The Pretender

Since I wrote my last post in English, Anti Hero, I can’t help but think about how learning more about myself and my neurodivergent condition can help me improve, but also how it can teach me why I have had so many struggles in my life. It shows me how much I have had to hide and pretend since I was a child in order to be accepted by society trying to fit and to be happy.

In my case it was even harder than for others. I am gay, and always have been, so it was a matter of survival. I had to learn to wear masks way before others and better, so much that at some point I even believed the lie I was telling. (Not the gay part because that is something you can’t hide forever and I wanted to be myself in that aspect). This made even harder for me to realise that nothing was wrong with me, I am just different than the others.

I know some people will tell me it is just a hoax, or that I am just trying to convince myself of it so I can feel special, or draw attention to me. I’m not. I’m not interested in getting that attention, on the contrary, I never liked being the centre of it. That’s why I’ve always been telling lies about me: to be one of the rest.

The first one I can think of is me telling everyone I am stupid. It may sound daft but I used to do it. I never wanted to brag about my knowledge or my gifts. I remember when I started at the bar, the waitress that was teaching me how to work, told my former boss that I may look and pretend to be ignorant but I wasn’t, on the contrary I had a privileged mind and I could learn very fast. Which I did. That brings me back to previous jobs where my colleagues would say the same thing about me. They would always tell others how good I was and how quick I would be mastering my job. It happened in logistics, when I got made steady they told my boss it was amazing how little time I needed to learn the tricks of the job, and since then I would be quiet on my desk working and solving the problems without any help, most of the time they didn’t even know I had issues. When I was a pilates instructor, my teachers used to say that I was a diamond and told all my bosses they should never let me go. Well they did and I ended up feeling useless. Even at the airport I managed to succeed. It has always been there with me.

Why did I do that? And when did it start? Well I would say in school. I was a nerd and I had to pay the price for it. I was the first in class and that brought a lot of social hatred towards me. Nobody wanted to be friends with me, or even talk to me. Instead I got insults and sometimes bullies would come for me, just because I was different. It wasn’t easy. I knew deep inside me that I had to be the best, but I couldn’t show it. I had to be the first so I could go out of that hell as soon as possible, and the only way was getting good grades and maybe get pushed forward in class… That never happened, unfortunately.

Once school was done and I was free from it, I went to university. I met there very challenging people, but I had already mastered my disguise, so I had to keep with it. I had trouble getting it finished because I wasn’t motivated at all. It was something I didn’t like, advertising and PR, and my flaw is that if something bores me or I find it useless, I will lose interest in it and thus never try to do it. In this case it meant I had bad grades and sometimes I had to repeat courses. I must say I finished it and never used that diploma in my life. What a waste of time.

Today I was thinking about how music has always been an important part of my life. Not that I wanted to be a musician or a singer, but I liked it. It helped me express how I felt. It still does. I still get absorbed by songs that I need to listen to so many times I end up knowing every single note on it. When a therapist told me whenever I felt in that deep dark well I was sometimes, to do something that no matter what made me feel good, and that was listening to music and singing for myself. I love doing it.

When I was a teenager my parents gave my a Walkman. That was huge. It became so much a part of me that some of my parents’ friends used to make fun of it and tell me, and them, that it was like one or my limbs. They laughed at that and my obsession of having it with me all the time. They made me feel bad so I would use it even more to escape from them and that awful feeling. It helped me join that safe and quiet place inside me where I was happy. It also was my English teacher. I would always have batteries and more than a cassette on me to make sure I could find my home whenever I needed it. After the Walkman came the CD player, and then the MP3 player and finally the phone. I reckon I use it way less than I used to, but I still need to be isolated from the world through music from time to time. The noise cancelling earphones are the best.

When I started livin alone I didn’t need it that much, I could have it playing all day long on the computer on the Winamp. I mostly used the discman for going shopping. I never knew why those crowded places always made me feel so uncomfortable. I hated going to the mall or the supermarket. I still dislike it. I remember during the confinement I would go when I knew there were less people. Nowadays it is the same. If I see there is a lot of people around I tend to use the music on my phone to isolate from them. It is funny that sometimes people tell me I ignored them when they have seen me in some public place. I always reply that if I had my earphones on then I was in my world and I wouldn’t see anything outside. That should have been the clue: I was in my world, away from the rest thanks to the music.

With music I didn’t have to pretend anything. I was not there. When I actually was or had to be, it was stressful. Social gatherings were the worst. Every Sunday my parents would take us to the beach with their friends. I insist their friends. They were loud, very loud, and touchy. They would hug you and chat all the time. It was exhausting, but I had to fake I was having fun. Even for me. I felt like I had to otherwise it would mean I was weird. As soon as I was old enough to stay home on my own I stopped going with them. I loved being left alone in the house. I realised how cool it felt to have no one around. So it became hard for my parents to get me to go with them. It was bad enough I had to go for birthdays and other celebrations. That was all they would be getting from then on.

I was a weirdo back then, but I put a mask on and used any excuse I found to be on my own. Away from the noise and the overwhelming physical contact. When I think back of that period of time I can only remember them being loud, and touching too much. I insist on that because it is important for me, they would go over my headphones. When I say they touched too much I don’t mean in a disrespectful way. Just that I realised during the confinement and when we had to keep the social distances how much I liked being far from people. Still I had to pretend I loved their hugs and shaking hands and the three greeting kisses…

Now that I look back at my teens and even afterwards I can see what was wrong with me. I was wearing a corset, a mask and in the end a disguise to blend woth the others. I had to hide my mind to them so they wouldn’t reject me. At work I had to play the game and be social. That meant I had to go to parties, I had to go to dinners, lunchs or any other gatherings they did so I wasn’t labeled as an introvert or a weirdo. Being gay in a cis World was bad enough. So I faked interest in all those things I disliked. I must say I never was happier than when working on my own. I liked to social interaction the office or other workplaces can give you, as long as it was light and with distances. Pilates was great for that. The airport and the restaurant were hell. Nevertheless I made it through and I succeeded there. Although I ended up exhausted from pretending to like it, from pretending to want that social life and most of all from having to be in close contact and proximity with all those people. My personal space was jeopardised too often. Now I know why I ended up hating those places so much.

And just like that I realised that I am special and now I am free to be who I am even if it means I will never be what the others may expect me to be. Or not.

February 2023.