I think there’s a sort of exchange of energies, if you will, when talking with people that you feel close. People have a need to talk about themselves, to share who they are and what they did, I think that’s part of how you find yourself connected, part of your world. So, maybe a bit cold and rational, it’s a sort of give-and-take, where ideally the whole is greater than the sum of the parts and all parties come out with more than what they started with, they feel connected.

I am a terrible communicator. Talking takes so much energy out of me, because I need to be so many things. I need to be witty, funny. I need to be empathetic. I need to listen and reply carefully. I need to project the best possible image of a me that doesn’t exist, so people will like me and stay with me. But I don’t have the energy to be all those things, I am not any of that, I am nothing. I think I am a decent listener, but at the same time I feel like I’m not there for people. I would not respond to messages for hours, days, I don’t reach out. I feel the need to do and be all if these things, but I also find it impossible to talk about myself, to elaborate how I feel, how I am. Is it vulnerability that scares me? Is it that I am not comfortable anymore without a mask, without faking everything? Comfortable anymore? When ever have I been comfortable with myself, in any place in my life?

Sometimes I feel like I’m missing such a crucial part of being human, connections and feeling connected. I have friends, but I always felt so far from most of them. I feel I’m attached with such a small thread to them, I am not really giving anything to anyone - and how could I when I have such a hard time maintaining any sort of relationship?

So outside work talk or brief exchanges, I spend most of my days not really talking with anyone, consuming palliatives to not feel myself.

I feel invisible, locked in a cement room of my own making, with no doors or windows. I do feel terribly alone, but it’s my fault, I have locked myself in here. I don’t really know how to get out. I have consumed so much content about how to possibly get better, I have been going to therapy for so long, but sometimes it feels like nothing changed, I can intellectualize and explain anything all I want, I can understand that a lot of my issues are tied to my nonexistent self-worth, I can understand that I need to feel those emotions and not escape from them, I can understand and can do, but I am still inside suffocating. These feelings seep into every moment of the day, every second I’m awake. I am always in pain, I am unworthy and if I could, I’d really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, like never having existed ever.