srsly
08.06.20 | 3:31 pm
my shorts literally slid off my body today.
but to me, honestly, i look almost exactly the same.
my papaw saw me last night and asked if i'd lost weight. then, if i'd found a man. then, he said, "well now that you've lost weight, you can find one!"
i can't even make myself get into how furious that one made me. as though i'm only worth something romantically -- worth something as a person, even -- when i look a certain way.
i'm tired of people seeing a difference, asking me these questions, giving me what they think are compliments. it makes me so incredibly uncomfortable. and you can't say anything against these people's comments because then it hurts their feelings.
i don't even want to keep talking about this, it just makes it easier to be obsessive about it, but here i am, in my stupid diary, talking about this again.
--
you messaged me today (we've been talking more again, as though the distance has made you more comfortable, made you feel safer, or something) and said, "i will tell you tomorrow all about the date i had tonight... i think there is something seriously wrong with me..." and later, "i had a good date but i'm becoming more and more george. i'm gonna end up killing my fiancee with cheap envelopes."
i examined the fact that this isn't some knife-to-the-heart kind of feeling. it's actually a weirdly almost-totally-okay feeling.
and i remember a few things that are true:
-if i ever really date someone again, i want them to have lots of friends (this is something i have maintained since matt because he had so few friends). you self-profess that you have one male friend and some female friends, but not very many.
-i have a problematic stupid weird fantasy in my head that i'll return to france, having lost more weight, and you'll see me and think wow, yes i do like this weird american girl, now that i can see she is no longer a hideous monster. because on top of everything else, with literally no evidence at all, i feel like this plays a role here. again: no evidence at all, just crippling self-worth.
-you're still not far out from a big break up, and you need time to date and feel these things out for yourself. it's exciting, at first, all the new opportunities. i know how that feels.
-in so many ways, you are actually not what i want at all. and i've done the same thing i've done in the past: got attached because someone paid attention to me. felt special. i love being the person someone tells all their random thoughts to, and so, naturally, i tumbled in head first. undoubtedly, if this had even gone anywhere, it would've ended the same way it ended with matt.
-going off of that -- there are so many similarities here to my situation with matt that it's almost weird. but i suppose really, it's just a pattern.
sometimes i think about how you ended up telling me all these other people you'd pushed your favorite tv show on to, how after my comment, you tried to backtrack a little and said, "i only recommend it to people i think are smart enough to enjoy it."
i think about how you asked me where i might want to settle down one day, and how you said, "it's not so bad over here," with that stupid emoji.
or the time you said, "i could see myself dating women that are not especially good looking, but cute in their own way." and when i said, "my friends describe the people i think are cute as goofy-looking" you replied, "goofy-looking is exactly the type of my ex." as though this meant something good for me, also a self-professed goofy-looking person.
now, i look back at these things that i took to mean something so much deeper, and i just laugh at myself. it's all so, so silly.
i've been so silly.
--
it has been an incredibly reflective time for me. i stopped dating in february, the pandemic hit and i was alone for weeks on end, now i'm home (with no reason to date for the next three months). i've been able to focus on myself and what i actually want out of my life. i've been able to recognize more of my patterns, where they come from, why they keep happening, and how to (hopefully) stop them in the future.
and that has truly been a gift.
i should stop taking this all so seriously.