So, about a month ago I went downstate to visit my friend. The trip down was awful, it was just problem after problem piling up. It started when I overslept an hour and was late getting on the road. My first thought upon waking up was panic. "Omigod, I'm late! I'm late! I won't make the train on time! He's going to be so mad... Omigod, oh no no nonononono..." So I send a text and get a nice reply back not to worry.
Next, I see that the predicted two inches total of snow for today has already fallen, plus more, with no real end in sight. I think to myself, maybe once I get a little past out of town, it'll get better. Oh, how wrong I was.... The roads were frightening, to say the least. After white knuckle driving at 40 miles per hour, I send a photo of the snow after stopping to get gas as my future apology. In return, I get a text saying that it looks bad out there and to stay safe.
The snow doesn't let up and I spend I don't know how much longer white knuckle driving, but I do know that I am incredibly nervous. The roads are some of the worst I've driven on in years, I passed 7 accidents on the way and I'm terrified that I'm going to miss my train. What is normally an easy 3 hour drive has turned into a nightmare. I finally give in and admit to myself I will have to take a later train into the city. When I get a chance to stop at a rest stop, I text him and let him know. He tells me no worries. However, this is me. I continue to worry. My inner monologue is telling me that I'm off schedule, I'm making him wait. He's going to be annoyed.
I worry enough that I still miss the later train. Rather than wait at the train station an extra hour, I get the bright idea that I can catch it at a later stop. What follows is a cartoonish chase against time in a futile to get ahead of the train. I miss several stops, get a tad lost a couple times and get even more frustrated. By the time I finally give up, I find myself in Secaucus. I have to get on this train. I figure Secaucus has tons of trains going into the city, I won't be that late. I also have to pay an exorbitant parking fee that I wasn't expecting because I took the train in so close to the city. I get in the station, and I have to wait an EXTRA hour. All of my plans were for naught. My inner monologue tells me that I am a failure.
I call and attempt to explain my troubles, but I quickly devolve into crying. Crying! I feel like a complete idiot. I apologize profusely for being so stupid. I apologize for making him wait another hour and ruining our plans for lunch. I am met with nothing but kindness and understanding. He reschedules our reservation. He could not have been sweeter. When I finally make it into the city, we have an absolutely lovely time. He even helps me out with my unexpected budgeting expense on the parking issue. I feel very lucky and blessed, but I also feel an extreme sense of relief that I really, truly didn't screw up the weekend.
This has been on my mind for a month now. Why was my reaction so extreme? I know that I couldn't help the weather, but I was beating myself up about waking up late and convinced myself this was the root of the horrible drive down. And my stress combined with the drive, further compounded with my failure to find a way to stick to my original plan caused me to stress out more, make dumber mistakes and feel like a useless idiot overall... And my biggest fear wasn't even getting in an accident. It was that someone might be mad at me. Why do I still think that way?
People talk about how hard it is to be in an abusive relationship. This may sound crazy, but as difficult as it was, I adapted. You have to adapt in order to survive. And now I don't always know how to be in a normal relationship, whether romantic or friendship. I know how to mitigate a crazy person. I know how to avoid "getting in trouble" for the most part. I know the rules. I know how to ride the waves of a bad day, how to apologize for mistakes, whether they're my fault or not. I know how to pick myself up when I'm told all manner of terrible things and move on. It's a daily effort, but I can do it.
I don't know how to react to kindness, though. I don't know how to trust it, or how to believe when someone tells me it's ok, that it really is ok for them. I don't know how to honestly accept another person truly caring about my well-being and support. I keep waiting for the nice thing to be followed by the "but you" statement.
It didn't occur to me that it would actually be difficult to believe someone wants to be nice with no strings attached. And it's wonderful, but it's also like navigating a new world. I don't know the rules to this world and it's very hard for me to break those old patterns of behavior that I learned for over a decade. I don't know how to turn off my inner monologue. And I like having someone nice in my life, I just have a hard time accepting that I deserve it. Anyways, I suppose that realization is the first step to change.
