Walls… And a Moat

I was 12 when my parents told my sister and I that they were going to get a divorce. It was a Sunday. I know this because it was every Sunday I would either play basketball with my dad or go to the driving range with him and then get lunch before coming home.

I was blindsided.

My dad told us that he couldn’t be the husband he felt he ought to be. My sister and I were reassured that both parents still loved us very much and that we would still see both of them regularly, but that our dad would be moving out and eventually we would be selling the house. Both parents made a concerted effort to enforce the claim that our relationships, as children, would only be slightly affected by their divorce.

As much as I wanted to believe this, deep down I knew something was wrong. I felt alone. I felt like my dad was leaving the family behind. Like many children of divorce, I felt like I had done something horribly wrong to contribute to the destruction of my family. I felt abandoned.

If you couldn’t guess it or have never experienced it: feeling abandoned by someone in your family who you look up to and idolize is a pretty big deal. That’s the kind of thing that sticks with you.

Another thing that sticks with you? When it appears that your closest friends are doing the same thing.

It wouldn’t be so awful to have the experiences stick with me if it weren’t for the effect that they have on my present life (and life over the last several years). That effect being: I don’t like to let people in.

I’ve become very good at keeping people (potential friends and romantic interests alike) at an arm’s distance. I let them in just enough to know a bit about me and to feel comfortable with me, but I almost never fully open up. It sounds cold, but it’s really just easier that way.

I don’t like the idea that somebody could cause pain like I felt when my parents divorced or when I felt alone during my depression. If I only allow people in to my life up to a certain level, then I remain protected. I don’t end up crying when things go wrong and I don’t end up wishing that I knew what I could have done better. I don’t go back to the person and try to see what I could have done differently or try to have them take me back (probably because I usually am the one to end things, though). Of course, this isn’t to say that I don’t feel anything when a friendship or relationship of some kind ends; I do. I just don’t dwell on it for very long.

I do this all out of fear. I keep people at bay out of fear that they will, once getting to know me completely, reject me. They will see aspects of my personality that repulse them and they will leave me stranded. I fear spending a long period of my life with someone who eventually discovers that they don’t love me the way they think they should. Almost as much as I’m afraid of being abandoned, I’m afraid of rejection. It’s kept me from talking to countless pretty girls. It’s kept me from telling some people how I feel about them. Rejection on that level is basically just Abandonment Lite.

The thing is… I’m sick of being afraid of these things. I try to overcome them. I try to tell myself that I’ll never fully be happy with somebody until I allow myself to let them in. I try to tell myself that it’s better to take a risk and fail than to not try at all.

But none of it works. It’s such a deep part of me. It’s definitely habitual. My defenses are always up high and I require spectacular feats of affection and trust and personal challenge from people in order to let them in.

So for now, I keep working on it… and hopefully one day I’ll be able to let down the defenses so not everyone has to fight through mazes and guards and get past walls… and a moat. (You can never forget about the moat).