New year, new me.
A lot of people say that don't they? I know I've heard and read it a few times.
I wonder how many people actually follow through with that statement.
I entered 2013 on the road to wanting to learn to live with my anxiety and to cope with things I find hard in life.
I have therapy sessions planned, which are every week, and I feel a bit in control.
I seem to have automatically realised, without trying or thinking about it, that the life I sometimes think I should have isn't really the life I'd want, is unattainable and just not necessary.
I imagined that having children would bring me dozens of friends. At school I was never part of a group of friends and would flit between groups. I always seemed a lot more grown up than most of my peers. I was in a long term relationship and spent all of my time with him out of school, but even prior to that I didn't see friends socially outside of school much. This continued when the relationship broke down. I tried going out more but, to be honest, I didn't enjoy it.
I had particular friends at that point that I would see, they would stay round my house by one by one they let me down. In big ways.
I was then left with very few friends, but enough to invite them to my wedding. I'd moved away at this point too but saw no reason for us to not all keep in touch.
Well, you'd think that a 19 year old had never got married before. Very soon after my wedding these friends rarely kept in touch. It was almost like they didn't know what to say to me...now I was a wife!
I made a few friends when I moved away, and I'm still in touch with a couple of them now. It was hard coming back and I knew I wouldn't be able to slot back into any of the previous groups, and looking at their lives on Facebook I wasn't sure I wanted to.
Work, when I moved back home, was horrid, falling pregnant was my way out.
And then I expected to be able to make friends.
I reconnected with a couple of friends from school who were pregnant around the same time as me. One I have now drifted away from, her choice really, and the other is Harry's Godmother now.
I tried hard to make friends at various groups but it didn't happen, and I'm not sure why. Making that move to then see each other away from group can be huge and then it becomes too late.
I keep going through phases when I think I *need* to be surrounding myself with lots of friends. I *need* to go and make some *NOW*!! Forgetting that it's not that easy and having no plan in place.
I've now realised that it really doesn't matter that I don't have lots of friends surrounding me.
I have three really lovely friends who live in my phone/Kindle/laptop who know more about me than anyone in real life (I'm yet to even meet one of these friends!)
I really do feel settled in the fact that in real life I may not have a diary full of playdates and coffee meets. Or friends I can call at any time of the day.
BUT I know I always have someone available to me inside my phone. Not just the three people I mentioned above, but lots of other people.
People who won't judge me, criticise me (or if they do it really doesn't matter), some understand my anxiety or the feeling of being so overwhelmed by life. Some don't understand by still offer a hug and sometimes it can be the nicest thing to have happened that day.
I have realised that life, for me, isn't about how many real life friends I have. It isn't about how many internet friends I have.
It's about happiness and being settled and clear about what I want and what I need.
Friends who live in Cyber Space rather than the same town might be weird to some but they are most perfect friends for me, no matter what anyone else thinks.
