I have never been a person that lingers. Instead, I leave the party early. Well, to be honest, these days, I don’t go to the party in the first place, but this is mostly a metaphor.1 I sneak out the door without making eye contact with anyone and send a follow up thank you for having me text thirty minutes after getting home.2 On a phone call, I am the first to say goodbye. In the last five minutes of almost every phone call, I am planning an exit strategy. In a text thread, I am often the first to stop texting. In a voice note exchange, I question myself. Have I already said too much today? Have I been too much today? I am often too much for myself, all these thoughts and emotions bubble inside me and I can’t wait to go to sleep so I can take a break. I can’t wait to disappear into my video game/television mode so I can take a break. I need a break from myself every few hours.3

I assume everyone needs a break from me. I am constantly afraid that people will tire of me.4 The truth is, it is easier to hold all of my too muchness if I share myself with my close people. The truth is still something I’m uncovering. Some days, the lessons are easier to digest than others.

A friend once told me that I shouldn’t leave so early. He said that I’m missing out on the postscripts of social interactions. I’m leaving before we get to hug. I’m leaving before someone gets to say something profound. I’m not letting people love me to the fullest. I would rather leave early than overstay my welcome, I guess. I am so petrified of rejection and abandonment that I would rather not give people the opportunity to leave me.5 At my core, I still believe it is easier to leave me than it is to keep loving me. At my core, I still believe I’m only tolerable for short bursts of time. At my core, the negative self talk has decreased, but the scars from years of emotional self harm have only begun to heal. Even in moments of obscene self confidence, which are happening more and more often these days, I remind myself that just because I like me doesn’t mean that I’m easy to like.6

The point is, the harder I hold on to the idea of who I am, the more stubborn I get about who I am, the harder it is to change. I have changed profoundly since my autism diagnosis, since the divorce, since going through an actual fuckton of trauma therapy, since finding so many people I consider to be my people - and yet I resist myself at every turn. I resist change with every change. I question myself at every turn. I hold on tight to old stories about myself, instead of letting go with ease. The ease will come, eventually, I hope.

In the past three years, I have been learning that there’s no such thing as “I’ve always been this kind of person.” I am always changing, always becoming. I am already not the same person that I was on April 1st. (Unfold is the best thing that happens to me in April.)7 Change is the only thing that is inevitable, which is a hard truth to accept as someone who hates change with a vicious vengeance. The instability of unpredictability constantly has me on edge.8 Lately, I’ve been actively working to stop limiting myself with my labels. Instead of saying, I have always been this kind of person or that kind of person, I look at myself in the mirror, or in my journal, and think about the kind of person that I want to be. I want to be open, honest, kind, funny, inviting, brave, nurturing. creative. I think about all the ways that I’m already that person. I think about the things that stand in between the person that I am and the person that I want to be. I think about how often I’m the one standing in my own way. I feel stuck because I am equal parts unstoppable force and immovable object. I feel free when I allow room for flexibility.9 I remind myself that change doesn’t have to happen all at once. I don’t have to present a before and after picture of my past, present, and future selves. The differences are incremental. Sometimes I do not see the differences. Sometimes I feel like a brand new person. Sometimes, I just want to rip off these stupid butterfly wings and crawl back into my cozy cocoon, preferably with arms full of salty snacks.10