You don't know me.

A Grumpy, Depressed PMDD Rant
by Joanna

Let's begin:
I need to know what is wrong with me.
I want to know what makes me the way I am, all the bad ways that I am, and why people really, really like me, then don't like me at all.
They actually just want me to go away; shun me from them, and they stay away from me. And they go away forever, sometimes.

Family? They are disappointed in me. They are disgusted by something I've done... or they are just too busy, too tired, too consumed by all the things that are bigger than me. I'm small in the world. I know that. I don't expect anyone to love me or see me. I never did. I still felt like I could leave my house--to pick up the kids at school, or run to the store--and not be recognized if I looked down and didn't make eye contact. But people always know who I am.

And... Being a teacher in the town in which I live made it very difficult to not be recognized. It's something my grandfather was honored to experience--meeting students from his long career in education out and about... yet it makes me feel... uncomfortable. They are so loving and sweet. They miss me. They miss my class. They are so happy to see me. And I remember I'm not a teacher and I don't know why I can't just get my fucking head together and teach again. And so I am happy to see my students doing well, and it's funny to hear they miss an English class, 4 years after graduating, yet I realize... I'm not the person they think I am. They saw the good parts of me?

There are bad parts: Those are the parts that make some people just completely despise me. I assume that's what they feel--

To be someone's best friend, then to refuse to talk to him or her for months... years... that is a loathing and a detestation that is more frightening than I ever imagined. Would I rather be a neutral person? An, Eh or Meh, person? I think so. I think I would. Because, when people believe you are so much more than that, that you are important or beautiful or talented or amazing, then you disappoint them. And then they lose faith in a piece of humanity. I have. A small part of me lost faith in a small part of it all...

It happens too many times, you know? "I give up," they say. "She's hopeless." And I think: I am. I really, really am. And then I want to just walk out into the water and swim, in the only way I know, (how my Nanny Tops taught me), until I'm too tired to swim back. And then worry about what happens next as it happens... But realize the sinking...

Oh no, I'm writing very depressing stuff, huh? Haha. It doesn't matter, because no one reads it, and even I write it, then post it... then wait a while to read it fully and correct the typos.

Damn it. The problem is the people who could tell me what the Hell makes me so detestable won't talk to me at all and tell me what I need to do to change, or at least try... or just understand... My siblings and mother have told me some of the things I really need to work on. They each find very different flaws in my being:
Too bossy.
Too mean.
Too nice.
Too passive.
Too depressed.
Not doing enough to change.
Not doing enough to make my life work as it is.
I'm Alive.
I Want to be dead.
I tried to not be alive.
I've tried to not be dead.
I want to talk about it...  all of it... any of it... tell me.