Confessions of an INFP Tryhard

I feel like I give too much of myself to this world. I hope too much. Love too much. Am too much.

I try to make genuine connections with other humans and they just… couldn’t care less. The worst ones pretend to want connection, too, but are really just using me.

And yet I stupidly continue to trust. To be open and vulnerable. To meet people where they are. To give of myself. Even though that became harder and harder after every time I got hurt.

I used to think it was just because I lived in the middle of nowhere, where my only friend or partner options were pretty freaking abysmal. So I gave up, was basically a hermit for a lot of years, wasting my life. But then I came to this city and met people who were more like me and thought things would be different. Opened up again, tried again.

But I feel like it hasn’t gotten me very far, and at this point, I’m starting to run out of energy and to think I should just give up again. Maybe the problem was only 20% other people and 70% me not being what anyone wants in their life (with the other 10% being people actually using me). Because even when I find people I truly vibe with, it ends up being mostly the same sh*t.

And yeah I could try caring less. I could try being as selfish as most people are. I have tried that. I can’t pull it off. And yeah that means I’m a good person and that’s supposed to make me feel better. It doesn’t.

And yes some of those people are sabotaging themselves by keeping real connections at arm’s length. But that doesn’t comfort me either. It just makes me sad for us both.

I wish I could talk about this stuff with my therapist, but since she’s not safe (seriously, she does things that should get her license revoked), I can’t. So I have to dump it here.

Speaking of therapy. The above feelings also kind of apply to that. I was put in therapy as a child because I acted out in response to the multiple forms of abuse and neglect I was experiencing at home and school. But it was always focused on me, what was I doing wrong. As a child. (Spoiler alert: children aren’t doing anything wrong, they’re reacting the only way they know how to protect themselves in shitty situations.)

So I grew up thinking I was the problem, worked on myself so much that I literally score differently on personality tests than I used to, I use the skills without consciously thinking about it and can teach them to others. But even when others need them more than I do, they wouldn’t use them. I was always the one who needed to change.

And after I had changed as much as I humanly could, and asked my mother to consider some of the skills I had learned for herself, she would get mad at the very notion that she might not be perfect (yes, she’s a narcissist). A relationship can only improve so much with only one person doing the work. It’s taken so many years for her to finally make an effort, and yeah I’m glad she is doing it now but I still spend decades bearing the weight of it for us both.

I also feel like I outgrew my therapists. I got tired of being the one teaching them shit. Tired of opening up and doing the emotional labor of sharing my trauma with them for 45 minutes straight week after week, and only getting nods in response. Getting very little back for the effort I put in. In other words, wasting my time and energy. Just like with the people in my life.

So here I am, still seeing this “therapist” because I need that surgery letter, but otherwise having given up on therapy. And feeling like I should give up on all the other people in my life. And on trying to meet new ones. I just need to accept that this is how humanity is. How this world is. That I don’t belong here.