Member-only story
Are you scared of being alone?
People are great, but so are you
Growing up, if you asked me what my biggest fear was, I would confidently say — being alone.
For as long as I could remember, I was afraid to be alone.
The fell head first into the trap of popularity, and I spent my formative year obsessed with being popular. Whatever that means.
Adolescence me thought it meant surrounding myself with people. If I’m always on aol sending IM’s, and I have people to walk to class with and to eat lunch with, then I was safe.
I dreaded being by myself. It was a sign of failure and a badge of shame.
When I had a falling out with friends near the end of high school, I resorted to fulfilling my need for non stop companionship with a boyfriend.
Never mind love, a boyfriend is my go to person for doing anything and everything. A default fall back who will say yes to every plan, so that I would never have to do anything by myself.
Of course, this turns out to not be what a partner is for. And so I went from boy to boy, anxiously attached, feeling desperately abandoned whenever they told me they had other obligations, or god forbid, family duties.
