I've been feeling really down lately. It feels like the people in my life only keep me around for what I can do for them, and no-one really cares what might be going on with me. It's a hard feeling to explain if you haven't been there yourself, but at times I absolutely crave connection with another person, while at the same time, wanting to grab my survival bag (yes, I have one) and head off into the woods and never see another person again. I've always been able to snap myself out of it (which I know makes me very lucky), but it seems like the last couple years, the low points have been coming more frequently and lasting longer, with no-one to talk to about it. And that last part, about having no-one to talk to, is what really gets me, because I basically did it to myself. I have always been the guy people come to with their problems, while handling my own shit by myself. I mean, since I was 9 or 10 it's been that way. When my parents divorced, I was the only one of three kids who stayed with my mom, while my older brother went with my dad, and my sister went off to college. But from then-on, it was my mission in life to make sure I was always okay, and to cheer my mom up if she needed it.
Then I enlisted in the Army when I was 17, and it ended up being more of the same. Granted, it wasn't a single working mother I was trying to cheer up, but ask any man I served in Iraq with, who did the most to keep up morale, and they'd tell you it was me. It's not my ego, I just really am that funny😆. And before, during, and since the Army, I'm always the guy people come to with relationship problems, work problems, whatever it may be; all the while, remaining stoically silent about my own issues. I don't know if it's some ingrained "toxic masculinity," or the mindset that someone always has it worse than you, so suck it the fuck up and move on (I learned that lesson very well in the military). I even tried to talk to someone, a few months back. My 2 best friends on this Earth, 2 brothers who I've known for almost 30 years. I totally unloaded on them, told them I was depressed and laid out all my issues. I was met with stunned silence. It's not their fault, though, like I said, I did it to myself. How were they supposed to react, when the guy who's laughed off every problem for the last 3 decades, suddenly tells them he's full of despair and a pit of anger? I dunno, I'm making myself cringe even typing this, but I guess I just want someone to ask how I'm doing, and actually care about the answer, and not just as a segue to unload their problems on me. All I know, is that the next gas station clerk who asks how my day is going, is going to get an absolute fucking ear load.
Thanks for reading this, if you did, it at least helped to get this out somewhere.
