Dear secure relationship girly,
Most of my life, I have struggled to see myself in a light that isn’t a dark one. I didn’t like the way I looked, I was insecure of my personality, and I never felt like I fit with the people around me. I felt like I had to change myself to match the energy of my peers. And it sounds clichĂ© and corny, but since coming to college and finding my people, I have never seen myself in a brighter light than I do now. I finally like the way I look, I don’t feel like I have to be anything other than myself, and I feel like I am finally coming into my skin in every way that counts. I haven’t been worried about being too much or too quiet, being too skinny or too tall, or having too much to say or nothing that anyone cares about. I am finally secure in my own skin. In fact, I have gotten so comfortable that I haven’t let anyone in, really in, in a long time. I like being on my own. I like being independent, with only my friends and myself to rely on.Â
I may be secure in myself and who I am, but when it comes to a relationship, I feel like a fish out of water. I met a boy the first weekend back at school, and this is the first guy who I feel like I belong with, yet I find myself shrinking down and retreating into my skin, feeling like the lost girl I once was. My relationship history isn’t so much a history but a short blurb, and I wouldn’t say my first boyfriend scarred me, but he definitely left some damage that has bled into every situation with a man since. So much so, that this is the first guy in four years that I have deemed worthy of dropping my walls and revealing my cards to. That isn’t to say I haven’t talked to anyone, but no one has gotten past the point of my comfort zone: at arms length. That is, until this guy. He has made me comfortable enough to reveal some of my cards, and I have been trying really hard to drop my walls too, but I have never felt more vulnerable. And I hate that feeling.Â
I think my worst fear is that he likes me now, but one day he’ll wake up and realize he could do better. That he’ll realize that maybe I am too much, too quiet, not interesting or funny enough, or doesn’t do it enough for him anymore. And these fears have been causing me to pull away and act nonchalant, like I usually would be, even though I have been trying so hard to not let these fears come out and play. And I don’t know how to get over them. How does one go from content and secure on her own to the same in a relationship?Â
It is funny that I am the number one advocate that if a man doesn’t want you for all that you are, then he isn’t the one, and he isn’t worth your tears. But yet, getting to that point somehow paralyzes me when it comes to my own relationship. My friends are telling me to put my trust in him and in myself. They tell me that the only thing that will drift us apart is my own pulling away. They tell me to talk to him about it. But why is this all so terrifying? Is this what happens when you actually like someone? Is this what falling is like? Please let a girl know.Â
Sincerely, Rhiannon