My childhood wasn’t a peachy one. It was tumultuous and unstable. My mother is a bit co-dependent and I had multiple stepdads when I was growing up. My father is in an alcoholic, and I couldn’t count on him to be much of a source of guidance in life. My teenage years were even crazier than my childhood, and it resulted in me feeling depressed, anxious, insecure, and just generally empty.
I say all this to say that growing up, I don’t think I ever had an example of a functioning adult relationship. I was surrounded by toxicity in one way or another. The moment I stopped being totally dependent on my parents, I began having codependent relationships with friends, and eventually boyfriends. I wasn’t good at being alone. I didn’t really know who I was. I didn’t have much of a personality at all. I had a habit of simply blending in with whomever I happened to be around. As a result, many of my friendships were based on dishonesty. I would put up with negativity because I didn’t think I deserved better. I truly believed that even the worst of my friendships were the best I was ever going to get in life.
The past few years of my life, I have been turning myself around. I’m growing into myself, learning who I am and what I truly believe. I’ve been going to therapy and generally taking care of myself for the first time in my life. The unhealthy relationships I’d been holding on to were beginning to crack. It was becoming clear that I could not simultaneously value myself and maintain those relationships. Still, there was something holding me back from being truly honest with those people. Instead of communicating, telling them how I really felt, I decided the solution was to just remove them. I did the same thing with my family, too. I didn’t talk to them about how I felt, I just distanced myself from them.
It has really sucked. The more I grow, the less I feel I relate to the people I once loved so dearly. It’s been a lonely experience. While I recognize the importance of standing up for yourself and removing truly toxic relationships from your life, it has been hard to accept at times. I yearn for a “normal” life in which I grew up in a loving family and maintained good relationships with each member. However, that is not my reality.
This past week has been a wild one. In the span of one day at work, I ran into two childhood friends that I’ve stopped talking to. I don’t know what was different about that day, but seeing them sparked something. I ended up talking to both of them, finally telling my truth. Until that moment, I had simply avoided them, ignoring the root of the problem. I had cut them out of my life due to the negativity that had infiltrated our friendships, but I never once told them. I didn’t explain myself or stand up for myself. Well, this week, I decided I was through with that. I can be an adult and have adult discussions, I figured. The result has honestly been phenomenal. Each friend took responsibility for the things that happened in the past, and I took responsibility for my part in it, too.
The next day, I finished writing a letter that has been in the making for months. The letter is for my father. Since moving out of his house, I haven’t called him. The reasons behind this are multifold, but essentially, he has not been a good father, and I’ve been holding a grudge. I finally finished this letter that outlines my truth. The reality of my experience with him, along with things I wish I could get from him now. The success of the previous day, telling the truth to my friends, invigorated me. I, somewhat impulsively, put the letter in my dad’s mailbox. Within hours, he called me wanting to meet up. The next morning, we went out to breakfast. After all these years of suffering in silence, I finally told my dad the truth. I told him how I really feel about him and our relationship. Unfortunately, the meeting didn’t result in the way I had hoped for, but I feel a million times lighter. It’s like I was holding on to a secret- the truth of how I felt about my father, my friends, and I had finally gained the courage to speak to them.
I realize, finally, the importance of honesty, even when being honest is the hardest thing to do. The thing is, if my telling the truth results in losing someone I care about, then it’s likely that that relationship is not a healthy one to begin with. It has taken me quite some time to realize this. I do not have to sit in silence while my friends treat me badly. I can stand up for myself, because I deserve good friends just as much as anybody else. Maybe this seems obvious to you, reader, but for me, it’s been revolutionary. It’s been an amazing epiphany. These revelations have also opened the door to me being a better friend myself. I am in no way a perfect person, I have a lot to learn and a lot of growth to do. However, I am better these days that I was before. When I was living a life of insecurity, I projected that onto those around me. I relied on them for my own self-worth. I think there is a lot of truth in the saying, “you cannot love others until you love yourself.” Real love, the unconditional kind, isn’t easy when you don’t even love yourself. How can you truly accept others if you deny yourself? I don’t know… Just something to ponder, I suppose. Personally, through learning to love who I am, I can better serve the ones I love.
Telling uncomfortable truths is just that: uncomfortable. But growth can only occur when you leave your comfort zone. If you feel dissatisfied, you owe it to yourself to tell the truth. Otherwise, you’ll only perpetuate the suffering. I encourage each and everyone of you to truly evaluate the relationships you have in your lives. Do they enrich your life? Do they truly encourage you to be the best version of yourself? Or do they bring out the worst in you, nurturing the toxicity we all have the capacity for?
Life is too short to spend it with people who don’t truly care for you. & If you are worried that you don’t deserve better, I urge you to figure out why that is. By working on yourself, you can ensure that you are bringing your best self to the table of every relationship. Then, there is no denying that you truly do deserve better. Not only that, but I find that the more you work on yourself, the more you attract like-minded individuals to you. So long as you harbor hate, gossip, negativity, you will receive that back.
I have come a long way from the shy, insecure girl I once was. I am no longer interested in relationships in which we do not each encourage each other to be better. While unconditional, accepting love is important, it’s also important to balance it with growth and improvement. If you consider yourself to be my friend and you have the urge to speak ill of me behind my back, I encourage you to tell me these things directly. I always try to be better, and if I am truly doing something that bothers you, it would be so meaningful to me to have a constructive conversation about it. Ultimately, nothing will ever change if one is dishonest. I want to live in a more honest world. How about you?
