Dating : You Don’t Owe Anyone The Transcript of Your Inner Monologue

no matter how many times they say “I’m here for you”

There’s so much comfort in knowing that you could confide in someone, that they want to support and love you and take care of you. It’s a beautiful thing to hear them say “I’m here for you”, but what’s the point of saying it if they haven’t shown you whether or not they can handle supporting you?

I’ve been struggling with mental health issues for years, and I’ve thankfully gotten to a place of comfort where I know my psyche enough to manage my anxiety and depression well most of the time. Still, there always come those days when I want to curl up in a ball; days I feel like the world is closing in on me and I can’t breathe. During those days, I either want to scream my feelings to the world, or I want to pretend that the world around me doesn’t exist. I’ve always been careful about how I interact with people on my bad days, because I can be a lot sometimes, and a lot can turn into too much and too much can turn into a crushing weight.

Share your feelings, but be careful who you share them with

I’m a strong believer in the importance of communication (revolutionary, I know), so when my friends communicated to me that I open up too much to people, I started taking notice of how my relationships have been changed by my oversharing. I used to trust people easily, and with some, their “support” was nothing more than curiosity, and I would end up having an array of “opinions” surrounding my feelings. I’d get lost in a sea of others’ thoughts on how I should manage my problems, to the point where I forgot what my own stance on them was. I became a shell of who I was, wondering why people were not understanding me while I was floundering about my own emotions. Some people couldn’t handle my thoughts, and that pushed them away. These were not people I would want in my life anyway. But not everyone has to be your confidante, your best friend, or your savior. not everyone needs to know your every thought.

You shouldn’t give disclaimers about who you are

I used to think that opening up to people is a way for me to tell them why I am the way that I am, to catch them off guard before they form a bad opinion of me as if I knew they would judge me otherwise. I began to provide disclaimers so they’d understand me, as if I was already apologizing for who I am, forcing them to understand me. But I don’t apologize for who I am anymore, I don’t allow people to make my inner monologue into a dialogue, I no longer give people the power to give me their opinion on my own thoughts. I learned that there is power in self-reflection.

It’s totally okay to process things on your own

Don’t let people gaslight you into including them in your inner monologue and inner thoughts, it’s your right to want to process things alone sometimes. here’s where communication comes in again, it’s totally fine to tell someone that you need alone time to process your feelings. “I appreciate you, but I think I need a few hours to unplug and regroup” is such a tiny concise and beautiful way to communicate that this is how you process.

I’ve had people become upset with me for communicating this. “I just want to be there for you, but fine”. I’ve heard this from people I’ve known for years and others I’ve known for weeks, more so from the latter. This is what some people do, they try to make your emotions about them. they try to make your problems and your issues about them, because their ego needs it, it needs for them to be your savior, to be your knight in shining armor.

“I’m here for you” is just talk, and talk is cheap. opening up to someone new is always difficult, so don’t let them rush you into it. there isn’t a magic sentence, “I’m here for you” is not your “open sesame”. You don’t owe anyone your feelings or your emotions. you don’t owe them the gratification of being your savior merely for offering to hear you, because that is what they are offering, they are offering to hear you but they need to prove that they are listening. how can you trust that someone will listen to your thoughts and emotions if they can’t listen to you when you say that you need time?

I guess what I’m trying to say here is that someone truly being there for you means them supporting you when you need to be alone just as much as when you need to be alone.

Confiding in someone and opening up is difficult enough, and you should never let someone rush you into baring more of yourself than you’re comfortable. No one has the right to make your struggles about them, because opening up should never be a chore. no one has monopoly over knowing what is inside your heart or your mind, because at the end of the day no one knows you as well as you know yourself.