When I was a teen recovering from back surgery at home, I was the product of "outta sight; outta mind" as I wasn't at school to participate in 13 year old shenanigans, gossip, and activities. My group of friends reached out at first but then started to not call and visit as often as they got busier and I wasn't there. I heard rumors being spread about me by them (typical teenage crap but hard to hear from afar where I cannot defend myself)....what happened to me was so difficult to process I am sure everyone struggled with the right response to me and my family, but being the subject of 13 year old gossip hurt. I needed friends more than ever as I was so lonely and in pain at home and suddenly I found myself without any friends. When I finally returned to school, I remember feeling out of place. I didn't have anyone to sit with at lunch. My boyfriend at the time had moved onto someone else, so I was feeling unloved. I didn't have anyone to hang out with after school or call on the phone. I couldn't play any sports because of the recovery and the girls I used to play softball with and do gymnastics with moved on in both skill and to other friends. Those who were my core group of friends acted as if they didn't really know me at all. Junior high starts the groups of kids: the studious ones, the popular kids, the goof-offs, etc. and I didn't really fit into any of those groups. I was desperately joining any group I could to try to make new friends. Since it was 7th and 8th grade, many folks looked and sounded different upon my return due to puberty, so it was almost like I was the new kid in school but everyone knew me and just looked at me with my body cast and movement restrictions with pity. I felt defeated as my former friends weren't trying to call me, hang out with me, and would go out of their way to avoid me all together. Suddenly, I needed to become the outgoing kid who reached out to others.
Believe it or not, I was a fairly shy kid before my surgery. But after losing what felt like my whole world around me, I started to become more an more outgoing. I became a bit self deprecating by putting myself down in an attempt to entertain people around me so I would maybe entice them into becoming friends. I started calling other people I wouldn't have ever called in the past to see if I could generate a friendship. My parents were trying to help and pushed me to invite a very popular girl to go away on vacation with me and my family whom I never really hung out with before. It ended up being so awkward and forced that I don't think we ever really spoke again after being together for a week. But eventually, I found some other friends in the yearbook staff, girl scouts, and in art class that helped me over this speed bump in my life so I could move onto high school and start fresh again. I know what happened to me was unfair and out of the ordinary for any teen, but it is my reality and a benchmark I use to measure other situations against.
Unfortunately, losing all my friends in junior high was just a preview for a few other times I would lose friends in my life. I had a great core group of friends in college from the freshman year in the dorms, but as I was finally catching up with unprocessed emotions from my surgery I was having a bit of a nervous breakdown. For this group of friends, I was just too much to deal with so it was easier for them to just leave me out of the activities. So once again I was finding myself friendless while I was breaking down emotionally from never having therapy about the surgery and recovery. I found great groups of friends in classes and activities at college and in my many jobs during and after school, but once I moved onto the next job, I felt written off by people. I certainly would try to stay in touch, but the friendships would fizzle as we weren't around each other in person as much. I always felt I was working really hard to reach out to people and organize coffee dates and lunches, but not a lot of invites were coming my way. Another time to lose friends was when my girlfriends started having kids. I don't have any of my own, so I was easy to forget at this time since I didn't have a little one to talk about with them. I was always hoping I would be able to start back up with them after the kids grew up and went to college, but that doesn't seem to be the case as many of them have moved onto other things and people. While I accept that once we move onto other activities it is normal to lose those people in life, but I have always internalized this as I have people in my life that have kept friendships going back to childhood desertion. So I cannot help but think there is something about me that isn't worth maintaining a friendship.
Now, I am leaving the only place I have ever lived: Northern CA. I grew up 60 miles away from where I live now and have had Davis as my home for 32 years now. This area, the people, the politics, the traffic, the businesses.....this is all I know. I have to say I am quite wary to start over yet again to try to find another group of friends. Clearly, I am dependent on other people in my life for happiness, so this is rather daunting and scary. I am desperately clinging to the ones I call my "chosen family" as well as many of my closer clients/friends hoping that history in my life doesn't repeat itself. I know that I have more tools to deal with this change as I would have 5 years ago thanks to therapy, but the little voice that sits on my shoulder cannot help but remind me that these people I love so much are going to forget about me once I am not here. I am hoping Zoom coffee dates and an online craft group will be enough as plane tickets to Hawaii can be expensive for the people I know to come visit.
I have spent the past week saying goodbye. Its been like a wound that has started to heal but gets ripped open and starts to bleed each time I say goodbye. Honestly, I say "see you soon" as the word "goodbye" is too painful for me, but the reality is for many of them it will be a "goodbye." I plan on putting in the effort once again to stay in touch with people, but I am sad that I know I need to accept that it will not be reciprocated by many of them. I keep getting told, "you're so outgoing, you'll meet new friends with no problems." If only those folks knew how hard I have worked since junior high school to have any friends at all, they'd get why I am so scared to make this transition to Maui. Being told I am outgoing is only a reminder of how I have had to transform myself multiple times to have friends at all. I've had a lot of last appointments these past couple weeks and today there is a farewell party at the studio that I am sure will be bittersweet. I'm honored to have the chance to hear good things from the folks I have helped over the years and I am hoping I will be in the right mindset to hear them all. I just don't want to wallow in this thought I am losing a group of people in my life once again.
Hoping for a different outcome this time. Onto chasing rainbows.....