I saw a tweet on Twitter. A woman saying that her mum told her a few years ago that she was an accident and she was a disappointment. In my mind, I was like “oh girl, how sweet is your story”. Because my mum made me think for years, since my childhood, that I ruined her life by existing.

I have a lot of sad memories about my childhood. Maybe some are exaggerated, like every memories I think. But I remember clearly that before I turned 6, my mum used to yell at me because I used to many tissues while I was sick. I clearly remember her confiscating my new tissues, spilling the garbage and saying “those are not dirty, it’s just water, use them again”. I remember when she yelled at me when I used too many toilet paper after a number two.  I remember when I was a teenager. She entered in the bathroom while I was naked and said that I had to be careful, that I was starting to get stretch marks while slapping on my thigh. I remember when she was mad at me because she read my diary. She had corrected all the spelling mistakes and put notes like “that’s not how it happened at all, you’re a liar”. She was mad because my point of view wasn’t hers. I remember when she entered in my room without knocking and saying things like “I don’t like your laugh either”. I was doing my homework for 2 hours and did not understand where it came from. In the mean time, she was saying awful things about my dad. I though for a long time that he was the one who hurt me the most when I was a child. (spoiler: he wasn’t)

Now I see how fucked up I am. I always want to help people. I always feel that everything is my responsibility. I always have this feeling that if something’s wrong, it’s my fault and that I should have done something to improve and resolve the situation. I can’t stand to feel like this anymore. So that’s something I need to change.

Today I’m single. I had this 10 years relationship. I was with someone who needed my help, I thought. I was with someone who wasn’t as responsible as me. And one day, I came back home and said that I couldn’t take it anymore. The sacrifices I’ve made, all the belongings I sold, all the space I gave to him. It wasn’t compromises, it was really sacrifices. To be fair, I did these sacrifices without even asking him to do the same. Because I felt that it was my responsibility to do something.

Now I’m surrounded by people who are telling me what I need to do. They want to help. And it’s nice. But I feel weak because it’s my role to find solutions. It’s my purpose to help them evolve and be happy.

But I’m a mess. I went to my brother’s place because they wanted me to go. I want to see my mum but when I think about what is “my mum”, I realize that what I need is a mum but not my mum. And I feel bad. I feel bad because with all those years, never listening to people, being mean with everyone, rejecting everyone, now she’s alone and she’s living in her cat’s vomit. I told her that it would happen if she didn’t change. She didn’t want to change. And now, I don’t feel responsible because I warned her for years. But I feel bad because I don’t have a mum who could listen to me or hug me the way I need it right now. I have my brother who is good to put me in front of the TV to make me think about anything else but my situation and my feelings. I have my dad who is like a bear: no talk, no hug, just growl sometimes. And when I told him I broke up with my boyfriend, he growled a lot because I was weak, I didn’t want to see in what kind of situation I was, all the sacrifices I made and yes, he’s right, I’m responsible for my misery. But I think that I was shaped to think like this. Not asking for help, dealing with everything myself, keeping hope and find solutions even where there aren’t.

I do not want to die. I do not want to hurt myself. That’s pretty new to me. Because when I was young, my mum made me feel so guilty about existing that I hurt myself a lot. She was ashamed of that so she bought a lot of healing bandages that help scars disappear. She sometimes even threatened to send me to a psychiatric institution if I continue to be that miserable. No, today, I don’t wanna die or hurt myself. I want to feel better, even if I don’t know how.

My best friend told me to write. Because for months I didn’t do it. And because he knows that I find answers while writing.

What I see now is that everyone tells me to be alone, to reconnect with myself, not to fall in love, just to appreciate and to discover me with myself. And I feel like a child who doesn’t want to be alone. I don’t want to have a boyfriend. Not for the moment at least. I want to live alone, sure. But I spend all my life with a twin substitute, someone who understand me too well. It’s not every time the same person. I don’t need a twin substitute right now. I feel like I need a big brother who could take care of me. Not everyone can be that responsible. It’s not like it could be difficult but I always feel more mature and responsible than everybody. Because my mum taught me how to anticipate everything. Like when I told her that I wanted to live in a foreign country and she didn’t scream at me. I asked her why she wasn’t mad. She said: I trained you well. I know that you have as much plan B as there are letters in the alphabet. And she was fucking right.

My friend and colleague has this new saying: “good enough”. It’s not important to do the perfect job, just to do what’s good enough. And for me, it’s difficult because my “good enough” is taking everything in consideration. Knowing everything, anticipate everything, having solutions for everything. It’s not a “perfect” approach but it’s my view of “good enough”.  My new view of “good enough”, for the moment, is writing in English, even if I know that there are a lot of mistakes. But at least I try. And I try not to write the perfect thing. Just to write something that matters to me.

What matters to me is to realize that I am responsible for my feelings. I could have chosen a long time ago to reject my boyfriend, send him away, regain my freedom. I could have chosen not to stay in Belgium. I could have chosen to see a therapist (but again, my mum scared me so much about them that they’re like a scarecrow to me). I could have chosen not to listen to some music that make me feel so sad and so bad that I want to disappear forever. I could have chosen to take some pills to make those feelings go away. I could have chosen to drink alcohol like everybody, or use some drug.

But I want to feel everything. I want to know what’s happening to me. I want to find a way to be in peace. And now that I realize somehow that I have to let a lot of things go, that we are more likely to be hurt by someone close than by a stranger, that my life just begins again and that I’m not as scare as I’m supposed to be, strangely I feel a bit better.

One of my dear new friends told me that a few weeks ago:

“All the dirt and sand we get on our clothes, that gets in our hearts too. As memories and we are changed. Shaped. Molded by them.”

I don’t know if it’s from him or else but I kind of like it.