If I Was Stronger
I asked my sister once about her dependence on other people.
When I was younger and feeling badly, I would tell my dad my stomach hurt or my head hurt or I felt sick, and he would say, Ok. What do you want me to do? This always felt like a dismissal of my pain, which sounds worse than it felt. I combined this with my annoyance at my sister's insistence that we know every scratch and scrape she got, and have since pretty much ignored when I'm feeling badly. The physical pain I've felt has always been fairly easy to ignore, or to alleviate with over the counter drugs. (Emotional pain, I'm finding, is an entirely different monster.)
I think this tendency has something to do with my current taste for independence. I don't like to count on people for things. I don't feel like I can, for one, and I feel like I can do most things on my own anyway. I can certainly make dinner for myself, do my own laundry, clean the apartment, look for apartments, lift that box, pay my bills, and figure out the answers to my problems.
This confidence in my abilities disappears in the face of social issues. I have no idea how to talk to boys the way boys apparently need you to talk to them to make a move. I don't know how to tell if someone actually enjoys my company or is talking to me simply because I'm around. Strangers always have to initiate conversation, and are generally the ones who have to keep it going. If I've just met you, don't count on me to know anything to say to you. (You were different.)
I asked my sister once about her dependence on other people. This is the same sister I mentioned earlier, who would tell us any time she was hurting. Sometimes this was pretty annoying, and I've learned to treat these conversations with polite detachment. If this seems harsh to you, I'll start posting what she tells me, and you can decide for yourself. This tendency of hers, among other factors, I'm sure, has instilled in her a dependence on others. She shares this with our mom. Obviously, I can't know about before I was born, but from the time I can remember, my mom has always had a boyfriend, four or five that I can remember. My sister has had four or five herself. The time in between boyfriends was never very long, and in at least one case, nonexistent.
My sister told me she has no problem being completely dependent on her fiancé. This blew my mind. Having a boyfriend all the time is one thing, being totally fine relying on this guy for whatever everything she depends on him for seems absolutely wrong to me. I cannot imagine putting so much of my life in someone else's hands. (Which should help to explain my feelings about God, but I'm trying to try.) I didn't even want help moving, really. Whenever I ask for help, which is not very often, I always feel like I'm inconveniencing someone else. Can you deny it? I'm asking them to sacrifice something, a Saturday afternoon, a Friday night, or even just five minutes. I'm not convinced most people would be willing to do that for me.
I've been trying to post every Monday, and I've done it the last few weeks. As I was thinking about what this post should be, and I hit on dependence as a topic, I couldn't help thinking of my sister. She has, at least for a very long while, had a boyfriend to ask for help with boyfriend type things. If I had the same opportunity, how differently would I think about this? Would I still disdain the idea, or would it be suddenly more attractive?
How much of myself has been decided by someone else?
When I was younger and feeling badly, I would tell my dad my stomach hurt or my head hurt or I felt sick, and he would say, Ok. What do you want me to do? This always felt like a dismissal of my pain, which sounds worse than it felt. I combined this with my annoyance at my sister's insistence that we know every scratch and scrape she got, and have since pretty much ignored when I'm feeling badly. The physical pain I've felt has always been fairly easy to ignore, or to alleviate with over the counter drugs. (Emotional pain, I'm finding, is an entirely different monster.)
I think this tendency has something to do with my current taste for independence. I don't like to count on people for things. I don't feel like I can, for one, and I feel like I can do most things on my own anyway. I can certainly make dinner for myself, do my own laundry, clean the apartment, look for apartments, lift that box, pay my bills, and figure out the answers to my problems.
This confidence in my abilities disappears in the face of social issues. I have no idea how to talk to boys the way boys apparently need you to talk to them to make a move. I don't know how to tell if someone actually enjoys my company or is talking to me simply because I'm around. Strangers always have to initiate conversation, and are generally the ones who have to keep it going. If I've just met you, don't count on me to know anything to say to you. (You were different.)
I asked my sister once about her dependence on other people. This is the same sister I mentioned earlier, who would tell us any time she was hurting. Sometimes this was pretty annoying, and I've learned to treat these conversations with polite detachment. If this seems harsh to you, I'll start posting what she tells me, and you can decide for yourself. This tendency of hers, among other factors, I'm sure, has instilled in her a dependence on others. She shares this with our mom. Obviously, I can't know about before I was born, but from the time I can remember, my mom has always had a boyfriend, four or five that I can remember. My sister has had four or five herself. The time in between boyfriends was never very long, and in at least one case, nonexistent.
My sister told me she has no problem being completely dependent on her fiancé. This blew my mind. Having a boyfriend all the time is one thing, being totally fine relying on this guy for whatever everything she depends on him for seems absolutely wrong to me. I cannot imagine putting so much of my life in someone else's hands. (Which should help to explain my feelings about God, but I'm trying to try.) I didn't even want help moving, really. Whenever I ask for help, which is not very often, I always feel like I'm inconveniencing someone else. Can you deny it? I'm asking them to sacrifice something, a Saturday afternoon, a Friday night, or even just five minutes. I'm not convinced most people would be willing to do that for me.
I've been trying to post every Monday, and I've done it the last few weeks. As I was thinking about what this post should be, and I hit on dependence as a topic, I couldn't help thinking of my sister. She has, at least for a very long while, had a boyfriend to ask for help with boyfriend type things. If I had the same opportunity, how differently would I think about this? Would I still disdain the idea, or would it be suddenly more attractive?
How much of myself has been decided by someone else?
P.S. I no longer advocate taking the leap.
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