I'm Still Who I've Always Been - My Name is Lexie and I am Becoming Myself

in #introduceyourself6 years ago (edited)

I don’t even know where to begin.

People may joke about having a quarter-life crisis but apparently they are very, very real - the past five years of my life have been a strong testament to that fact. Now I am twenty-five and in the same position - socially, financially, emotionally/mentally - as I was in my late teens/early twenties. Have you ever taken stock of your life and realized that you’ve actually taken as many steps backwards as you have forward? Yeah, that’s where I’m at. A lot of stuff has happened but at the same time, nothing has changed.

I was set up for success from an early age and I mean that in the least pretentious manner possible. I just recognize how fortunate I was at the time. I had loving, supportive parents that sent me to a strict private school. I thrived in the environment (academically only mind you, the social environment was toxic but that’s a completely different story) and maintained a spotless report card. Looking back, I don’t know if I was born to be a student or groomed to fit the mold from the beginning. But earning a letter grade, doing homework, and taking tests was my life - it was all I knew and all that I was good at. So I felt that continuing my education was a no brainer. The only decisions to make were which college and what degree?

Well, I chose a school I didn’t want to go to (tight finances) and an area of study that I had little experience with but seemed fascinating nonetheless (theatre). That’s when things started to go downhill.

I moved from my home town, out of my childhood bedroom, and right out of my little bubble. I started becoming a sentient being. But wait a minute, we’re all sentient right? I mean, we’re human. Well, yeah, we’re aware of our own existence… but many of us aren’t aware we are so aware of our existence. I started feeling every second tick by and thinking about how I was thinking. I questioned what I was doing and if it’s what I really wanted, and how I knew what I wanted, and if what I wanted really mattered in the grand scheme of things, and what was the grand scheme of things really? It spitballed from there. But without diving too deep into the darker workings of my mind, let’s just say I was questioning my existence. Then the depression and anxiety made me question the worth of my existence… in very tangible ways if you catch my morbid drift. It felt like I had woken up and was finally seeing life clearly. I stopped going to classes, doing homework, going to rehearsals, and talking to my friends. I began to have those dangerous thoughts that made me question why. Why does this assignment matter? Why do I even need to answer these questions? We’re all just little ants running around until we run out of steam and die, right? It was an intoxicating mindset at first… simple and freeing.

I dropped out. The semester ended with failing grades, disappointed teachers, and cold-shoulder friends. My grandmother had just passed from cancer so I was able to convince most of my teachers that this “rough period in my life” was due to that. But there was a lot more going on in my head than I knew how to explain.

Then things started getting wild. Dropping out of college and moving back in with my parents seemed bad enough… I mean, all my “friends” we’re still moving forward and I had taken a step back. But I didn’t think too hard about it. Instead, I went to my favorite coffee shop to escape the inner workings of my mind and ended up falling in love.

He was older than me, almost thirty, while I was barely growing into a young woman. He was cute, had dark eyes, and after our first date, I found out he also suffered from the same mental illnesses that I did. We clicked.

Long story short, it was toxic. Every day was worse than the last, was poison to my self-esteem, as he teased me, berated me, and beat me down. I was stuck, unable to leave him, even though he made it clear he didn’t want me. I stopped talking for a while, unable to say a word to him without a backhanded insult. He grew angrier and angrier, drank more, stuck more needles in his veins, snorted a bunch more stuff… He yelled at me for folding a blanket “incorrectly.” He made me feel terrible for dropping a hand towel. Near the end, he even had me apologizing to him… for the fact that he forgot he took my virginity. Yeah, I had to apologize to him because he forgot. Not really sure what I was thinking at the time. I don’t think I was. But thankfully, I got out. And I think he got prison time. Cross fingers anyways.

I started working two jobs, diving headfirst into the only goal I had - pay off student loan debt. It was a clear driving force for a while. But one morning I woke up and didn’t go. I just didn’t drive to work. I was done and that was that.

