ambergris

So when my sister's so-called relationship turned to shit, the only thing which kept me going through the endless hours of listening to her rant and rave and cry on my shoulder was: I will never have to go through that again.

Because the unrequited love thing I specialised in when I was younger? Was not fun. It was soul-sapping, confidence-eroding misery. It was a constant reinforcement of all the stuff I believed about being unattractive, and boring, and generally worthless. (That said, any contact I have with other people tends to reinforce those perceptions. I didn't become AvPD by accident.)

Most of the time, I have to work at being grateful that I'm single. I know perfectly well that I'm such an extreme introvert that I NEED to be alone most of the time, but I live in a world where I am constantly told that I should be striving to find somebody (anybody) with whom to share my life, and that if I happen to be bad at sharing then I must be immature and selfish. This sort of thing seeps into your brain and most people never even question it.

But enduring hour upon hour of angst, I finally believed the things I keep telling myself. That nothing, nothing is worth putting yourself through that level of suffering. It is just insane. And if that makes me immature and selfish, well, all the better that I am not in a position to inflict my selfishness upon anyone else. There are worse things in life than being lonely.