I did try "growing up"...

I did try to pretend I was happily married and I liked my friends who weren't really good people. They were just pretending like me. I tried to pretend alcohol was fun and that I cared about their mundane gossip. I tried to be positive and find something to believe in, somewhere to belong. I pulled it off for years. Even believed myself.

But the persistent voice of personal truth was screaming louder and louder. My body started hurting. The nausea never ended. People began to exhaust me and the less I gave, the less I faked it, the less they liked me.

I went to college, I lived on my own, worked and paid it all. I had good jobs that I was laid off from, always for economic reasons outside of my control. I had crappy jobs that I enjoyed the most.

I have raised my child mostly alone so far and the only people in my life, the ones I'm supposed to rely on, have consistently dumped on me after I have shown up for them when they definitely didn't deserve it.

So no, I don't want to be a stupid grown up who fakes it. It takes too much. I sacrifice a lot, I will not put my energy for me into faking. It diminishes me. I always make it without it.

I know I'm not alone in that either. I'm not lonely even when I am alone. I'm okay being the stooge in people's story. Cheers.