I applied for disability. I couldn’t hold down a job and even an interview sent me into a full-blown panic attack. Months of paperwork, doctors appointments, psychological exams, psychiatry appointments, recounting every single antidepressant medication I had ever tried… all down the drain because of course I was denied. I mean, no one can “prove” they have a mental illness beyond a reasonable doubt. So legally I didn’t have a mental illness. I began to question whether I really was making it all up - if I was just a pessimistic person with a penchant for acting melancholy. I told myself I didn’t have a reason to be sad so I couldn’t be anymore. But we all know how well that logic works.

I thought I hit rock bottom. So I reached out online and found someone new to connect with. Someone who was actually kind to me, who didn’t call me names, who lit up when I walked into the room, who followed me around a party just to stay close, who said he got butterflies from holding my hand… I can go on. It was nice. It was what I needed to survive. Someone… just fucking caring. Of course, I was nervous at first. My previous lover had stripped me of all confidence and trust so my new boyfriend worked for months towards gaining it. Two years later and I can say he had my unequivocal trust. I trusted him with my life. I finally believed him when he told me he loved me, that he would always be there for me, that he cared about me more than I could ever care about him, that he would one day ask my father for his permission. This was the man I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. He wasn’t perfect, but we tried.

You all know how the story goes from there. I got a message on Facebook from a stranger, a woman, who asked if I was dating this man. She told me he had been talking to her all day on a dating site, asking her to come over and help him “stay awake” for his late night work shift.

My world ended. I lost my boyfriend and best friend. The man I knew so well no longer looked the same.

We tried to fix things. He said he wanted me back before I went to visit my brother in Minneapolis but then changed his mind while I was there. We spent more time apart, finally met, reconnected, decided we were going to give our relationship 100%, then hesitated and questioned our future. The final straw was when he told me he still loved me and cared about me, but he also had someone he was seeing in order to “move on.” In practically the same breath, he told me that he wanted me to be his “one” but he found someone “amazing” that he “really, really liked.” We hadn’t even definitively decided to end things (again) when he told me he liked her. He cried to me, apologizing, saying that he really cared about me… but still fell in love with someone else in less than a week? Can you tell how bitter I am still?

Now I am actually at rock bottom. I’m hurt and confused and extremely scared. So things can only go up from here. Literally. I don’t think I can get any lower than where I am now.

But the most exciting prospect is living my life without my rules. The rules of how the world works, the ones you convince yourself are worldly truths. As it says in Don Miguel Ruiz’ The Four Agreements,

"You can only be you when you do your best. When you don’t do your best you are denying yourself the right to be you. That’s a seed that you should really nurture in your mind. You don’t need knowledge or great philosophical concepts. You don’t need the acceptance of others. You express your own divinity by being alive and by loving yourself and others.”

I no longer know anything about who I am or how this world works. So I’m just going to live my life. Without an agenda, without a “right” or a “wrong” way to do so… I’m just gonna live. I’ve always felt the need for a purpose in my life; to understand why I was alive or to at least create a reason for my life. But what if my only purpose is to be alive? To seriously just live life? And that’s it - no demands or expectations or requirements about how to live a life. To just exist and accept that as enough.

I want a clean slate - to ignore my past and start fresh. To clear the history books of my existence until this point and only show the upward momentum I’m sure to gain from here on. But that’s not healthy and not possible unfortunately. So regardless of whether I start a new Steemit account with a new name and new purpose, whether I move to a new city and make new friends, whether I toss all my old possessions and start over, I’m still me. The good and the bad.

So today is not a fresh start and this account is not a chance at a “new me.” I’m who I’ve always been - a woman still discovering who she is and who she will become.

So come with me on this personal journey! My name is Lexie and I’m becoming myself!

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Ooph. Anyone would struggle after such a series of events.
I honestly don't know what to tell you - having felt wrong in life myself at least twice (at 22 and for some months). I currently think there's always a chance to get to a worse state ... :/ Speaking for myself, an agenda helps focusing on life and social aspects of it (who really wants to play computer games all day seeing nobody else? ;)). And it gets you some reputation in real life ...
I hope you have or can find soon a living apart from your parents. There's nothing wrong with spending some time together but a longer 24x7 stay might be poisonous for both parties. Sometimes parents are struggling more with their kids status than the kids themselves do. I think it's not healthy if parents don't have a chance to let go of their children.

All the best!

