Siren Shell

Having a thin shell separate you from the outdoors, especially at night, really forces you to look at things differently. I honestly hate camping. I enjoy the day, hate the night. My boyfriend is very adventurous and I am the opposite, I cling to my comfort zone for dear life.

I’ve only felt safe when I moved out with my boyfriend, into our shared apartment. I didn’t realize I was in survival mode this entire time. As soon as we lived together my body screamed that I am not ok with being disrespected at home, and made me leave that environment. It made me see a reality that was there the entire time, disguised to preserve my survival.

I think that I still am in survival mode, but I am in an elevated survival mode. I felt like I had to re-learn who I was because I was doing things to survive, not because I actually liked them. I had no feelings, I was numb. Being a programmer who works remotely is both helping and stalling my personal growth because I’ve gotten so comfortable here.

My boyfriend has an opposite situation, his mother is overbearing so I believe he only feels free when he is doing something remote so that she cannot reach him, and dangerous so that he feels he has a bit of power over his life.

The problem with this is I only feel safe with my boyfriend in a nice house, I hate everything else. This is not good either, and I am aware. I am slowly working on this. I would spend any amount of $ to feel safe and not to have to be dependent on the people who hurt me again.

For me doing dangerous and remote things feels like I am risking my life/health/ability to earn money and might lose my freedom doing so, tumbling back into my prior situation. Safety also feels so nice, it’s truly such an amazing feeling. Feeling unsafe just reminds me of the way I felt everyday.

I keep telling myself it wasn’t that bad, and maybe it wasn’t, but I had to go to the bathroom at my parents and realized the lock didn’t work. Well I had a deeply emotional reaction where I was absolutely petrified. Isn’t that valid? Am I inventing things? I don’t think so. Anyways.