Sunday, 8 November 2015

Fellow lifeforms, can you read me?

There's a very large part of me that hasn't ever really felt, real. It still feels like my mind is clinging to some conflicting existentialist ego that made its first appearance when we're told to grow up. There are an abundance of ways to describe it: child trapped in an adults body, alien among the human race, ghost not quite come to terms with its own mortality, etc., etc.
But by far the worst aspect is, there is no real way to describe it. Sure, the above may summarise it to an extent, sure, I might be understood for a little while, but honestly because I can't be sure of who, what, or why I am, I cannot communicate what I feel like I am. This is really my best effort.
So like almost every other human on this planet I will profess that I never seemed to fit in anywhere, but I've seen the same people say that and I've seen what fitting in is, when you're always on the outside looking in, when you've studied it but never partaken in it, you learn to recognise it. Because of this, I still feel alone. This isn't anything particularly sad, unless you allow it to be, but more a topic I'd like to put into writing. Perhaps in doing so I'll find my thoughts easier to process. I mean, they say that you're never sure of what you're thinking, until you write it down.
I digress; I was diagnosed with dyspraxia at the age of 17, a seemingly harmless, simplistic disorder. On account of how subtle it is, it has scarcely been given any notice by governmental institutions, psychological boards or educational systems. While you do learn how to deal with the physical side effects as you grow older, for the most part, the mental ones are far more treacherous, and lonely to navigate. There are a huge number of reasons for this, but I've found the most pressing is, we are as humans constantly reminded that it could be worse. So, with dyspraxia, we are constantly reminding ourselves that it could be worse. Forgo'ing our right to discuss it, vent about it or even bring it up in a social environment. Although anybody with any disability, physical or mental, can tell you that it is frustrating to live with, at the very least.
I constantly find myself without a place to fit in, because I can hardly have a normal conversation with somebody, or apply for a job, meet new people, have a relationship, without feeling completely isolated. It doesn't matter how warm and loving the person is, how accepting they are of this difficulty, because their brain is wired differently to mine, and in turn will interpret information differently to mine, I can never be on the same wave-length as them. Grounded by the knowledge that there are millions out there like this, disturbed knowing that even still we could barely understand each other, I find myself in a purgatory of sorts. A social suspension, in which I can very much recognise convention, reality (as we seem to perceive it) and culture, but cannot participate. Being an extrovert, well, that just seems like a crude joke to me.

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