At the end of my rope

Today I finally got around to the bank to pay my October rent, five days late. This is not my style. 

I’m just so overwhelmed, so tired, at the very end of my rope. 

I’m not getting my needs met. 

I’m tired of having to drive miles to meet up with friends in person and, especially, tired of having to wait weeks, even months, to actually see friends. 

I’m tired of having to almost always be the one who initiates plans with people. 

I’m tired of having to be so often the one who keeps in touch and of hearing from friends only if I’m silent for days or weeks — then, fortunately, they start to wonder if I’m alright and get in touch. 

I’m tired of being so alone. 

I’m tired of having to move once again — for the fourth time in nine months. 

I would need to not have to move again now. 

I need to have some friends with whom I could meet up for an impromptu dinner, to relax for a walk and/or a beer after work, without always having to plan it days — or weeks or months — in advance. 

I need to have more friends that I could call spontaneously for a chat instead of there being so many constraints coming from time zones and/or personal boundaries. 

I need more spontaneity and flexibility and availability in my social life. 

I need to have more “healthy fun”, more “down time” in relaxed, friendly company; I need to have physical contact, touch, shared sexuality.

And maybe above all, I need to have someone for whom I’m “the first person”. Because although I have many lovely friends, for all of them there are one or more persons who “come before me” — their family, their partner(s), their housemates, closer friends. 

I know I’m not the only one struggling at the moment. I know that several of my best friends are also going through rough spots right now. But I have only one friend who is truly as alone as myself. And I am really in need now. In need of love and affection and support, even in person, and as spontaneous and unasked for as possible. 

I also know that part of these feeling stems from chemical unbalance: from my weaning myself off meds recently and currently exacerbated by my period (which I got one week early this month, making things even worse). But chemistry is not the only, or principal, cause of how I’m feeling now. I’m not going to write my emotions off, I’m not going to brush them off as a “chemical storm”. 

I am suffering. I have important needs that are not being met and that haven’t been met for months, maybe years. 

Maybe these needs aren’t getting met because of some deep incapacity of my own. Maybe I’m unable to build connections or a life style that lead to the type of company that I truly need deep down inside me. In that case, I could add this to my list of failures. 

I know that after having cried it all out, I will get a grip on myself again. I know that resilient nugget in me will pull itself together again and get me through my move in a few days; it will get me through my urgent work deadlines, and hopefully through the rest of my upcoming and future tasks — as it got me safely to my destination on my motorcycle despite the horrible freeway traffic earlier today.

But how long will this little core inside me hold up before it’s worn to shreds?