Snowflake 8!

[flamingsword]

Challenge #8
In your own space, celebrate a personal win from the past year: it can be a list of fanworks you're especially proud of, a gift of your time to the community, a quality or skill you cultivated in yourself, something you generally feel went well. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your post if you feel comfortable doing so.

Things I won at this year:

I wrote a character fairly believably, even though her personality diverges from mine at most points? Yay for reading enough Darcy Lewis-centric fanfic to have a handle on how fandom portrays her.

I think I’m learning how to give up on stuff that is bad for me in my personal life? When my friend broke off our friendship, I did not immediately fight for getting back a friendship that was emotionally draining and slightly toxic on both sides. I recognized that we both have other, better friends and let go, and I am really proud of that.

I have blogged way more this year than last, even though it’s my own stuff and not therapy content. (Which admittedly I should get back to.)

I have still not gotten covid. A lot of that is luck, but some of it is also choosing to do almost all stuff online that I wanted to do in person. I’m so grateful to past me for being a paranoid little shit.

I hope you, too, are proud of yourselves, for making it through another hellish year. You survived! Thank you!



In other news, the waking up in the middle of the night insomnia is trying to come back. Welp! Time to figure out what my brain is doing now!

Comments

[fairyniamh]

Learning to let go is important. Just remember, some things, people are worth fighting for. They are few and far between, but those little unknown pieces of your soul exist.

May your continued wellness continue.

[flamingsword]

See, fighting for other people was never my problem. Fighting to be a better person, a better friend, fighting to prove myself - those are things I’m good at. I am a defiant trash creature and my fight/flight/freeze response is mostly stuck on fight. I am having to learn to give up on people, which is not in my nature. I’m still tender-hearted and sore in some emotional places from that utter fiasco.

I know that she knows a version of me that no one else gets to access, but I realized that this person doesn’t really see me, and I was starting to see only her trauma instead of her as a whole person because of how often she would project and be in her trauma-formed reactions even though they had nothing to do with me. We were becoming strangers to each other, and I did not know what to do that would not make her feel worse about that. So I chose to stop fighting instead of hurting both of us by thinking that I can always fix what is broken.

Such is life.

[spikedluv]

learning how to give up on stuff that is bad for me in my personal life

Difficult, but important. I'm happy that you did that. And that you've remained Covid-free!

[flamingsword]

Thank you!

[senmut]

Way to go!

[flamingsword]

Thank you! I feel validated. 😀

[muccamukk]

Not getting covid is a huge win right now! And so is letting go of a relationship that's not working. I've been there, and it's more difficult than it would seem.

[flamingsword]

Yeah. Breakups with friends can be just as rough as romantic breakups. Nobody warns you, or teaches you how to handle that gracefully. 😕

[kingstoken]

Sounds like you are really improving your life

[flamingsword]

I’m trying! I listen to Brené Brown’s podcasts, and read her books, and am going back to therapy right now, but, honestly? Personal growth is a boatload of work, and I had forgotten how absorbing it could be to go all in on this stuff.

I have so much respect for people who achieve any measure of inner peace. Especially right now.

[corvidology]

What a great post. It's really difficult to give up on personal relationships, even when you know they're toxic so well done you!

[flamingsword]

Thank you! I’m trying my best, and I think she was too? But sometimes you realize that you can not be what someone else needs you to be and they can’t fit in your boundaries comfortably, so it’s time to just let each other go.

[tsuki_no_bara]

it sounds so weird to say "good on you!" for letting the friendship go, but... good on you for recognizing it was toxic and not worth keeping.

[flamingsword]

I was toxic for her, too, sometimes. I am still not great at standing up for my boundaries in a way that does not sound blaming, and I’m in therapy to work on that stuff. But I don’t think she can or would choose to fit into the spaces my boundaries leave her, and so the breakup was kind of inevitable. She just saw it before I did.

She didn’t handle the dumping me part very well, but I knew it could come to that when we became closer friends. 🤷

[peaked]

I feel you on letting go of toxic relationships. It's so hard. Sometimes we hold on for nostalgia or "what if it gets better and this is all in my head", but sometimes the kindest thing you can do for yourself and the other person is to let go. I'm glad you were able to do that and recognise you made the right decision for yourself.

[flamingsword]

Thank you. She made the decision to break up the friendship, but I reflected on it and chose not to fight for a relationship that was getting toxic. Even if her stated reasons were not things I agreed with, her intuition that things were not right between us was correct. It was painful to accept that, but letting go was for the best for both of us.

[peaked]

Oh, for sure it'd be painful. No matter how toxic a relationship may be, there are still genuine feelings there! I can only hope having a stranger on the Internet tell you that however you feel about it—anger, resentment, elation, uncertainty, etc.—is totally, totally normal. You're allowed to miss her and be grateful she's no longer in your life. You're allowed to grieve a friendship however you wish to grieve it. Feel your feelings and validate them all, even the ones that feel ugly. ♥

And you never know—you two may come back together in the future, but need time apart to heal. I always believe that people come into your life for a reason (and stay because they're meant to) and leave for a reason, and the people who do return do so when they're meant to.

[svgurl]

Letting go is not easy, whether you recognize it is good for you or not, and to be able to is a great accomplishment all on its own. I hope you're able to figure out the insomnia though. Waking up in the middle of the night consistently must be extremely frustrating.

[flamingsword]

Thanks!

And yeah, this is a whole new kind of insomnia for me! 🙃 Yay, I guess?

[dhampyresa]

Congrats on letting go!

[flamingsword]

Thank you!