Forced Interactions

I just had an 'I'm 10 years old' type of freak out. Everything is finally getting to me. It's coming out in weird ways.

I shouldn't need to feel like I'm walking on eggshells around someone who's supposedly a friend. It's exhausting trying to keep myself in check. One slip and I fulfill the negative expectation in her head. She waits for it, because it's inevitable. It is, but it really shouldn't be that big of a deal. Real friends get mad, who cares. I shouldn't have to feel guilty or stressed every time we are together. It's too stressful. I feel judged. This isn't healthy. I'm trying to leave it all behind...by leaving it.

mom's first turkey

my mom made her first attempt at Christmas dinner tonight. Pre-Christmas dinner I should say... it was this early to accommodate my uncle going to Montreal for what I like to call, "real Christmas dinner". I am 25 years old...and have had 24 Christmases where my mom has NOT cooked Christmas dinner.. so this was a big deal.

I appreciate how sometimes my family tries to be close knit here in Toronto now that everyone is slowly moving over. However, I wonder if I'm the only one that notices the initial awkwardness...the forced banter at first. We were not raised like this. We went to Montreal for family. They were the ones with Christmas. In Toronto, we didn't even put up a tree most years. And although it is better, I'm still having a bit of a tough time adapting to this. I also think it's a bit sad that family has been such a little part of my life that this is still awkward.

As a sidenote, I was truthfully a little disappointed when DC didn't message me back today. Realistically, there was no reason to. The last message ended the conversation topic. Admittedly, he has put a bit of a smile on my face. Could this mean that I really do like him or is this some kinda sick thrill for the chase? I was trying to remember how I felt when Freckles was around. I couldn't remember... let's hope this doesn't go badly.

my postsecret

i have no regrets, but undergrad would have been so much more fun without you.

hill wedding

the wedding chaos is finally over. was a great party. it both reminded me that i was alone and also made me look forward to the one day when i am that happy.

just a moment of weakness

I think the hardest part about this whole process is knowing that everything in the end will be okay. As much as I keep telling myself that, it still remains a nagging doubt in my life.
My life was set and it didn't matter what happened. I knew that together we could get through it. Everything else in a way faded in importance because no matter what happened as long as I had him with me, things wouldn't be so bad. So what happens when that person is no longer there and you are forced to face the world alone? Suddenly all the things that seemed trivial now become a burden. The future life I had envisioned is now shaken and I realized that the things that were once 'things that would just work out somehow' are becoming giant anxieties of my life becuase now there is no safety blanket and I no longer have the belief that it will all just be okay. Now these small things have a bigger part in my life. Now I am lost. I over analyse. I think perhaps that the relationship was too much of my life. That I relied on it too much. Will I ever let myself go back to that? Was it healthy? Was it normal? My life and my history are filled with questions now.

I've lost that sense of security. I've lost a lot of confidence. It's hard trying to gain it all back.

burn it off

When I was a kid, I had a dark wart on the bottom of my right big toe. On the bottom pad, where the toe touches the ground. It didn't looke like a wart. It looked more like a mole. It was flat and under my skin. My mom was convinced for a while that it was a rock that had gotten trapped in a cut and then eventually just stayed there under layers and layers of new skin that had grown over it over time. It didn't bother me, therefore I didn't care. For years my pediatrician said it was nothing.

One day I noticed more bumps on my foot. On other toes. They were a lighter shade of grey and this time were raised. By this time, many years later I had switched family doctors. He had one look at it and knew. It was warts. Warts had a habit of spreading. He didn't know why it took so long. I freaked out when he tried to scrape away the skin that had grown overtop that first big, black one. I flinched and bit my lip. He didn't even get close to it. It was so deep. I was bleeding.

I had to go to the hospital to get them burned off with liquid nitrogen. The little raised ones were still new- they were easy. A few sessions and they were gone. The big one had been festering for years and was a bitch to get rid of. Many sessions later it was cleared. Most of the time I forget it was ever even there.

Sometimes however, I feel a phantom pain in my right big toe. One that feels exactly like it did when the wart was getting burned off. It's nothing I can explain but so distinct that I can relate the sensation to that one moment. I don't ever feel it on the other toes that had the newer warts.

Strange how something like that still has a way of haunting you 20 or so years later. It just goes to show that its the ones that have been with you the longest that will cause you the most pain and pain that you will never be able to fully escape even when it's gone.

"The Beginning of the End"

A friend said that to me yesterday. She said it felt like this was the beginning of the end for our little group of friends. We were getting old, moving on with our own separate lives. The dynamics of the group has changed. I thought it was funny that she noticed it too, despite being away for school. I could feel it happening for months now. I felt it mainly because I was in many way in the centre of it. I predicted that one person in particular would soon be out of my life. Partly because of things out of our control...partly because I don't agree...partly because I want it to be so.

