Waiting is Hard

Waiting is hard.

There’s been several areas of my life in which I’ve spent the past few months engaged in a series of long periods of waiting. i don’t think anyone enjoys being induced into a period of intense worry, but for me especially, it causes a massive amount of anxiety to accumulate.

I didn’t always struggle with anxiety. I remember carefree periods of my life, particularly in my childhood, in which I had no worries or fears about the future. it wasn’t until went through traumatic relationships and experiences in my teenage years that I first learned what anxiety felt like: the racing heart, the sweaty palms, the tight chest. Migraines, nausea, paralysis. The excruciating fear of what I would feel and experience, as soon as I entered the world beyond my bedroom door.

There’s a lot that many people in my life past and present don’t know about my childhood. The people who do know things probably have learned about them secondhand, whether through someone else who knew me (like my parents) or from whatever they experienced knowing me first-hand. However, most of ‘what actually happened’ were not events, conversations, or happenings that were being experienced outside of my own home(s). I don’t say that to discredit anyone or dismiss their perspective, but rather, to plainly state that I am the only true expert on my life and no one except for me saw, felt, and experienced it all. 

This was a lonely place to be.

It’s how I first internalized this narrative I have of being alone, of others never ‘truly’ understanding or knowing who I was or what I’d been through.

Much of this can be attributed to my parent’s divorce when I was five, since I spent my childhood split between two different households. Since I had no siblings, I was the only person who was a member of both households, straddling this strange line between 5 families (my birth parents’, each adopted parent, and my then step family). They were all a part of me, I was a part of them, yet, I was the only one who was a part of all of them. Did that make me my only ‘true’ immediate family member?

It sure feels like it.

Most of this ‘trauma’ that I mention took place at the household that belonged to my Dad and stepfamily. It was probably, definitely worse than you’ve heard. If you’re someone who knows anything about my Dad, just take what you know and multiply it by 50, as to how dysfunctional of a parent he was. 

He also sought increasing control over my life, as I grew older, which is what led me to spend the majority of the time at his home during high school; until he kicked me out when I was 17. 

Bet you didn’t know that.

Speaking of waiting, the subject of estrangement brings me full circle to the theme of waiting. I’ve been waiting for an acknowledgment, an apology….something, anything for  almost 15 years. I’ve tried to fix things on my own, take ownership for things I had no responsibility for, in order to try to move forward, to not have this huge missing piece in my life and hole in my heart.

You never get over the pain of having to let go of someone like a parent. You also never understand how to talk about it, how to explain to others why it is you no longer have a relationship with someone who is supposed to be one of the most important people in your life. There’s no easy explanation, no satisfying answer, as to why things have to be this way. It’s biologically unnatural to be disconnected from your kin and it takes many failed attempts at repair, disappointments, let downs, and painful discussions to get to the point where you see no path forward. (Add link) https://www.apa.org/monitor/2024/04/healing-pain-estrangement#:~:text=As%20Scharp%20notes%2C%20in%20the,running%20tensions%20in%20the%20relationship. 

That brings me back to waiting: I realized that I’ve been waiting for people to understand, or to ask, or to find some perfect moment in which to open up and put pen to paper about who I am and what I’ve been through. I’ve been anxious, feelings the weight of not knowing how, if, or when to finally rip this bandage off.

I’ve realized through waiting for so many pieces of news in the past two months that there is no ‘right time,’ ‘perfect moment,’ or ‘ideal circumstance’ in which to finally decide to move forward. Part of life is trusting the process and enduring and part of it is deciding to take a leap forward towards finding out. If you keep waiting, if you choose to live in anticipation and fear, you will only prolong your pain.

Waiting is hard.

Staying stuck in trepidation is even harder.