As I continue my journey of #DiscoveringByron I have found that I keep catching glimpses of the real me coming through. Be it certain thoughts, or actions, or whatever, the real me is coming back out. I so wish that I could make him come back completely, but I really don’t want to rush it. I am really scared that if I rush it, he will get frightened and run away. Which I know sounds weird, seeing’s as how I am talking about myself, but it’s true.
The real me, the me that I am trying to get back to, hasn’t seen much light of day in a long time. The real me, lets call him Bert, which was the nickname I was given in high school and it stuck with me. The last time Bert felt free to come out was when I was maybe 20 or 21. I was a counselor at a summer camp and was so very excited to be back there. Summer camp was where I always felt the most free to be myself, and where Bert shined the brightest. I always thought it was because I was being called to be a youth pastor, it was a Christian camp, but the more I think about it, Bert shined the brightest there for the simple fact that no one had any preconceived notions of who he was, well, who I was. I could start with a blank slate with people, and if I stayed the summer there, there were new campers every week, and often new staff as well. So it wasn’t just a blank slate at the beginning of the summer, but a blank slate almost every week as well. I could be me without fear of anyone calling me out for past mistakes. No one there knew how awkward I was at school, no one knew how few friends that I had, or that I was neurodivergent at all. All they knew was that my name was Byron, or Bert depending on the person, and that I was just a friendly, outgoing, energetic, love all people kind of person. They got to see the real me and I absolutely loved it. I guess I should say they got to see as close to the real me as anyone ever had. It was God camp after all, and a lot of who I was on the inside was considered sin by the church, so I still hid a lot. Overall though, I was able to just allow my actual personality to come out to play, and Bert thrived.
However the last full summer of Bert ended with Byron being dragged home by my significant other and told that I needed to get my head out of the clouds and find a career and become an adult. That relationship was everything to me, so I followed their advice and tried to focus on just them and work. I let Bert fall behind and tried to just be Byron, an adult with adult responsibilities and no time for the parts of life I used to take joy in. About 6 months later I left that relationship and went back to Chicago to try to finish college. I then met my first wife, and yet again did the same thing. I devoted my life, my work, my everything to her, and then proceeded to just let Bert vanish into the past. He would come out from time to time, but almost always only when I was home with my family. Even then though, they noticed that who I was during those visits was never even close to who I used to be. I spent years being surrounded by people and yet still some how feeling completely alone. So when our marriage fell apart, I did the only thing I could to try to save myself from the spiral of depression and loneliness that I had spent years living in, I moved back home.
Life since then has been filled with amazing ups, but it’s all been overwhelmed by some insanely down downs. Deaths of loved ones, soul crushing breakups, jobs that controlled my life, constant physical pains, and multiple mental breakdowns all just kept piling on top of each other. Bert just became a nickname that I was called by a few people from my past and sometimes by family. I was convinced that I would never be able to get back to being Bert. That I would never get back to having Bert and Byron become one in the same ever again. Then, lately, I have seen flashes of Bert coming out of me, and it is invigorating. I didn’t think he really actually existed anymore, and had given up trying to bring him back. So to see that my self-work has been bringing him out more and more, gives me energy to keep going. Gives me something to hold onto as proof that all this work isn’t for nothing. Proof that I am not doomed to forever be the broken Byron that I have been for the past 20ish years. The worst of it seems to have come and gone, and now I can work on being the Bert/Byron hybrid I was meant to be.
I got this.
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