Goodbye... For Now

Hey, everyone,

     So it's been nearly 2 years... whoops. I checked on this randomly, and I'm like, oh, I never actually made an official goodbye.
     Basically, buckle your seatbelts, it's gonna be a ride.

     With all this mess going on in the year 2020, I've had a lot of time for self-reflection. More than I usually do, that is. What I figured out a while back is that I think of myself as very self-centered, but also have put myself down a lot. Basically, because I can get so wrapped up in my own head, sometimes I think that I don't deserve the friends I've had or have. Which is easy to believe when I was living in an environment where not a lot of folks would acknowledge me, even if I was their friend. Heck, I almost got forgotten in places when I got distracted by some random thing.
     Now, I'm going to talk about senior year because that's the origin of this blog, and honestly, I've barely thought about it since my last post here. It's only come up recently more because, for some reason, I've been dreaming about my old friends, and strangely, the most common one is being talked behind my back again. Honestly, I couldn't give a crap about that now. People will believe what they want, and I'll keep being me.
    At the risk of sounding self-centered, I owe it to myself to let this rest. I'll leave the blog up, and maybe someday I'll write again. But here's my final thoughts as of now, to let this go.
    (Apologies if I repeat myself from past posts, I know I do that a lot.)

     My depression and anxiety kept me from speaking up about how I was actually feeling. This blog was one way I could vent and I changed names so that the general public wouldn't know the identities of anyone. Thing is, some friends knew the people behind the names and took offense to my fears and feelings that I had no outlet for, so I ended up apologizing for a lot, which, honestly, I don't think I should have. What should have happened is I should have been more honest about how I was feeling in the first place, instead of just ducking my head and trying not to offend people I cared so deeply about.

      This quote ("If someone tells you you hurt them, you don't get to decide that you didn't.") is something that's run through my head since senior year of high school. I was told by at least one of my former friends that they didn't hurt me. Which made no sense to me. Because I was hurting and it was their actions that caused it. So like, I was confused and heartbroken and scared because I didn't know if maybe I was just overreacting. Maybe I was like everyone said and too sensitive.

     I know now that I was both right and wrong. I was hurt and pushed to the side and taken for granted. The friends that were supposed to treat me right decided their version of right wasn't something I should have been hurt so deeply by. Honestly, to me, that just proves how little they knew me. I also never got an explanation or an answer for what happened. Part of me still wants something, anything to know why things happened the way they did. The hardest thing to accept is that things just happen. They don't always have a nice and easy explanation attached.
     But I was also wrong. I got mad and lashed out, pushing people away. In my depressed state and full of fear, I could no longer see the good in people I'd been friends with. Maybe I shouldn't have. Maybe I should have explained myself more, helped them to see how confused and lost I was. Maybe I should have been more open about how I saw patterns repeating themselves and that's when I finally drew the line.
     I never actually told one person the reason I left was because I knew that they'd talked bad about me again, but acted like I was still mad about senior year so that they could come forward with the new information themselves. Stupid, right? People can't read minds. But in the moment, it was another apology I never got.

     Now I've gone through college, somewhat. I've found out I'm ace and trans. I've gotten a better handle on my depression and anxiety. Mostly I can thank a lot of that to Felix and another of my best friends I met in college. They've stuck by me and I know I can depend on them, no matter how busy we are.
     True, I've got other friends. We chat every now and then, in some cases once a year because I've learned that while other friends are crappy at keeping contact, I'm not innocent of that either. So sometimes you have to be the one to reach out. Because not everyone has Felix's powers of knowing I want to talk and will randomly reach out of the blue.
     I've also learned how to let go of people that are bad for me. Another "friend" in college told me over text that he and other friends of mine made fun of me when I wasn't around. Then I let go of some more recently when they got all fussed I've been supporting the Black Lives Matter movement. In their defense, I don't think they know they're racist. Still, I dropped them anyway. People having rights, or the lack of them, because of something they cannot control isn't an opinion or an argument that we should be having.

     Wrapping this up, I just want to say, I don't hate the people I leave. Sure, I get really angry and pissed at first, but after a while, it aches. I still miss the people I left in high school. We went through a lot together and then... yeah. I don't hate them, I just know for my own peace of mind, I can't trust them how I used to.
     But now I also can't see them graduate college. Now I can't hear about their lives and be so proud of them and their accomplishments. Back in high school graduation, I smiled and clapped the hardest for my friends because we did it. And I was so extremely proud of them, even as I thought my own accomplishments were lesser. I'm still so proud of them.
     Now that's gone. I can't tell them how I feel because I severed those ties.

     Part of me still thinks we'll see each other again someday. Mostly because I've found that's just how the world works. The one thing that's changed is I used to dread it. Or, I'll admit, because I wanted to be petty and be like, "See, I'm not the failure you predicted I'd be."
     But that doesn't matter to me. Not as much anymore, anyway. Now I kind of just want to see how things are going. Know that they're safe and happy and healthy.
     That's all I've ever wanted, really.

     In case you're wondering where the pettiness energy went, it's going into my books. And it's being translated into as many LGBT characters as I can possibly write. One of my old stories from senior year has gone from a hetero romance in the background to girl power lesbians. Because fight me, lol.
    Am I maybe overcompensating for not being able to express myself for most of my life...

     Seriously, though, jumping back. Any old friends who are reading this and I did you wrong without realizing, I'm truly sorry. I know how much it can hurt, and the last thing I'd wish on anyone is for them to go through what I did.

     Finally, I'll leave this blog with Thomas Sanders' song "Recipe for Me". I relate a lot to it and I know others do as well.
     Goodbye for now. I wish you all the best.

-Kay

PS: As of right now, the greater amount of folks I know don't know I'm trans, so that's still a thing I know the folks who know me reading this will respect. And that you very much for that. :)