Every now and again, I come across someone who reads my blog in real life. 

I still can’t believe anyone cares anything about my ramblings to be honest, so it’s always this weird sort of blossoming happiness inside when it happens. 

It’s also, obviously, ABSOLUTELY AND UTTERLY TERRIFYING.

And it’s terrifying not because the people aren’t lovely – but because I’m worried I’ll be a disappointment to them. 

I am worried they will see the disconnect that exists between what happens between my reflective brain and my fingers when I type, and my reactive brain and my mouth when I speak. (This is a gap I fall into ALL OF THE TIME so I can hardly blame them). 

Which of course makes what comes out of my mouth under these circumstances more weird, disconnected, awkward, out of kilter, intense, and un-sensed than normal – whatever that is, because I don’t really don’t know. 

If you’ve read more than one of my blogs you’ll know that my normal can vary, A LOT. I worry they are too schizophrenic, too unrelated, too unrelatABLE – that I will lose people because I am not what they expect, even in writing, where I am generally more comfortable being me. 

I worry that they will arrive here on a funny one, or something political, or something championing women’s rights, and then tune in to one where I’m depressed and self-reflective and wonder what the fork they’ve gotten themselves into – because it’s defo not what they thought they signed up for. 

This happened (again) very recently, in person. 

I met a nice Sheffielder, we got talking, it came up, and I told her I was Mumonthenetheredge. 

And she was cartoonishly astounded and told me I wasn’t what she expected. 

GAH. 

This – this is it. Probably the biggest fear of my life, brought to life. 

Because my biggest fear is really the fear of failing – and there is no bigger thing to fail at than to FAIL EVEN AT BEING YOURSELF. 

I mean, that’s a very special sort of a failure, isn’t it? 

I suppose it’s all related to imposter syndrome – and my pathological fear of abandonment. Because I really am afraid that people will find out that I’m actually rubbish, and then bugger off. That they’ll get to know me and just move on because I’m not good enough. That they will see me for what I am, and discover I am stupid, and boring, and shallow, and inarticulate, and repetitive, and maudlin – and not actually very likeable.

Because… that’s happened. That’s happened to me. More than once. 

I’ve shed people I’ve liked and loved… because I haven’t been good enough? Because I haven’t tried hard enough? Because they found out I wasn’t who they thought I was? Or because I didn’t know who I was… I don’t know.  

But it has hurt so much I never want it to happen again. 

It affects nearly all of my very closest relationships today. 

When I see BoyNotQuiteOnTheNetherEdge after a few days apart, I’m paranoid he won’t like me any more, and I’m conscious of TRYING to make him like me all over again, to be amusing, and insightful – and whatever the fork else it is he actually sees in me. (He is not here for my stunning good looks). 

With friends, too, even close ones, I am often thinking too hard, trying too hard to sparkle, to be what they want me to be, to attract, to accommodate, to appease. And part of me is always on the outside looking in. 

When my children come back from their Dad’s I am nervous to see them, too, anxious that we fit back together, afraid we won’t, that they’ll realise how flawed I am, that they’ll turn away or look over my shoulder for someone better. 

I am always this oddly shaped jigsaw piece trying to slot in, trying not to keep popping out of whatever picture I’m attempting to be part of. 

Some days I am all blobby bits and no sharp angles. 

Some days I’m the opposite. 

Some days I fit in a jigsaw.

Some days, I don’t anymore. And I never know why. 

Some days I am an integral piece. I am an eye, the pearl earring, the bit you’ve been looking for that slots in with a satisfying dull click.

Some days I am sky. I am background. I am miscellaneous sludge like a thousand other pieces. 

Some days I am the bit that’s not actually going to spoil the picture if it goes missing. 

And that is all… holding me back. 

This fear of being different, of not being liked, of being found out, of being left behind. Of standing out; of not standing out. 

It stops me being me. All of the mes I am. In writing. In person. In each shade of mood that ebbs and flows. 

So I’m going to start trying to be a jigsaw piece of one. I’m going to start trying to be whole. All of me. All of the time. 

I’m going to be me, whatever me it is that gets out of bed in the morning, whatever comes out of my mouth, or my fingertips on the keyboard, whatever is betrayed by my eyes when I look you not always quite in yours, whether you like me or not, World. Random strangers. People I actually know. 

One of the many things being an ill-fitting, inconstant and inconsistent jigsaw piece has stopped me from doing is making more of the community I’ve found on this blog – a community and contacts that are incredibly important to me, that have saved my sanity, and my tenuous sense of self… and possibly even more than that. 

So I am going to try and start putting myself out there a bit more. Meet more people. Be socially awkward and weird at them. 

I’m not sure what this might look like, but I’m open to ideas. Especially from other jigsaw pieces that won’t fit with mine – but will – because they don’t.