08 MIN READ · VOL. 01 · ISSUE 09 · PART III
Before you dive into this issue, I want you to know that I share some sensitive topics, including a short note on suicidal ideations and descriptions of first-hand childhood abuse. I’ll always give you a warning so you can decide if you want to continue. Please, do what’s best for your wellbeing.🖤
Sydney Buchanan is my alter-ego. Like Beyonce’s Sasha Fierce or Eminem’s Slim Shady, she is my vehicle to express all parts of myself, and who I want to be, without fear or reservation. Because Sydney isn’t fearful. She’s brave. She’s who I want to be when I grow up.
But me, as I am, I don’t always feel brave. I used to oscillate between absolute despair and emboldened visions of the future. And when I say despair, I mean that I know what a planned complex suicide is, the common mistakes people make, and what tools are immediately available to me if I were ever so inclined. It’s not that “specific type of loneliness” everyone can relate to. It’s a deep, dark, and incredibly isolated space.
And when I say emboldened visions of the future, I don’t mean I want to make a million dollars (although, yes please). I mean that I needed the type of vision that could give my life meaning beyond me, because “I” wasn’t enough reason to carry forward. I have a fantasy that, in the end, what I’ve been through can make a difference in someone else’s life, or at the very least make them feel less alone.
If you’re new here, this series is about creating a life that serves you, starting with unlocking self-limiting beliefs. I’ve asked you to work alongside me as we explore a method that’s helping me loosen some of my most firmly held convictions. So, today, I am going to share what I’m working on. I want to put all of my cards on the table, because that’s what Sydney would do.
My homework (answering the questions I asked you to explore):
What self-limiting belief do you want to tackle over the next few weeks?
Belief: I will always be alone.
Values & Tensions: While I value community and connection, I have lived a life of fierce independence from a place of necessity. I didn’t “choose” to take care of myself. I had to take care of myself. And by the time it became a choice, I had already embraced it as my identity.
I am going to give you a ten-thousand-foot view of some of the underlying reasons I believe I will always be alone. In my “emboldened visions of the future,” these are the stories I’ll share in greater detail someday not too far from today. But, for now, rapid-fire bullet points will have to do the heavy lifting.
I am an only child who was raised by a single mother in a physically, emotionally, and psychologically abusive household. I know she came by what she did honestly, and I can rationalize the fuck out of why she may have acted that way toward me, but I haven’t been able to let go of how she made me feel. So, what’s stuck with me?
Never knowing who my father was, or even seeing a picture of him, until I was in my 20s. I was just told he didn’t want to be in my life.
My mom told the same story about my extended family. When I was a pre-teen, she said that they didn’t approve of how we lived and wanted nothing to do with us (me). I didn’t find out she was lying until I moved to Vancouver, BC, shortly after graduating high school and was shocked that an extended family member was willing to let me stay with her (“Wait, I thought your family hated me?”).
Being systematically deprived of food for my entire childhood. I could eat when I was good and achieved. I couldn’t eat when I was bad or failed. As a result, I was chronically underweight and had an eating disorder I was entirely unaware of until my early 20s (I was 5’6” and 98 lbs.).
My mother’s abandonment games. One time she made me pack up all my bags and told me adoption agents were coming to get me, because she didn’t want me anymore. I remember standing outside of our apartment complex alone and crying as I waited for someone to come take me away. Another time, as we were driving down some highway, she told me to get out of the car. I remember watching her drive away, but I can’t remember how we were reunited. I suspect her favorite game was to pretend to play dead. I would say or do something that would make her angry, so she would collapse on the floor and lie there as I cried and screamed for help. Then, when she recovered, she would tell me how I’d hurt her and remind me that, if I was bad, it would kill her.
Being beaten by my mother or my mother’s friend, whether with a backhand, a belt, or a wooden spoon, whenever I misbehaved. I don’t know what the threshold was for her to hit me, but I know it stopped the day I hit her back.
If I was in a tough situation and called for help, being reminded that I got myself in it and needed to get myself out. Like when I was 16 and ran away to Thunder Bay with my adult boyfriend. I called her terrified because it turned out the person I was staying with was a drug addict and wanted to get me a job at the strip club so I could pay her back for her hospitality. My mom said she didn’t have money for a bus ticket home and reminded me there were consequences to my actions.
I got pregnant on that Thunder Bay trip and had my son, who I’d already arranged to place in an open adoption, the following spring. I had to stay in the hospital for a few days after his birth, so I asked my mom if she’d come visit me the next day. She declined, because she and my stepdad already had dinner plans with their friends. I doubt she’ll ever see this, but from the bottom of my heart, “thank you” to the woman on the other side of that room divider who talked me through my tears.
I’ll end this short list on the note that cut the deepest. I had a momentary lapse in judgment where I thought that, just maybe, I could be a mother. Shortly after arriving home from the hospital, I canceled the adoption and asked my mom for help in planning what life could look like. When she shared how my son and I would stay in her moldy bedroom, where the wall was ripping off the house because the garage was collapsing, and that we’d keep him in there at all hours rather than getting rid of the 5 cats, 2 dogs, and loads of garbage and excrement scattered throughout the house, I called the adoption agent and told her I’d made a mistake. I couldn’t be his mother.
Still with me?
That’s how my mother instilled the belief that I would always be alone. I’m sure you can imagine how much I sought and proved my theory through the majority of my romantic relationships, because that’s how these cycles work. We can skip the SparkNotes for now, but just know that I know: it didn’t end with my mother.
Is there one thought in particular that keeps reinforcing your belief? How could you reframe it?
The one that’s loudest right now is the fact that today’s my birthday. And, you know who knows that? A very, very small handful of people. One of those people is my angel of an ex-husband. He sent a loving text message to me early this morning, reminding me that he will always be in my corner. The irony of our relationship is that it was only after our divorce that I started to believe in unconditional love. I can say with complete conviction that I love him dearly, and he will always be my favorite ex-husband. Another person who reached out is a childhood friend I’m not all that close with, but who has been in my life for longer than I remember. I’ve known her for 31 years, and today I turn 35. She sent me a text message to wish me a happy birthday, because that’s just who she is. The last person is a friend I met for coffee last week. I told her my birthday was coming up and that it wasn’t a big deal, because it couldn’t be a big deal. Because that would be crushing. She reached out too.
So, the particular thought that reinforces my belief is how many birthdays I’ve spent alone, and that I’m spending this one alone too.
How can I reframe? Well, the fact that none of my other friends have reached out can mean a lot, or it can mean nothing. The reality is we’re all adults. We’re busy, and our lives get away from us. I am choosing not to take the lack of reach outs personally, because it’s not personal. Whether or not someone intentionally or unintentionally didn’t wish me a happy birthday isn’t something I need to carry.
Also, I didn’t message everyone to remind them. And, in a way, that’s on me. I could’ve been more proactive to make plans today. I just didn’t want to because, in all honesty, there are no plans that could make today feel any better. I always feel lonely and sad on my birthday, because the people you’d expect to spend it with — a mother, a father, a child — aren’t in my life. And it’s not that they’re gone. It’s that they all have lives that are, for the most part, completely separate from mine. And that hurts.
Now, the belief I am tackling is a big one, and I don’t know if it will ever have a full resolution. But that’s not the point. Some stories don’t have a happy ending. But they can still teach us how to let go of what’s not working, and how to hold what’s left.
Happy Birthday Sydney.
Thank you for your vulnerability and truth here.
You are not alone.