what matters and why

guarded

4/5/02
2:00pm

I want this feeling to go away; I want today to be over. I hate it that I have no motivation to everything that needs to be done. A beautiful day and no desire to enjoy it. I’m so scared that I’m falling into that trap again of self misery. If the dog barks one more time, I think I’m going to strangle him. I’m so easily irritated, low on patience and all I want is sleep even though I’ve had too much already. Maybe time away will be beneficial. On the other hand it may have the reverse effect. The thing is I have no good reason to feel like when things are going so well. I get everything I want and still feel like I’m nothing. What excuse do I have to feel like this? Only sometimes and it always goes away. I’m closed, and guarded. No one is allowed in. Any kind of close friendship I’ve ever had I always manage to either screw it up or back away. When it involves anything personal, I want nothing to do with it. I miss last year and my friend who moved away. I miss having someone around with a similar life and interests to my own. Who was selfish and not ashamed of that. Who thought about other things besides her child. Yet for that I despised her sometimes. I miss normal conversation, and hate that mine now, with anyone, is strained and pretentious. I do all right in the beginning stages of a relationship, but then if something personal is exposed, my weaknesses, or if something is shared, if too much time is spent together, then it’s over for me. After I babysat on a regular basis for a friend of mine’s son and it didn’t work out, it will never be the same. I always feel somewhat inadequate in her eyes. When a friend of mine moved in with me for a year in high school, it only took four months for us to almost completely stop speaking. Instead of communicating, I avoided the issue, and though a half way relationship continues to this day, I always sense hurt and regret from her, and months will go by when we don’t talk and then I feel like we have to start all over again. Once my family was close to her family, after she’d been in my house on a daily basis for a year, knew things about me that I didn’t want anyone to know, I closed up. I would have rather risked the chance of getting caught sneaking to my boyfriend’s house than spend the night girl-talking with her. When someone brings anything sexually related they assume that I’m offended, and immediately apologize. Growing up in a perfect environment with a Christian family leaves no room for excuses involving my childhood for my closed off behavior to this day. I can’t look back and identify anything that was wrong or out of place. No traumatic events, no divorce, no abuse, which all seems to be so common in our society now. I should be perfectly normal and capable of maintaining functional relationship that go beyond the “hi how are you” stage. But I consistently resist that kind of friendship. I can only share to a certain point and feel guilty after doing that. There is nothing in my life that could have caused such low self esteem. I could pick and prod at every little event that occurred, but I know there’s nothing significant. I usually performed well or average at everything I did. I’ve defeated odds and been told I have a strong personality. So then what causes this kind of insecurity?