Altschmerz

Sunday, 28th June 2020 - 

Thirty two tabs are open in my mobile Chrome browser and all of these point to one particular topic - Insecurity. 

I will honestly share the headings of few tabs. They read - What is insecurity? The 3 Most common causes of insecurity and how to beat them? What is Emotional insecurity? How to get over that Friendship Insecurity as an adult? Overcoming insecurities in friendships - How and Why? An article from iDiva saying 7 Women Reveal What Makes Them Insecure In Their Friendships, And It Is Not Men. 

How to stop being possessive about a friend? 

Why Am I Such an Insecure Friend?

Facing Insecurity, Finding Friendship.

And numerous such topics including Reddit and Quora answers on questions related to insecurity in friendships.

I was always very curious about what's going on between my friends? I still am. 

Is my best friend too much into our/my other friends? Is the other friend is getting more information than what I have? I wasn't present in school yesterday, did Sanchari talk too much to other people? And if she did, what did she talk about? Are the other people more informed now? 

It started from being possessive about her and now, I'm possessive about a lot of my friends. 

Insane, right? 

A condition I have been in, since years. 

In this post, I will not be hiding anything behind metaphors and over described or under explained lines. I will be honest and vulnerable. 

I totally feel I'm replaceable by a friend (I would like to exclude my best friend Sanchari and few other friends because I think I am no more insecure with how many friends they make but I'm definitely bothered about how much they share with other people and if that's known to me beforehand) and this insecurity of being replaced is something which is really driving me insane. It has always did. The lockdown made it worse. 

Today, I am feeling tired with the same old issue that I have always had—the anxieties and apprehensions around losing a friend or being replaced.

This has been troubling me for years. 

What's more alarming is that - I don't understand the flow of conversations that might happen between two of my friends from different areas (say school and college or college and office etc) and it can lead to further sharing of things. What bothers me is that a simple and negligible event in one of my friend's life may have been shared with the other one from my another circle and what if I am not aware of the incident? 

I even ask questions like - when did you send friend request to that friend of mine? 

Pathetic I know. But before judging, understand that I have already told above that here, I'm going to be honest and vulnerable. 

I understand everything in my sane mind that people can be friends, they can talk to each other over texts or calls, they can meet too without me (doesn't matter if the two or three people who are meeting belong to different friend circles I have), but my insecurity makes it worse for me. I have acceptance issues probably. 

I have become so used to this fear of getting replaced that I don't even complain about all of the things I'm insecure of. I just sit, overthink, share with other friends sometimes, tell the intended person sometimes and on some days, I just weep incessantly and cry myself to sleep. The next day, I feel okay for few hours and then the same feeling begins to affect me. 

What if I'm not important to so and so person anymore? 

You know the worst part? I even try to concentrate on other things so that I'm preoccupied and I don't think unnecessarily but then I end up sitting on the bed, next to the window, watch the sky change its colors from golden yellow to glooming gray and I totally sink myself into further insecurities. 

The sky today is gray. Isn't it? 

As a kid, I have always disliked the idea of mixing up people and clubbing people together from different friends groups. 

I will tell you about few questions from my book of 101 ways to feel insecure - 

1. What if two friends from different zones don't like each other?

2. What if they like each other so much that they neglect me? 

3. What if they start to hangout? 

4. What if they share things first with each other and not at all with me? 

5. What if they find soul warming friends within each other and forget me over time? 

6. I'm already available 24*7, why they need to call each other up? 

7. They are my friends first so the right to information about anything going on in their life has to be shared with me first. (I only demand this if they have opened up earlier)

And this list never ends. 

Today, at the age of 27, I'm struggling with a thing as normal as the fact that I'm an individual and I have every right to talk to as many people I want. 

But, at the end of the day, I'm sitting here, 

questioning my self worth, questioning my availability for friends, questioning my depth of understanding, questioning the need of repetitive assurance from them, questioning if I'm the kind of friend they desire to have, questioning if I'm being too unkind to myself, questioning my capabilities of giving 100% even if they don't reciprocate sometimes, questioning if I will ever be able to accept cross friend circle friendships, questioning them in my mind and questioning the situation. 

I feel trapped in the confines of my questions. I feel breathless. 

Restless. 

I'm freaking out. 

This is just a haphazard extract. 

I intend to write more as I learn more.