. I'm very open about my polyam and queer identities. I am very passionate, I am loyal to a fault, I love with my whole being. I won't keep my mouth shut when something is important to me and I've been known to literally hulk out (minus the turning green part) when faced with injustice and bigotry. I am wholeheartedly dedicated to being my authentic self at all times. This hasn't always ingratiated me in professional and educational settings. On occasion, I even think that my overexuberance about things I'm passionate about can make my friends and family embarrassed of me or even put off. People think I don't see it, but I notice more than I let on. It has always been a point of pride with me that I refuse to change who I am on behalf of other people's discomfort, no matter how much it can hurt my feelings at times. And to be completely honest, I sometimes find myself disappointed in friends who I believe have a strong sense of self but immediately dim their shine to make their family members or coworkers more comfortable. 

Oddly, enough this entire philosophy seems to get thrown immediately out the window when I've found myself in more intimate relationships. I find it difficult to confront the people I love when they've hurt me. It is damn near impossible for me to make my own needs known. I have never once used a safe word. I struggle setting boundaries and saying no. There are only a handful of people I feel comfortable being completely vulnerable with in person. The most important and dearest dreams I had, I only shared with people that proved my trust in them wrong. And now I don't trust my instincts enough to trust the right people and I don't trust myself enough not to adapt who I am out of fear of losing someone.

I don't know how we keep ourselves from maladapting in this way. My current solution has been to pull the walls in tighter. These days, I keep the inner circle smaller. I don't date at all anymore and I don't think I ever will again. They might not be the best coping skills, but they're all I can trust now.