If you're lonely on a friday night

The dismantling of the strong one identity :: ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON JULY 29th 2022

I made a promise to myself to write honestly again on the internet when I started writing this substack newsletter. Week after week, I get barely ANY unsubscribes. It’s quite wild. And people are actually signing up to pay me to write this newsletter more each week. That might be you — thank you. If you’d like to support me as a writer, you can sign up through the link at the bottom of this email.

So, I have been detailing the downfall of my being the strong one identity that has been going on for the past 6 or 7 months here on this weekly letter.

And this week, I went for a hike. I am processing a breakup after all - heart break, longing, regret, questioning, so many feelings are happening. And walking and hiking and discharging is really a huge part of my nervous system health.

So what happened on the walk/hike you may ask? Well I really injured my knee. I haven’t seen my doctor yet, but I do believe it’s the meniscus part of the knee.

My knee hurts so much I am regularly crying of pain these past few days. I am currently writing prompted up in my bed, with my leg elevated. I have a system for icing. The whole bit.

This means I cannot walk. This is the end of the world for a person who’s favorite stim is to pace and walk. I am being forced to feel my feelings and lean into my vulnerability because I literally cannot move.

God, it’s fucking hard. I am having to ask for literally every little thing I need. I need a drink, I need to ask my mum. I want the rice cooked a specific sort of way, I have to detail it. I want to go pee, I’ve got to plan it strategically.

Last night I woke up at 1 am, in so much pain, and cried until I fell back asleep, wondering what I was going to do if the pain never stops.

Then I fell asleep and dreamt of my dad, and I didn’t write it all down so it’s a bit blurry, but I do remember being like I wrote the book because I was allowed. It would be really nice if you could love me still.

And then later on in the morning, I saw an email come in with his email with an order of the ebook on the site. I immediately had a panic attack and forgot my knee hurt so bad and stood up in an adrenaline fury. I was shaking and crying and saying, “oh god, he’s going to kill me.”

I don’t think he will actually kill me, by the way. It’s more so expressing the terror I have that stems from being in big big trouble if I told my truth or expressed my feelings about the reality that I experienced.

Then 15 minutes passed, and I started laughing and smiling and thinking, well this is an opportunity for him to re-connect with me if he wants, and if he doesn’t take it, he doesn’t take it.

And all day, I’ve been staying very close with the fact that I am allowed to have opinions and thoughts and feelings about my own experiences and my own life.

And I really do hope he reads the whole thing if he’s upset, because it’s very clear that he is not the bad guy. No one in my book is the bad guy. No one is the good guy either. Including me.

Everyone is a human. Because that is the truthiest truth.

So anyway, I am in bed, unable to escape or do anything to forget the breakup woes, and also, unable to distract from the dad fear.

I feel so vulnerable. I feel the opposite of the strong one. I feel like the weakest one. The one who will cry over a text message. The one who apparently will have a panic attack from an email. The one who needs help to walk right now. The one who’s been in an autistic burn out for months having frequent embarrassing meltdowns. The one who wrote a very honest memoir that challenges people to accept that I exist as a separate entity from them and that I wasn’t invincible. The one who got bit by something and who keeps needing to be checked for lyme’s disease. The one who hasn’t figured out romantic and sexy love yet. The one who has to take time off work and rely on other people for paying the bills.

I’ve always powered through. I’ve always and never once dropped the ball, and it’s like who am I when I can’t power through, when I do drop the ball?

Do I still feel worthy of being a person and being respected and having value, if I can’t offer much? If I only have my breath and my fingers that can still type?

I guess I do. I do feel worthy of that. But fuck, is it ever a trip to not be the strong one anymore. What surprises me though, is that when you’re not so busy not needing other people and handling it yourself, and not being affected by life, you start to feel more human. And being human is a thing I crave to be. Even if I am lonely on friday night.