I'm realizing that in my attempts to not be "childish" in sharing my struggle publicly for validation or comfort, I may actually just have barred my friends and family from ever understanding the depth of how deeply my illness affects me. I just feel so detached from everyone, I forget how dishonest it makes me about how often I'm actually in crisis. I feel like none of my loved ones really know how bad it actually is (and those that do feel too uncomfortable to bring it up, really). I have such contradictory feelings about it all. I love being alone, I don't want anyone to bear witness to my emotions, leave me alone. But also, nobody really knows me at all damn. I keep being surprised at how open other people are because I can't as easily do that myself - even people who express they struggle with talking about their inner lives are never at the same level of guardedness and secrecy about it as I am apparently. I guess I just wish people would dig more, be less polite, insist on empathizing even when I'm being stubborn and avoidant. I know I can't really have both that and the privacy I insist upon but I feel so unseen. It's like I am fully invisible to everyone. I feel like nothing that's worth sharing is ever appropriate, like nothing would be understood as I mean it, like I am watching everyone else from behind a one way mirror and viewing everybody else's lives pass by like a spectator but they don't really know much about me in return. I know myself better than I ever have and have no place to share it.
Frodo
