My mom told me a story the other day that I found almost hilariously clarifying.
So, during one of our first trips to disney (she does not remember if this was when I was two or four, tho she thinks it was two and really the point is just that I was v young) my family went to one of those immersive 3-D shows, the kind that uses air and water spray and vibrating seats to add to the realism. And going in the guy giving out the 3D glasses said not to take them off during the show, they were safety glasses and you should not remove them. Made it real for the kiddies and all that. But at one point during the show snakes and bugs and shit came out of the screen, and because I was v young I thought it was real and it freaked me out. My mom told me to take off the glasses, so then I would see it was just a movie and it was okay. But I wouldn’t. The guy said not to take off the glasses. I had to follow the rules. EVEN THOUGH I WAS STILL SUPER SCARED AND FREAKING OUT I WOULDN’T BREAK THE RULES. She had to fight to get the glasses off me.
And I kind of have to laugh at this, because like, hyperconcern for rules is such a thing for me and it apparently always has been? And it’s something I was lowkey aware of but it really clicked hearing this. (It also clicked that my mom was using this as an example of me being “such a good child” which is kind of a fucked up reinforcement of this behavior and may have made it worse, but ah well.) But idk recognizing it is helping me, because I can rationalize that people generally don’t worry so much about rules and some situations don’t actually *have* rules to follow even tho I feel they do (this is esp. true for social situations, either I have weird ass rules in place or panic about not knowing the rules (I’m incredibly shy despite being a fairly confident person because of this, like some of you may know I get genuinely scared about sending messages because I haven’t established rules and what if I’m breaking them and I have to talk myself into the line of thought that not sending a message could also be breaking the rules))
And obviously this is something I should talk to a professional about, and I plan to, but realizing it is kind of nice. (And not nice, idk, realizing I probably have long standing mental health issues isn’t the most pleasant thing, whether this is a form of anxiety or something else.)
SittingOverHereDreaming 