13^th of December 2019

Hi A

I have wanted to write for a while. A part of why I haven’t is because of you. When I suggested this it was so we could write together. And it’s not that I don’t understand why you can’t write back or even read along. It’s that I’m not sure you ever will. I have barely talked or heard from you in more than six months. Every time I do you are dying from exhaustion and pressure and the circumstances of your life. And I do understand. I really do. I even think you know that.

But in these past six months I have not heard you take good care of yourself or be kind to yourself. I know what is happening in your life is killing you, and I feel a little shut out. And I don’t mind being shut out, except for the fact that I feel like I am the only person looking out for you. If I knew you looked out for you and was kind and encouraging to yourself, I would be just fine being shut out. But with everything I know about you, I don’t think that you are doing that. I know you are taking care of the people you need to take care of, but that the list of people in your mind doesn’t include you.

It’s not like I am sitting on my high horse and judging you. I have the same difficulties setting boundaries as you do. And the last month had been a month of failing that. And I am not exactly listening to the signals I’ve getting lately. But that is also really difficult knowing almost none my friends even know how to do those things. And I sucks watching the people I care about not taking care of themselves. And it somehow makes it really difficult to keep going with taking care of myself. Because I cannot take care of all of us. A friend of mine described it a little like I am getting out of a substance abuse but having all my friends still being addicts, and that makes it really hard for me to keep getting better. It also sometimes makes me lose my temper and patience with the rest of you, because I sometimes feel like I have to go back to a mental space I have fought hard to leave in order to talk to you and understand you and say things in a way that makes sense from where you are. And I want to do those things, in part because I hope that me getting to know the way will make it easier for you to walk it too. I just don’t have enough people on the whole spectrum of self love and self esteem and all those things. And as much as I like being the one who know more than everyone else and who has a lot of answers and being a few steps ahead, I miss having someone who knows the next steps of the way ahead of me.

If I am the only voice in your life telling you “you are awesome and amazing and that you deserve good things and that you deserve a hell of a lot better then what you’ve gotten up until that point”, I feel like my voice drowns in all the other voices. And the voice I feel most drowned out by is your own internal voice telling you all the bad lies I know it tell you.

There are days I wonder if anyone in your family knows to contact me and let me know about you funeral if you decide to kill yourself. I don’t know that preparations you have made for that. Is there a list of people they should remember to invite. A list of people they should not invite. Or am I just to hope that I’ll hear about it somehow. I worry about you. And I am a little angry that I am don’t know if you are taking care of yourself or allowing space for people in your life to take care of you.

I’ve spent a long time making a Christmas present for you. Not anything great, just an “I am thinking of you”-present. But I am not allowed to drop it off. Just like I wasn’t allowed to drop off your birthday present. You don’t pick up your phone, you rarely call or text. And when I do hear from you it’s a long list of all the stressors and no signs that you are taking care of yourself. And I don’t know if that’s because there is no progress or if that’s because you aren’t ready to share the progress. A, when you do write you share what is happening around you. And that is nice. But it doesn’t give me any indication of where you are and what is happening inside you. I feel like I am just hearing about the surface and honestly that tells me nothing. Maybe because I don’t hear your thought processes which are the ones that tells me what is going on under the surface.

I know you were raised to think that there were different (and much stricter) rules for you, while I was taught I wasn’t special and told not to think I was better than anyone. I was also taught I was responsible for my own pain and unhappiness. That difference has given us very different starting points when it comes to dealing with a lot of the same problems. We understand each others problems, but not always each others ways of coping. And I think we both know I got the easier path. Also in part to my autism, making me unafraid to question things you never questioned. I know that for most of your life thinking nice thoughts about yourself was impossible and doing kind things for yourself or allowing anything good do happen to you felt forbidden and wrong. And when you this pressured and this in need of better boundaries, taking good care of yourself is so important. And knowing it is next to impossible for you makes me more worried than I might be for someone else.

I care about you. A lot. You are amazing and awesome. And you deserve the best. You are such a warm and generous and kind human being. And it hurts to know you are in so much pain and that there is nothing I can do. I used to feel like I was standing at the sideline cheering you on. Now I just feel like I am too far away and shut out to do anything. And as always I just need to vent my frustrations. I have them because you are important to me and because I like you and want to be your friend. I don’t blame you or anything for doing the best you can in one impossible situation after another. I know you are there and that you a fighting to get through. I just have a really selfish sadness that I cannot do more to help or be involved. I’ll find a way to deal. Thank you for allowing space for my frustrations.

I am going to retry writing once a week beginning in January. Iam not sure it’ll be a success, but I am going to try. And then I’ll give it a few months, and if you are not a least reading my letters I am going to find a new concept for this blog. Because if I am all alone but have to pretend I am not it’s not working for me.

Looking forward to hearing from you
Jace

P.S. A. It’s not that I think or feel that you don’t care about me, or that you don’t think our friendship is important or valuable. It’s that you don’t think you are important and valuable. And that pisses me off. I care about you. But if you don’t care about you my caring won’t really matter. It might matter a little, but it won’t really make a real difference. I worry about you. I know your life has no meaning and that you don’t really want to be alive. And you are unable to accept all my attempts to connect and try to create meaning. And every time I hear from you I hear how much your life and your surroundings are making your life so much more difficult. I know it’s going to kill you if nothing changes. And I don’t see the changes right now. And I know that because as many differences as there is in our situations some things are the same. And I feel what it does to a person to live with the weight of what you live with.