This should be interesting and truly heartbreaking.

anopheles

I have a problem. A stupid, but nevertheless a nagging and annoying problem.
Every time I want to hang out with my friends, the threat of the ex is there.
Most people break up with their boyfriends and can just avoid them. Yes, there is the chance that somewhere at a mutual friend's birthday they will meet up again. But I face my ex every other week. He is that annoying storm cloud that follows me. And even though it doesn't always rain, the threat is there, it's shadow looms. It ruins your day with the chance.

I think it is actually hampering my healing. Everytime he interrupts my life whether by being with my friends while I can't or actually being in my presence, I can feel all the anger and hurt well up again. I don't have time for it to just go away. I don't like the ups and down. The normal- normal - normal then boom oh yeah my ex boyfriend broke my heart. A cycle that occurs at least every other week. Most people can just go on with their lives and then have the awkward encounters a year later. Not me. I can't just ignore it since it's too big and too persistant to just simply look over. He's too involved. It is just something I have to adjust and get used to. I have no choice.

It's not only the fact that he's there... it's that he's there with his girlfriend...and that even when he's not there, there's always the threat of him there so he may as well have just come anyways....and the fact that he is seeming to make such an effort to see these friends now. How many friends' birthdays have we opted out not to go to since it was too expensive or too out of the way? How many times has he just tagged along because I was already out? Ugh it's so frustrating. Why does he dump all of his pre-relationship freinds despite my insisting that he should hang out with them? And why does he then try harder with the ones we have in common?

I have started a stage of avoidance. I just don't put myself there anymore. I hang out with the friends that we don't share.

It is unfair that I have to choose between mutal friends and my comfort. It's unfair that from day one, I had to deal with seeing him and her in my face all the time. It's unfair that she's infiltrating.

I want to burn everything and start over again.

I need to stop sitting here eating peanut butter out of the jar.

TFC #8

Sometimes it just takes a soccer game, a couple of beers, and a good friend from the past to give you a little perspective on things. I deserve better.

maybe this is what healing feels like

Sometimes I understand that right now I am better off without him. I wouldn't be where I am now if he was still in my life. In some ways, he was very hindering. It was a choice I made at the time.. I let it happen. It's weird looking back on it now.

I am starting to see that despite the many ways he was right for me, in some ways he was definitely wrong. I think I put in too much faith that things would be different eventually. Sometimes I even wonder if he is perhaps different for the new girl in his life...that maybe he is this amazingly communicative and romantic boyfriend. Maybe he even does things without being told or does things despite being told not to do them because it would have been too much of a hassle. He never understood the idea of doing something just because...but maybe that was just with me.

Maybe it's just the type of boys I am exposed to here at school....ones who are more or less self sufficient and independent... but I am seeing that some things I thought were too much to expect are actually not.

A relationship is always dynamic. You feed off what the other one gives off and reflect it back. Perhaps our dynamic wasn't working out. Perhaps me getting sick when I did didn't help the situation. Perhaps he contributed to my stress, which in turn made me put stress on him and our relationship. Perhaps both his long hours and my school fiasco made things worse. It was the perfect storm in many ways and sometimes it's hard to deny that this just may be fate... and as cheesy as it may sound, perhaps it is just all happening for a reason. All I know is that a lot of things just started to fix themselves once he wasn't in my life.

The harvest

I spent all day sacrificing mice, taking out their blood, organs and then plating them. Ten hours. Sixteen mice. A hundred and fourty-four plates. Sometimes when I think of what I'm doing, I wonder how I got here.. how I got into doing this. I remember as a child I never knew what I wanted to do and would make up a response everytime I was asked. The obligatory 'doctor' was a favourite response. In many ways I still don't know what I want to do.
Yesterday M asked me what I would be if I could be anything in the world regardless of talent or money. He would have been a soccer player. I still couldn't answer. I like what I do. I find it interesting. Sometimes I even think it's pretty cool. But is that enough?

heartbreaker

I am a heartbreaker. I laugh when I say this cause I'm really not... but when I think back, there have definitely been a few times where it wasn't just disappointment on the other end, but actual emotional pain... like I could have messed up someone just a little. And yes although 6th grade crushes really don't mean much now that I am approaching 25...and summer flings in highschool aren't that big of a deal... back then they were everything. I can't say I made the best choices in those situations. So maybe this one was just to even the field a bit. You can't go through life totally unscathed right? Maybe just once my heart had to be broken too.

Adopted family

I miss his family far more than I miss him being around. I love them so much and wish I could keep them. It hurts knowing that they are no longer a part of my life.
I miss them. I miss them. I miss them.

statesman

Today I broke a man's heart.
I will repay one day in karma.
I should have said something sooner. I was unsure.
I am way more screwed up than I am letting myself believe.