Thank you for the support! I have a job interview in another city this Friday so if all goes well, I will be moving soon! I will be posting more about that tomorrow or the next day!

All life starts with a journey. We have several stages that we get to play on throughout our life. We can step forward into the spotlight, or we can hold back. I am a lot older than you, I would like to tell you that life gets easier as time goes by. There will always be a regret here and a regret there as we progress through life, don't let the regrets rule your life, that is one of the most important things in life, Do not let the regrets get in the way of living. So what something did not work the way we want, I am who I am and I really have no regrets about how I became who I am. I have regrets, but would I ever go back and fix or change one of those regrets, no! not at all!, they are part of what made me me, and I am happy with who I am.

Try a lot of things, ignore those people that tell you to concentrate on one thing to become good at one thing, life is not about one thing, life is about many things, become a joat a Joan of All Things. If you find something you really like drawing, writing, photography, etc then do it, but don't do it to exclude the rest of life, it is a long road to the end. You might find you want to go back to school, (I never did), you may never go back, people might ask what happened, tell them life happened, and I am living it and I expect more life to happen.

You are not living someone else's life, it really is your life. You can not live your life wrong. Some people may tell you you are living life wrong, but if it is working for you then you are living your life right, and they may be the ones living life wrong.

Good luck on the rest of your life, living really is a trip, physical/mental aches, pains and all the rest, it is what makes us who we are in the end. I read in a book a long time ago, it was asked "what are you going to bring to god when you die". What did you learn about life, did you live life? Just a few thoughts.

Yes, "just a few good thoughts". Nailed!

Posted using Partiko Android

You have a wonderful array of "just a few thoughts" that you presented here and I appreciate them very much! Sage advice that I will take to heart!


Welcome to Steemit @becomingmyself!

I wish you much success and hope you find Steemit to be as rewarding and informative as I have.

Here are some links you might find useful.
Your stats on SteemNow
Your stats on SteemWorld
Your stats on SteemD
How does Steemit actually work?

Oh yea, I have upvoted you and followed you. Many blessings!

Welcome to the community @becomingmyself! Here in the platform you can do a lot of things to grow your authorship. Follow your favorite authors to help you learn new things and become a great author as well.

Here are some helpful posts about blogging from Steemit users:

While it's true that everybody can earn from content creation and curation, the best practice is to not expect anything in return. You won't get tired writing beautiful contents if you love what you do.

Do you find it hard to keep up with the game? Try adding value to your content and let others authors see value in it too. Don't be afraid to express your thoughts and make good contents.

Everyone had their own starting point, yours is just beginning.

See you around!

Welcome here is an upvote to get you started!

Thank you, I appreciate the support <3

I dig the The no holds barred type of intro! Welcome to Steemit @becomingmyself, cheers to the start of an exciting journey.

More so the continuation of a journey, but thank you very much for the support <3

Hi Lexie, yeah quarter-life crisis is really quite scary. Suddenly everything just became so fast and real all at once. D: All the best, I hope it gets better for you!

Thank you, I appreciate the well wishes <3

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Welcome to steemit!
Wish u best of luck!
Think wisely,before u post!
Thats the best advice!
AND,B YOURSELF!

Life is an interesting road to travel with a lot of challenges on the way.
For me, gratitude is my very first on the list, all the rest follows.
Live in the present. If things are not working in my direction, changing my thoughts sets me straight.
Challenging moments provide you the tool to benchmark so called happiness. If grateful you'll end up in a state of "happierness". Happiness is a man made concept ALWAYS dependant on outcome. It's pure consumerism!
Enjoy the rest of your journey, although challenging in hindsight you will see, it was worth every minute if you are truly GRATEFUL.
Gratitude, compassion, unconditional love, respect/tolerance, trust and then love, for me in that order I strive to live, placing love last as I consider it to be a selfish act. "I'll stay if....".

Posted using Partiko Android

Thank you for the insight! I definitely need to work towards cultivating a better sense of gratitude - that is something I will be striving towards and documenting here on this blog!

Consider reading this book it may change your direction. Whether good or not, for you to evaluate. Enjoy.

Posted using Partiko Android

Thank you very much, I appreciate the link!

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