(Copied from my blog onto its own topic here, because I really feel like I needed to talk about this a bit more publicly.)
(TRIGGER WARNING: relationship regret / inadequacy to cis-women.)
Well... today's my last day of packing before I move out of the house and head two states away to start my new job. And I'm going to be honest, I'm feeling pretty bad.
Last night, I had yet another dream involving my dad accusing me of being a failure. I've had a dream like this before, where Dad was irrationally accusing me of being a failure. In the first dream like this, basically it was after I'd been on HRT for an entire extra year, and yet I was still stuck in the exact same place as before, miserable, self-loathing, still stuck in "guy mode," still hating myself, still too afraid to make the social switch, while in the dream my friend that I started at the same time with was already full-time, passing, and loving her new life. And when the friend's mother asked my dad what was wrong with me, he pointed an accusing finger at me and said that it was all my fault, that I'd done nothing but sit in my room feeling sorry for myself, and then he accused me of doing drugs, which I had to defend myself against even though I'd never done them in my entire life.
Well, something like that dream happened again last night. But this time it was drinking. He accused me of being a drunk. And again, I've never been drunk in my entire life, so I felt completely betrayed. He was accusing me of being a terrible person because I never did house chores. He pretty much spent several minutes dissecting every single one of my flaws, every single one of my failures as a human being... failing in school, losing my job, how my room's such a disaster, how I never do housework, everything. He then accused me of being selfish, horrible, and again, a drunk. I was nearly crying by this point. Jenny was there too this time. And when I turned to her and asked her to vouch for me, all that she could say was "well, to his credit, he did take Louise (our cat) to the vet several times." And that was all she could say. And I just felt so awful, so betrayed. Because I felt like I put all of this effort into being a decent human being, into being nice to everyone, and yet my own father couldn't see it.
Murg... what an awful dream. And unfortunately, it touched a very tender nerve because of what's happening in my life today. Today is the last day that I'll be living with Jenny, my ex-girlfriend, before moving out. So I'm already feeling pretty bad about this. Because when you come down to it, the failure of our relationship, and the failure of this joint housing, is pretty much all my fault.
This is the girl that I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with. That I clicked so amazingly well with from the very first instant that we met. That I thought for sure was the one, that we were going to settle down, that I imagined growing old with, and having kids with, and there was nobody else in the entire world that I'd rather be with. The girl that I thought I could never hate, never fight with, as long as we lived, because we just had so much fun every single time we were together. And yet now here I am, leaving her house in shame, as a miserable failure.
Ultimately, it's my own personal shortcomings that split us up. She has her whole life together. I don't know where she gets such energy, such constant ability to not only work a job that she hates without complaining, but still have energy left over to clean, play with our cat, have a social life, and date all at the same time. Even when she's feeling miserable, she still does all of this, and it's just second nature to her, without blinking an eye. In every way that she's a success, I'm a failure. Even when I'm happy, I'm still a pathetic loser that can't get a damned thing done, and still finds ways to be incapacitated by every single little bad thing going on in my life.
This really is all my fault. Our relationship failing is ultimately all because of me. I'm the one who waited four months to send her an e-mail after we were done working at Cedar Point because I was such a social coward. I'm the one who could barely talk to her even though I loved her. I'm the one who almost let our relationship end because I went through an uber-conservative Christian phase of trans denial where suddenly God became more important than her. Then it was because I couldn't function sexually. Because she had what every single normal human being is supposed to have, a healthy sex-drive, and yet I was too ashamed of my own anatomy to enjoy what was right in front of me. Then it was because I couldn't do even the most basic of romantic gestures. I couldn't give her flowers like a normal person in love would. I couldn't get up the enthusiasm to go on trips and have fun date nights and treat her like she deserves. I was too much of a selfish failure in that regard. That's what ultimately split us up. And even then, I feel like I've held her back for seven years. She gave the best years of her young romantic life to me, and yet I wasted them because I was still in denial about my trans desires, and refused to face them no matter how much I knew they were destroying my life. And then to cap off my feelings of failure, it's my fault that now even our basic friendship is ending. It's because of my lack of ability to clean. Because I spend so much time sitting around and feeling sorry for myself that I leave dishes in the sink for several days at a time, and never clean the bathroom, and she constantly has to bother me, day after day after day, to get me to do anything. And now because of this, we can barely talk to each-other anymore without her bitterness about how little I contribute making us argue.
Hell, it's even my fault that I'm moving out right now. Because I couldn't keep my own personal problems out of my work life. Because I let myself get so worked up with dysphoria that I made a mistake that resulted in my termination. Because I just had to sit there feeling miserable instead of being brave and doing something about it. Because I'm still hiding. Because I'm still stuck in this horrible self-loathing state that takes up all of my mental energy.
It's all because of me. Because I'm such an inadequate human being, such a screw-up, such a freaking loser, so selfish, so uncaring. And so what looked like a perfect relationship is now ending in a state where we can barely stand to be around each-other because we're constantly fighting about cleaning, and the guilt-tripping and arguing about housework never ends. And again, it's my fault. She's always happy, always helpful, even when she's feeling bad. I'm always miserable, lazy, snappy, selfish, and I couldn't support the basic needs of a single other person. Hell, I can't even support my own needs.
So yeah... I'm feeling pretty bad today. And the worst part is, I still haven't learned. I still haven't dealt with this most basic of problems. I'm still hiding, still letting myself feel like crap every single day because I'm too scared to do anything about it, and because I'm letting my own feelings of inadequacy keep me from doing something that would help my functioning on the most basic of levels. And yet I still don't. And so I'm still spending almost every single hour of every single day feeling miserable, not having the ability to function on the most basic of levels.
And so I'm leaving this house in shame... it's all my fault in the first place, and the worst part is, I still haven't learned. I'm still putting up with being a self that I hate, still letting myself sit on the sidelines of life, still letting myself be miserable, because I'm too much of a coward to face up to it. And because I refused to face up to it for all of these years, I threw away the prime romantic years of a girl who deserved so much better than me.
And every single time I look at her, I feel inadequate... like I'm an idiot for ever thinking that I could possibly have the gall to be expected to be accepted as a member of the same gender as her, or any other girl for that matter.
And the thing that really kills me, is that everyone who I came out to says "what took you so long? I knew that you were suffering. I could see it. And now you're looking so much happier. If this was bothering you so much, why did it take you so long to do something about it?" And I really don't know. I just constantly seem to be petrified. I sat by idly as it destroyed my school life, my social life, my working life, and this relationship. And the worst part is, I still haven't learned. I'm still letting fear hold me back.
Anyone have advice to give? How can I move on from these horrible feelings of guilt, these feelings that I've failed as a son/daughter, failed as a significant other, and now that I feel like I'm failing as a trans woman? I just feel like I'm constantly being petrified by feelings of inadequacy... and I'm letting that social fear, and that lack of self-acceptance, keep me from being myself, and from being happy, on the most basic of levels. And it's been tearing my life apart for years now, but I still can't seem to learn from it.
