The days and weeks following on from her expression of love for me really laid the foundations of my understanding of my mental health and understanding of who I was as a person.
Of what I wanted and needed for myself.
Not that Maddie caused my mental health issues – absolutely not. She was absolutely the shining light in my heart and in my soul that got me through every single day.
No – this was the time I started to learn about myself. My brain twisted itself into some pretty ridiculous positions. Hearing her try and express a love for me turned me inside out. I never expected to feel so confused about love.
Yes it was the first time I had ever had feelings for someone – so I guess it makes sense on one level that I didn’t know how I would process it. However, never in a million years were some of the things that happened both inside my head and in the real world on the road ahead expected.
Maddie has never broken my heart in nearly 40 years – but I’ve broken my own heart over her a number of times.
This was the first time.
Some of what I am about to write about has come about from time I have spent with psychologists in later years – talking about her and about myself. Trying to learn and understand.
I am an internaliser and an over-processor. I contort my understanding of complicated issues into simple streams of thought to escape those complications and that pain. I beat myself up over choices I have made – and choices I haven’t made.
Ridiculous scenarios form in my head when my brain tries to find simple ways to cope with things that might otherwise rip me to pieces.
I have always talked to myself a lot – sometimes I am the only person who will listen to me. Certainly, I find myself agreeing with myself most of the time – but when that over-processing appears, I get myself pretty messed up.
I can count three mental breakdowns over my life – but as complicated as this period of time was inside my head, this wasn’t one of those times.
But the “plan” my brain came up with?
Insane.
While Maddie telling me that she loved me was a precious moment in my life, as previously described I wasn’t able to process that voice from her.
Interacting with her become somewhat more awkward than it had been previously. Not to the point of being unable to talk to her, but it wouldn’t take long for me to start trying to re-process her words, and it was difficult to spend anything more than a few minutes with her at a time before I would overload.
How did my brain deal with it?
Somewhere the idea that she was leaving the school got into my head. There was no evidence of this, she had never said that she was, but that’s the headspace that developed.
When talking with psychologists in later life about this, those I have spoken with all came to the same conclusion – that I subconsciously invented it to deal with the pain of knowing how she felt, and not having any idea of how to deal with it.
So the end of that first year of high school was excruciating for me. I was “preparing” for her departure from the school. I was brokenhearted and I was feeling the grief one would expect to feel over losing the one that they loved.
As the final school day of the year got closer and closer, I struggled more and more. I tried to push myself to spend as much time around her – close to her, but not too close – so that I would have as many memories as possible before she “left”.
I was convinced that I would never see her again – which was plainly stupid.
Even if she really was leaving, I knew where she lived, and I knew her phone number. Even if she was leaving, I could just pick up the phone and talk to her any time.
Of course, that would have been emotionally very difficult for me to do, but you get my point.
Those last weeks were hell, and there were many voices playing in my head.
Maddie was the clearest voice – and I was desperately trying to find a way to connect in the short time I thought we had left.
We had to find a way to connect our love – at least, that’s what I thought we needed.
We had to make ends meet, before we got much older.