Fear

 Today, I am full of fear.  I don't know whether I've only just started to experience fear, or if, in the past, I just never registered that's what I was feeling.  You see, I learned not to feel at a very young age.  Life was better when I didn't have feelings.  People around me were happier.  It was easier.  It's only been in the last few years that I have begun to truly feel and to be able to label those emotions.

I was abused and emotionally abandoned as a child.  I coped by forgetting, shutting down and getting on with life.  I was quite successful at it too.  I was not a victim and took everything that life threw at me and with a spring in my step, made my way in the world.  However, as I entered my 30s and realized that I was choosing the wrong partners again and again, I decided it was time to get some help and went to see my first therapist at the age of 36.  I had been single since I was 21 and the few times that I dated, it was with men who were completely unavailable to me.  I could see it again and again, and decided to discover why.

But I digress.  I'm now 45 and after a few years of therapy in different forms, I am finally beginning to learn how to feel.  I was always really proud that I wasn't emotional and out of control.  I thought this was a good thing.  It helped me to get things done.  Now, I realize that suppressing my emotions is what caused a lot of my physical illnesses.  I'm not sure about the relationship between emotions and my migraines, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was there somewhere.  

So, today I am afraid.  I am afraid to be my true self.  I am afraid to receive too much attention.  I am afraid to be too big.  I am afraid that someone might actually read this.