My biggest fear

My biggest fear is not being heard. It feels that I've gone through life not being heard by my family, my parents, my friends, my coworkers and bosses. I think I have things to say that are important and like everyone else in this world I worry that what I say will go unheard by the most important people in my life.

I have a fear of abandonment. I have a fear of being forgotten and ignored. It's happened to me more times that I can count. For some reason people can't stick around for the entire show. They show up for the intro, sometimes stick around for the first act but can't make it through the entire play. They find the play too intense, too scattered. They can't get the story line and they don't want to try and decipher it. That makes it hard for me to trust people.

I've never made friends easily. I've never fit into a group or click. In high school I was part of a group until they decided I wasn't good enough, wasn't stable enough to be friends with them. I lost all my friends and with them my sense of stability. I wandered through my last two years of high school without a purpose. I lost my identity.

I entered into my first year of college with no real prospects. I was living at home then, and I was taking this course to upgrade my science and biology. I didn't have any real hopes of making friends. This was just a stepping stone to bigger and better things. I tried but ultimately I failed. Maybe it's because I didn't dress "cool" or maybe it's because I didn't attend school functions.

When I started college for vet technology, I had higher hopes. I was in the program for two years so I figured that was long enough to make a friend. It was still extremely hard. I didn't drink, I was living off campus and I was used to being a loner. People felt I wasn't good enough for the program and a number of them thought I wouldn't make it past the first semester. I made some "enemies", people who didn't like me for whatever reason. However, I did make one good lasting friendship. That bolstered my resolve to make myself someone better, a nonloner.

My first year out of college was lonely. I only had my animals and my fish. I didn't make friends at work. I didn't make friends out of work. I wasn't too worried, I knew how to be alone and how to entertain myself.

I moved to the big city the second year out of college. That's where I started dating and started getting to know people. I got to know 3 people really well at work. So well that we spent a lot of time together outside of work. The biggest theme with these outings was alcohol. I did indeed discover drinking and I discovered that I was fun and outgoing when I was drinking. I made people laugh.

Alcohol is also what made my depression worse. I've always had depression but about 2 years ago it started to get bad again. My job was getting to me and my marriage was in trouble.

Last October my life fell apart. I had quit my job due to depression and anxiety. I was on antidepressants and seeing a therapist. My cat got sick and we had to put him down. And I lost my friends. I was stupid at a party and I let the depression dictate my drinking and I became a horrible human being.

I have never been described as horrible. I'm a genuinely nice person. I don't get mad at people for being asses, I forgive and I don't lie. I guess that's why their betrayal was so painful. They abandoned me.

I couldn't explain myself. They didn't give me the chance. They didn't allow me to apologize. They judged me negatively because of one night. I knew these people for 6 years and in one night all the good we were was erased and thrown out.

I'm a little bitter but I forgive them. They don't understand and they don't forgive easily. For some people a mistake is a mistake. For others it's a deal breaker. If I knew I was breaking our deal, I wouldn't have had alcohol that night. I would have listened to what I was trying to tell myself, that I wasn't in a good place. I should have gone home and avoided the situation all together. For someone who wants to be heard, I definitely didn't hear myself. Ironic, isn't it?