It's been almost another year.
When I look back on this post, when I think about the year that I've had, and the person I've become, I don't know what to feel. I've succeeded in so much, and come so far, and there's something to be proud of in that. I'm more stable now, most of the time. Free of my abuser, in a real way. I have an actually healthy relationship for the first time in my life, and we had an anniversary a little over a month ago. That's something. I'm waiting to see a specialist for my mental health issues. That's another thing.
I've also failed. Profoundly, in ways which make me hate myself. Every step forward feels like it comes with two steps back. I want to be more than I am, I want to reach out and grasp at the life that I know I want, and that I think I deserve. I want to know people, and be known. I don't want to be so scared of everyone. I try, and I get close. I open myself up. The second I'm close enough to look them in the eyes, I flinch. Things go well, and I get scared, and I pull back. Things go poorly, and I freak out, and I sever. I mismanage my own relationships until I have few left, and I make people insist upon me until they're too exhausted to keep trying. I ruin good things, and destroy beauty, until there's nothing left for me. I yearn for people who are standing just in front of me, an imagined wall of glass between us.
I feel stalled out. I finally opened the door to the life I wanted, and then I looked at the world and shrunk. There's nobody to blame but myself, any more. Nobody else holding me back, but I still feel their hands on me, an insistent iron grip. Am I my trauma? Will I ever really get better, or is this it for me?
I got so used to someone telling I wasn't allowed that I hear their voice echoing even though they've been gone for a long time. It was easier to push forward when there was something pulling me back. For so long, I was defined by defiance, resistance, and opposition. Without that friction, I simply drift. Was I ever headstrong? Did I ever really direct myself, or was I always just fighting for the sake of fighting?
It is Transgender Day of Remembrance. My mom just sent me pics of the damage I did to the protestors at that vigil, years ago. It's a funny memory to her, and I laugh, too. I think about how, even though I'd barely started to figure myself out, barely gotten on hormones... even though I was still in the closet and boymoding all the time, I already understood the duty I still feel to my Sisters today. I was so full of fire. Ardent in my cause, and willing to give up anything for it. Could I look that girl in the eyes today? Would she be proud of who I am, now? Am I proud of who I am now?