Feeling weird
Worrying too much about what others think about me
My consumption-to-creation ratio has been out of whack for quite a while now and it feels SHITTY. I can always tell when I am feeling particularly low about myself when I stop writing. I have been a vacuum, seeking desperately for the words of others to soothe me.
I want to be a therapist but I am intimidated by the price tag and time commitment that grad school demands. Also, whenever I share this interest with actual therapists, they immediately tell me not to pursue this path. Why?
I started re-reading Lori Gottlieb’s books, “Maybe You Should Talk to Someone” and “Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough” (we’ll save an analysis of that second title for another post) because I remember that she had a very circuitous path to becoming a therapist. She began her career working in television in Los Angeles, then decided to go to medical school at age 28. She glosses over how she went from being a language major in college to Stanford medical school (where she completed her undergrad), but I understand that her career journey is not the focus of her books. At 33, she decides to drop out of med school to focus on journalism. Per Wikipedia, she was born in 1966 and obtained a Masters of Clinical Psychology at Pepperdine University in 2010. This means she was 44 when she finished her masters! This gives me immense hope.
As I said, I have been very avoidant lately. I haven’t been doing my morning pages. I have not had a sense of routine. I feel scattered. I haven’t been sleeping well.
I’ve been feeling weird.
I came home from a friend’s wedding last Sunday (7/3). I don’t drink very much, but I drank a good amount at her wedding. As a naturally anxious person, drinking doesn’t align well with my personality. I usually spend the next day overanalyzing all of my social interactions and berating myself for oversharing (which I tend to do after a few drinks).
I am embarrassed to admit that, at 31, this was my first time being a bridesmaid. One of my friends, who was also a bridesmaid, asked me how many times I had been one before and I lied and said three times because I didn’t want to seem like a loser in front of the group. Why did I feel this compulsion to lie? Admitting that I had never been a bridesmaid before felt like admitting to having no friends.
Unfortunately, social media has made friendships about quantity over quality. I was distraught when 4 of the 10 women that had committed to going to my bachelorette dropped out (mostly because this meant I had booked a larger house than necessary and would have to make up the monetary shortfall myself or charge my 6 non-flakey friends more than the original quote). But I also worried that only having 6 attendees made me look like a loser. 10 would have proven my worth much more nicely. And yet, our group total of 7 was much more manageable and I had an delightful time with my 6 friends who genuinely wanted to be there.
In 2021, one of my closest friends got married and she chose not to do bridesmaids (besides her sister and future sister-in-law). This blew my mind! You can choose not to do bridesmaids?! What a fantastic idea. She invited the women who attended her bachelorette to come over and take “getting ready” photos in robes and then sent us on our merry way! No ugly (expensive!) matching dresses to purchase, no mundane rehearsal to attend, just fun photos! It was genius. I planned to copy this idea. I hoped that this hack would mean that since I had not asked anyone to be in my wedding, my friends who got married after me would not feel obligated to ask me to be in theirs. This theory is proving not to be accurate.
I was one of 15 (!!) bridesmaids. This is an insane amount of bridesmaids. 6 of the other bridesmaids were girls from my sorority. I have only kept in touch with one of them since college. The other 5 girls weren’t mean to me but they certainly weren’t friendly. Seeing them made me feel like I was in college again. Most of them are only a year younger than me but the weekend made me feel old. The bridesmaids took group tequila shots before the ceremony. I was the only one to opt out! I thought the unspoken agreement of being over 30 was that shots are the devil and should never be taken.
All bridesmaids were added to the shared photo album after the wedding. I couldn’t help but notice that the other 6 sorority girls had taken a bunch of group photos together. I immediately felt like my middle school self. I felt sad and excluded. Why did I feel this way? We are not friends, they were under no obligation to include me. I felt rejected. Who knows? Maybe I was just in the bathroom or something. Maybe it wasn’t personal, but it felt personal. Feeling this way disappointed me because I like to think that I am much more confident than my younger self. I want to believe that I am more secure in who I am and that I don’t need so much external validation. Yet, this wedding made me feel like I haven’t grown as much as I thought.
I interviewed my friend, Rachel, for the latest episode of the podcast (give it a listen, she’s a gem!) She is one of my inspirations. She pivoted from a corporate job to the nonprofit world and is now a 7th-grade teacher. What inspires me most about her is actually a little silly: she doesn’t shave her legs. She opted out of doing something that society deems mandatory for women. She has a deep sense of self-trust. But something that struck me from our conversation was that she noted that even though she stopped shaving almost 10 years ago, it is still uncomfortable. It’s summer and she does wonder what people think when she wears shorts and dresses. I needed to hear this because I often imagine that one day I will be “evolved” enough and stop caring what others think of me. I tell myself I am weak for feeling insecure (which is not very kind to say to myself). She reminded me that veering off the default path will never be 100% smooth sailing. Insecurities will continue to come up, you have to learn to identify with them less.
Instead of being frustrated with myself for worrying about what others think of me, I can acknowledge that being excluded sucks. I am not a weak person because that upset me! I can choose not to identify with what I think being excluded says about me: that I am inferior, uncool, uninteresting, or ultimately unloveable. Those things are not true. I am not inferior. I think I am interesting! Working on the loveability piece…
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Tags - Books, Fear, Feminism, Friendship, Inspiration, Memories, Wedding